Page 50 of A Dirty Business
Me:Take them to the family safe house.
Ashton:She’s saying they had a shelter lined up for them.
Me:I don’t care.
Ashton:Ten-four, buddy. Might want to turn your phone off. Uncle Steph is going to want to know where the uncle is.
Me:I’ll be in touch later today.
He knew what that meant, and after that, I powered down the phone, then headed off.
Once we got to the city, Jess and I were going to have awaymore in-depth conversation.
I shifted the car into drive and started off. “You can sleep while I drive us back.”
“What about my aunt?”
“We’ll talk when we get there.”
“Tristian—”
“Trace.”
“What?”
“I hate the name Tristian. Call me Trace.”
She didn’t respond. I only heard her let out a soft sigh, but a few minutes later, she was sleeping. She must’ve needed it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
JESS
“Trace” took me to a downtown high-rise. I woke up as we pulled into a parking lot. When he got out of the SUV, I waited. I couldn’t bring myself to move, not yet. The night’s events kept replaying over in my head. Over and over again.
What my aunt did, which was understandable.
It was not understandable that I helped cover it up. I didn’t report her, and that was on me. I was an accessory now.
My whole life would change from this day on. I knew it. I felt it. It was in the pit of my stomach, but as my body filled up with lead, there was a different sensation in me, and I couldn’t place it. I didn’t want to place it. It went against every moral value ingrained inside of me, why I became a parole officer.
I was so beyond fucked that I couldn’t comprehend it, and I knew that I would start losing focus.
The days would blend. The lines were blurred now and would continue to be blurred. All this would keep happening, every step I tookafter I walked out of that house, until the day I would no longer recognize myself, but still.
I lifted my head up and saw Trace watching me from outside the SUV. He’d stopped, but he hadn’t said anything. He was just waiting for me, and there was a look of understanding there, like he knew exactly what was going on inside of me.
A part of me liked that. A part of me hated that.
I loathed it, and yet I needed it. All at the same time, and that didn’t make me hate him, but it sure as hell made me despise myself.
The hard part of living in a world where it was either wrong or right was that you forgot that being human meant you were never only on one side of that equation. What did you do then? Apparently, what I did. You chose, and you tried to survive your choice.
With almost numb hands, a numb body, I unclipped my seat belt and got out.
Trace turned, and I followed.
He took me to an elevator.
