Naw. Nessa had it coming. And he didn’t believe Jay would actually damage anything except Nessa’s pride.
“Listen to me, you stupid little bitch,” Jay said. “It’s obvious to anyone with half a brain you’re high on whatever else you’re dealing along with the steroids, otherwise you wouldn’t have dared show your face here.” Her voice had risen to a roar that could be clearly heard by everyone, even over the music… which was abruptly cut off. This little drama was way more entertaining than whatever was currently playing on the iPod. “So before I call the cops and point them right at your chubby, drugged up ass, why don’t you just head back to Shawn?”
Vanessa’s mouth opened and closed like a goldfish.
“Not that I give a shit about Shawn,” Jay said. “But I’m sure he’s not exactly thrilled his walking steroid supply has gone AWOL and snuck off to gatecrash my party. We’ve all had enough of your crap, Vanessa. No more lies. No one’s gonna take the rap for you anymore. And if you think Tyler’s gonna shield you this time to save your precious reputation, then you’ve got another think coming. You hear me? Enough!”
“Jay!” Tyler didn’t know whether to laugh or be shocked by her tirade. She sounded just like your average, mega-pissed-off teenage girl.
Matt caught his eye. “Well, that’s not exactly how I’d imagined taking Shawn down. But hey, works for me.”
Tyler agreed. Even the rumor of steroid use would be enough for Principal Harris to crack down hard and launch an investigation. Chances that someone who was watching this little showdown didn’t grasp the perfect opportunity to make trouble for Shawn and run bleating to the principal? Nil. Shawn had pissed too many people off.
“What the eff is going on?” Caro twisted around in Matt’s arms and peered up at him. “Is she really dealing drugs? And Shawn…. Steroids? Are you kidding me?”
“I’ll explain it all to you later, babe.”
“You’d better.”
Jay thrust Vanessa away like she was toxic, and she couldn’t bear to touch her. “Go home. You hear me?”
“Yeah, I hear you.” Vanessa straightened her top, patted her hair and pulled a sneer at the sight of Caro held snug in Matt’s embrace. “Dude, you were so better off with me,” she said. “At least I know how to show a guy a good time. Shawn told me that one’s nothing but a cock-teaser. And she—”
Jay’s hand snaked out, so lightning fast that it was a blur. And when Tyler refocused on her arm, it was back at her side, like he’d only imagined the movement. Except he hadn’t, because Vanessa’s left cheek sported a crimson handprint.
“Don’t you ever, ever speak like that about my friends again,” Jay said.
“You freaking slut!” Vanessa shrieked, cradling her cheek in her palm, her pretty face twisted with loathing.
“And you would know all about being a freak
and
a slut,” Jay said. “You’ve caused enough trouble, Vanessa. It’s time for you to leave. Go back to Shawn. Dealer and user, and both of you liars with all the morals of pond-scum. The two of you deserve each other.” As she’d once done with Shawn, she expertly manacled Vanessa’s wrist and twisted her arm up behind her back.
Tyler decided to step in. But only because after witnessing this delightful little scene, he wasn’t entirely sure Jay could control herself if Vanessa provoked her again. “I’ll help you walk her to the door,” he said. With heavy emphasis on “walk”. Just in case Jay was thinking more along the lines of “toss her out on her butt”.
“Let me go,” Vanessa screeched, leaning backward, trying to dig in her heels. “You’re hurting me!”
“Tough.” Jay marched her through the silent crowd, who all stepped aside.
“Get your hands off me!”
“No.”
“When Shawn hears about this—”
“You’ll be lucky if he doesn’t wash his hands of you. Now shut up or I’ll toss you down the stairs, just for the pleasure of seeing whether you bounce.”
“Jay.” Tyler placed a cautionary hand on her arm. “She’s not worth it, really.”
Jay shoved Vanessa through the doorway and leaned against it. The music started up again as she watched Vanessa totter and sway down the first few steps.
“Oh for God’s sake!” Jay screamed. And before Tyler could stop her, she ran toward Vanessa, swung her up over her shoulder, and sprinted down the stairs.
“Shit.” Tyler followed at a run. And when he hit the first floor landing, he was more relieved than he could possibly have believed when he saw Jay had reached the bottom of the stairs without doing something drastic. Like kicking Vanessa into orbit. Instead, she set Vanessa down outside the building and turned her back on her shocked face.
Vanessa took to her heels.
Jay let her go.
Tyler waited at the landing as she climbed the stairs toward him.
She glanced up at him, and the anguish on her face hit him like a physical blow. She doubled over, gasping. Her legs folded.
Tyler scooped her into his arms and sat on a stair, cradling her in his lap, rocking her and stroking her hair while she shivered and shook. “What’s wrong?” he whispered.
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m having a human meltdown. Because I don’t want to go. I don’t want to leave you. I can’t bear the thought of never seeing you again.”
He brushed the hair back from her temple and pressed a kiss to the tiny vein throbbing beneath her cool skin. “I wrote a song for you, you know. I recorded it on a thumb drive. I was going to give it to you tonight. To remember me by.”
She muffled her face in his shirt. “Sing it to me. Please?”
He sucked in a deep breath and launched into an
a cappella
version of the song.
“I wake in the dead of night,
And you’re not there.
I call your name,
But you don’t answer.
You’re gone,
And I’m lost.
Half of what I am is yours.
And I’m lost without you.
Thoughts of you glowing in my heart,
Thoughts of you shining in my soul,
Thoughts of you blazing in my mind,
Thoughts of you, burning,
Thoughts of you,
Burn.
I walk into the room,
And you’re there.
I tremble like a lunatic,
But you only smile.
I’m gone.
And I’m lost.
Half of what I am is yours.
And I’m lost within you.
Thoughts of you glowing in my heart,
Thoughts of you shining in my soul,
Thoughts of you blazing in my mind,
Thoughts of you, burning,
Thoughts of you,
Burn.”
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“Like you.”
She was silent for a moment. “What’s it called?”
“Lost Without You.”
A sob escaped her. And then another. And he held her while she cried.
Footsteps echoed through the stairwell, getting louder, heading toward them. Tyler didn’t move, content just to hold Jay for as long as he could. He hoped whoever it was would just continue on up the stairs.
The footsteps paused and he felt Jay go very still. He glanced up at the intruder and saw it wasn’t Vanessa returning, or some other kid who’d turned up late. It was a bald guy with a ’stache.
Jay heaved a sigh and lifted her head from his chest. “Good evening, Michael,” she said. “You’re early. How very tiresome. If you’d waited a few more hours, I would have been safely away.”
The man, Michael, laughed softly. “This wasn’t exactly how I’d planned it, either. But hey, I’ll run with it. Might be a good idea if your boyfriend made himself scarce, though.”
That voice…. So very familiar. Hauntingly familiar.
“Perhaps you might like to reconsider your options,” Jay told him. “In fact, I know that very shortly, you will do just that.”
She crawled from Tyler’s lap and clamped her arm around his waist, holding him tightly against her side as she drew him to his feet. She sounded completely unlike the girl he knew. Or the cyborg he knew, for that matter. She sounded too sure of herself, too adult. She spoke to this stranger like she considered herself his equal. Or perhaps even his superior.
“Tyler, I’d like you to meet Michael White. Not his real name, of course. But unless I’m very much mistaken—which of course I’m not—you know him quite well.”
Tyler frowned at the stranger.
He frowned right back. Fiercely. And then his jaw sagged open and whatever he’d been about to say ended up as a strangled, “Shit.”
“Ignore the walrus moustache,” Jay said. “Ditch the fake glasses and imagine him with hair. You’re an artist, Tyler. Don’t be fooled by outward appearances. Go deeper. Look at the eyes, the facial features, bone structure.”
Tyler gazed into the man’s eyes and his world tipped on its axis. Again. Because he
did
recognize this man with the dorky ’stache and shaved head and stunned eyes and shock-frozen face.
Except, to his knowledge, no one except Jay had ever called him Michael. Not even his wife.
Everyone knew him as Mike.
Mike Davidson.
Tyler’s father.
“Son,” Tyler’s father said. “Listen to me. I want you move away and come stand by me. Now.”
“Don’t call me son,” he managed to say.
“Tyler, please.”
This was no joke. He spoke tersely, his voice tense and strained. He was scared, scared of what Jay might do.
But Tyler knew she would never hurt him. Or at least, not physically.
Before he could even decide how to react, in one fluid movement Jay threw him over her shoulder and bounded up the stairs to the top floor landing. He struggled and she set him back on his feet but kept him close with an arm about his waist. “He’ll be far safer with me, Michael. For the moment.”
Tyler’s father blew out a disbelieving snort. “I don’t think so, Gamma-Dash-One. The first time you singled him out for attention, you put him at risk. They’ll target him for interrogation. And I can’t let that happen. I
won’t
let that happen. Let him go. I can protect him. I can make sure he’s safe and—”
“Can’t you sense them, Michael? They’re deploying themselves around this building as we speak. They didn’t trust you so they followed you. And you’ve led them right to everything you hold so dear. Do you truly believe they’ll care who gets hurt in the crossfire? Or are you just that naïve?”
Tyler’s father stilled. He cocked his head, considered Jay through narrowed intense eyes. He obviously heard something because he visibly paled, then sprang into motion, turning and rushing headlong down the stairs.
“What the hell is going on, Jay?” Tyler’s head was whirling from everything he’d witnessed. He was kinda grateful for her arm about his waist. Without her supporting him, he might have toppled down the stairs and landed at the bottom in a gibbering, useless heap.
“Your dad’s done a stupid thing and now it’s come back to bite him on the ass. I need you to trust me and do exactly what I say. Can you do that?”
He nodded. Then he had a really terrifying, paralyzing thought. “Will…?” He choked back his fear. “Will they hurt Mom?”
She shook her head, her bright blue eyes gleaming in the dull gloom of the stairwell. “I don’t believe she’s in any immediate danger. As always, they appear to have their priorities sorted. And, as always, their first priority is me.”
Michael raced back up the stairwell, taking the stairs two at a time. “Shit. You’re right. Full extraction team armed to the teeth. Tyler, where’s your sister?”
“Michael.” Tyler choked on the unfamiliarity of the word. He ignored the pain in his father’s eyes at the way he’d addressed him. But Michael had walked out on them five years ago. He didn’t deserve to be called “dad”. “Caro and a whole bunch of other kids are up there in Jay’s apartment.”
Michael scrubbed his hands over his shaven scalp. “Shit.” He stared helplessly at Tyler. “Shit!”
Cold, sick dread coated Tyler’s skin. “Just what kind of people are you working for?”
“A bunch of ruthless bastards who’d do anything—and I mean anything—to get their hands on this cyborg.”
Jay smiled. “Gosh, it feels wonderful to be loved.”
Michael stared at her, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “If you’re thinking of using my son and daughter as hostages—”
“Don’t be an ass, Michael,” she said. “I love your son. And your daughter is my best friend. I’m hardly going to endanger them just to save my own skin.”
“Huh?” Tyler heard himself squawk. “What did you say?”
Jay pressed a hard, possessive kiss to his lips. A kiss that left him entirely breathless, and hot and tingling all over. She reached into her back pocket and handed him a credit card in his mother’s maiden name, Marissa Rowen. A black American Express card. “Unlimited funds. And I mean, unlimited. All payments are handled by one of my offshore account agents. When it’s safe to leave the building, tell Marissa to take you and Caro and leave. Don’t pack up, don’t take anything. Just hire a rental, and go. This card will buy you anything you need. Car, house, anything at all. Tell her I’m sorry. It’s the best I can do. If I had more time—if there was any other way….”