Heat creeps into my cheeks, and I poke at my eggs. “No.”
“How come he didn’t get anything of yours?” Rowan presses. “You didn’t fight him off. You have no defensive wounds.”
I tuck my other hand into my lap and glare at my plate. “What difference does it make?”
“Jude.” His voice is sharp.
I drop my fork and glance up at him. “Max came out of his office, and it scared the guy off, okay?”
“Then maybe Max got a look at the guy.”
“Just let it go. He didn’t take anything. What do you want me to do? Go to the cops and tell them some guy hit me in an alley?”
“Hitting people is a crime,” Rowan says.
“I’m not going to the cops. That’s ridiculous.” My stomach clenches at the thought. Grant would kill us if he realized I did that.
I know I’m an adult now; I know a lot of things I didn’t when I was a teenager. But despite my age, Grant still seems so big, so powerful. And I’m scared of doing something that will make him angry enough to hurt my brothers.
Eighteen
Max
Even though our normal monthly lunch isn’t for another three weeks or so, I meet with Juan for breakfast. He just came off his forty-eight-hour shift, so bags line underneath his eyes. But he smiles when he sees me.
As much as I love the lunches when we’re all together, I really like one-on-one time with each of them.
When I sit across from Juan with my coffee and egg sandwich, he frowns.
“You look like crap.”
“Well, you don’t look so great yourself,” I reply, popping the lid off my cup so I can dump some sugar packets into the coffee.
“No, I mean, you look like you’re the one who just had the forty-eight-hour shift.”
I stir the sugar in to buy myself some time. I want to talk to him about what I saw last night, but I’m not sure how much I should tell him. I don’t want to overstep with Jude, but I need some advice.
“I stayed up kind of late thinking about Jude,” I finally say.
A sly smile creeps across his face. “Ah.”
“Not like that.” I shake my head, fighting my own smile. But then I sober. “When I left the office last night, I found him in the alley. Some guy was trying to…hurt him.”
Juan straightens, turning into the firefighter and EMT he is on the job. “Hurt him how?”
I glance around the restaurant even though I know no one’s listening into this. “I think the guy was trying to fuck him. Jude told me at first it was just a mugging, but when I pressed him on it, he kind of admitted it.”
Juan nods, like this is normal breakfast talk. “So what do you need to ask me?”
“I just… He was so strange about it. He talked like it wasn’t a big deal. And not like he was hiding, but like he really didn’t think it was so awful that someone would try that on him. Is that normal?”
“Well, everyone reacts to it differently,” Juan says with a shrug. “It’s possible he just wasn’t that afraid. It’s possible he’s been through something worse that makes everything else not seem too bad. Or that he’s actually been assaulted before. Some people who’ve been through that don’t carry the same fear of it happening again. Or they can go on the opposite side and do nothing but fear it happening again.”
God, I can’t imagine living like that. “But what do you do? I don’t want to say something stupid and upset him.”
Juan smiles a little. “Chances are, Jude will tell you stuff when he’s ready. I know Patrick was pretty open with you, but you guys knew each other when you were kids. You and Jude just met three days ago, right?”
“Yeah.” I turn that over in my head. When he says it like that, it does feel like an overreaction. Jude doesn’t owe me anything. And I’ve told him he can talk to me if he wants. I don’t think there is anything left for me to do.
