Jai had learned to kill efficiently and painlessly, and to make necessity his guidebook.
In this case, anidiot(as Jai put it) had stood on a bare excuse for a hill and fired blindly onJai’s people.
This made the man’s death a necessity.
They’d needed information from the man. That made his pain a necessity.
Jai was efficient with the pain, so the man had spoken quickly, and his death had resulted in a cessation of pain.
And now they knew that the corrupt sheriff was recruiting criminals he’d taken money or bribes from to help in the hunt for Brady Carnegie. This was a thing that Brady had confirmed, and knowing that had driven Ace to launch a host of refinements on their simple plan.
In a war—and George had seen firsthand how life here in the desert could result in battle conditions for silent wars nobody knew were being fought—this would be called a successful operation.
But when Jai had to come to his home, shake hands with Lee Burton and Jason Constance, and look their friends in the eye, George could see how it felt like a betrayal.
Jai wanted so badly to protect George. Not just from the physical danger that sometimes came their way, but from the pain and fear of knowing there were monsters out there.
It was too late, of course.
That August, George and Amal had risked their jobs, their freedom—maybe even their lives—helping Jason get a busload ofkids to safety when their government would have preferred they rot in a very real, very visceral hell. Not long after that, Amal had been detained in an ICE facility for the meresuspicionof helping a woman who had been sexually assaulted by an ICE officer. It turned out Ace and Sonny had helped some people with someveryprominent connections, and with a little help from them—and some true heroics from everybody else—they managed to get Amal free.
But the damage had been done. George and Amal both knew there were monsters out there, and they both knew that they were as likely to be killed by the legal monsters as by the illegal ones. It was one of the reasons Jai and George had offered to let Amal rent what amounted to a bedroom suite in their house. Amal claimed it was bigger than any apartment he’d ever had, but George knew it was more than that. Lots of people roomed with a couple—Amal could deal with knowing his roommates sometimes banged each other stupid (andloud), because he knew that if the legal monsters ever banged down his door, Jai, George, and everybody at the garage would have his back.
He’d told George once, not long after they’d moved, that it was the only way he would ever sleep again.
So George knew his lover had killed a man that night.
But he was a bad man, and George spent his time in the ER watching bad men walk away and innocence dying in tatters. He was fine with knowing that wasn’t always the case, and more than fine knowing Jai was an agent of justice.
And knowing what his man would do to keep them safe filled George with more than admiration.
It filled him with good old-fashioned lust.
After the others had left—and the text war had raged and ebbed, Jai stood up from the couch—where George and Amal were quietly watching television between the buzzing of phones—and grunted.
“I must shower, Little George,” he said, offering George a quiet touch on the cheek. “Do not stay up too late. You will be at the garage very early tomorrow.”
“I’ll take him,” Amal offered. “We both can’t take a day off, but I can drop him off so you can go do what you need to.”
Jai offered Amal a kind smile. He often treated George’s friends like helpful children, but children he was responsible for protecting nonetheless. “That is a generous offer, but Sonny will need to give the SUV a once-over, so it is just as well if I do it. You may need to pick him up, though.”
“I can do that,” Amal said, but he sighed. “Although it’s a shame to kill the SUV so soon after getting it. I would have liked a ride at the very least. Are you sure you can’t tank George’s piece-of-shit truck?”
Jai’s eyes popped open. He’d obviously had no idea George had kept Amal updated on text-a-geddon. “I would be happy to destroy George’s piece-of-shit truck,” Jai said bitterly—he’d hated George’s truck since they met—“but I don’t know if it will do the things we have planned for it tomorrow. The SUV can drive through the desert. The piece-of-shit is ready to be buried in it.”
George giggled, because it was funny. “We’ll play taps when it happens,” he said, and Amal gave him a soft slug in the arm to indicate that they may be friends, but Amal still thought he was an idiot.
“If you make me sing, Little George, we will all regret it,” Jai said indulgently, but George could see the weariness in his eyes.
He may have been good at it, but that didn’t mean helikedto kill.
George watched him go, waiting for him to disappear down the hallway toward their bedroom with veiled eyes.
“What are you thinking?” Amal asked.
George and Amal had tried dating—once. One kiss was all it had taken to pronounce them friends for life. But theywerefriends, and they’d both tried the dating scene in LA and had, George readily admitted, slept with alotof really boring men.
And had confided every boring second of that time to each other.
