“What about Jace?”
“I told him not to do it,” Chayton began, but was cut off.
“You should have done more than talk!”Lee said viciously.
“He’s right,” that was Valko, one of the quieter boys.He had the common Were coloring of dark brown hair and gray eyes, the latter so large and expressive that he talked through them more than words most of the time, but today he’d made an exception.“You should have stopped him.”
“How?”Chayton demanded.“Have youseenthis place?It’s crawling with Weres, most of which hate our guts!And he was in the lobby and practically surrounded—”
“You could have come and gotten us!”Lee said.“You didn’t have to just watch him leave—”
“Leave?”I repeated, but nobody heard me over the argument that had broken out.
“How the hell was I supposed to do that?”Chayton asked angrily.“He darted out the door, and I went after him.But there were guards out there, too, and I’d just come back from a run.I was all sweaty and in stained clothes; they were about to run us both off as street people or something—”
“So you should have come after us!”
“Idid.When I couldn’t talk sense into him, I came back inside—”
“You should have dragged him with you—” Noah snarled.
“In front of theguards?They were already eyeing me like I was something they’d stepped in.If I’d gotten in a fight, too—”
“There might not have been a fight—”
“Oh, therewouldhave been a fight!You didn’t see him—”
Chayton broke off, probably because I’d finally gotten enough info and grabbed his arm.“You saw Jace leave the hotel?”
He nodded, swallowing.“I tried to stop him—”
“Where was he going?”
“I don’t know.He said—” He licked his lips and looked at the others, until I tightened my grip and growled at him.“He said this was all his fault!He said—he’s scared, all right?We all were!Last night—”
“I wasn’t,” Lee said.“I wanted to tear someass—”
“You wanted to strain my shield,” Dimas snapped.“It was taking a pounding on one side already, and then youidiotashad to start clawing at it from the other.You’re lucky I was able to hold it—”
“You should have dropped it and let us out!Instead of putting a freaking lid on—”
“—until Lia could deal with everything—”
“Yeah!Alone!I told you—”
“Shut up!”I yelled, and for a wonder, they did, all turning to look at me.“Where.Is.Jace?”
“I—we don’t know,” Noah said, after glancing at the others.“But he blames himself for what happened—”
“How do you know?”
“He talked some last night, but I didn’t think it was this bad.I figured he was just letting off steam.We were all a little shaken—”
“A little hell,” somebody said, but I didn’t see who, because I was already up and walking into the bedroom.
“Keep talking!”I said over my shoulder.
“There’s not much else to tell,” Chayton said, raising his voice.“I spotted him when I was coming back from my run.There hadn’t been any guards earlier, well, except for some Corpsmen, but there were a fuck ton when I got back—”
