I pulled onto Reina's street and spotted Jaxon's motorcycle already parked outside the apartment complex.
He’d beat me here.
I slammed my car into park and was out before the engine fully stopped. Jaxon was standing at the building entrance, leaning against the brick with his arms crossed.
Waiting for me.
"Took you long enough," he said.
I crossed the distance between us fast, getting right in his face. "I told you to stay away from her."
"And I told you to make me." But there was something in his expression that didn't match his words. Something that looked almost like... uncertainty.
"What are you really doing here, Roarke?"
His jaw ticked. "Same thing you are."
"Which is?"
"Making sure she's okay."
The admission hung between us, raw and unexpected.
I stared at him, processing. "You don't know if she's okay."
"No." He pushed off the wall. "She hasn't answered my texts. Hasn't called. And that's not like her."
"How would you know what's like her? You've known her for two days."
"I've known her my whole fucking life, Vale. Same as you." His eyes locked onto mine. "And she's not answering either of us. So we can stand here with our dicks in our hands, or we can go check on her."
He was right.
I hated that he was right.
"Together," I said.
Jaxon's eyebrows raised. "What?"
"We go up together. No fighting. No competing. We make sure she's safe." I took a breath. "And then we figure out what the fuck happens next."
For a long moment, Jaxon just stared at me. Then, slowly, he nodded.
"Together."
We headed for the entrance, an uneasy alliance forming between rivals.
And both of us knew that whatever we found on the sixth floor was going to change everything.
7
REINA
The silence in my apartment was deafening.
Both Luca and Jaxon stared at me after my confession about being Category Red. About what that meant. About what I could do to them.
"Dual-bond capable," Luca repeated slowly. "That's what your mother told you?"
