"Because the world without you in it isn't a world I want to exist in. Because every equation I run, every scenario I model, every future I try to imagine—none of them work if you're not there." He pauses. "I don't know if that's love. I don't have a reference point. But if it isn't, it's close enough that the distinction doesn't matter."
My throat closes. Tears burn behind my eyes, but I'm too exhausted to cry.
"Jace."
"Yes?"
"I need you to hold me. Just for a while. I need to know this is real."
He doesn't hesitate. He climbs onto the couch beside me, careful of my injured ribs, and pulls me against his chest. I tuck my head under his chin and breathe him in—sweat and blood and everything that's just him, familiar and grounding.
"Real," he says against my hair. "This is real."
I sleep.
Not the drugged unconsciousness of Webb's facility, filled with nightmares and forced memories. Real sleep. Deep and dreamless, held in place by the weight of Jace's arm across my waist and the steady rhythm of his breathing.
When I wake, the light has changed. Grey morning seeps through curtained windows. The fire has burned down to embers, casting a faint orange glow across the room. My stomach growls and a pang runs through me.
Jace is still beside me. His eyes are closed, but I know he's not sleeping. The pattern of his breath is too controlled, too deliberate.
"You can stop pretending," I murmur.
His eyes open. Grey meeting grey dawn.
"I wasn't pretending. I was resting."
"There's a difference?"
"For me, yes."
I shift carefully, testing my ribs. The pain is still there, but duller now, more manageable. My wrists throb under the bandages. My throat aches where the collar sat for so long.
But I'm alive. I'm free. I'm here.
"What now?" I ask.
"Now we move to a more secure location. Briar has a place in the mountains, far from the Ministry's reach. We regroup there, let things settle, plan our next steps."
"And Webb?"
"Webb is still alive and according to Jagger, trying to get us before we leave the country." Jace's voice hardens. "I should have killed him when I had the chance."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because getting you out was more important than getting revenge. And because dead men can't be made to suffer."
I absorb this. The cold calculation beneath the words, the promise of violence to come.
"You're going to go after him eventually."
"Yes."
"And the others? The Custodians?"
"We're building something. Briar calls it a revolution. I call it a reckoning." He props himself on one elbow, looking down at me. "The system that created me, that bought and sold you, that treats people like inventory—it can't stand. Too many peoplehave invested in tearing it down. Webb's overreach gave us the opening we needed."
"What do you need from me?"
