“He texted me,” Wren said finally. “It’s the same person who’s been texting us since Morgan’s case. Since the cursed house. It’s the unknown we thought was on our side this whole time.”
“Shit.” Ash ran a hand over his shorn hair. “That can’t be possible!”
“What the fuck?” Saint asked. “Why would he help you this whole time?”
“Looks like he was just biding his time until he could get his hands on something he could use,” Wren said.
“Or maybe he knew,” Eerie said.
“Knew what?” Trace asked.
“What Kellan was doing, what his plan was, what the endgame was,” Eerie said. “Maybe this whole time they were using all of you to get to that research.”
“Shit,” Ash said again, and Black nodded, eyes wide.
“Call Cyrus,” Wren said, heart lodged in his throat as he looked to the side to see Teddy’s chest rising and falling slowly. The monitor beeped steadily with each heartbeat. It gave him hope. He’d come through eventually. He’d come back to Wren.
He’d get to keep him this time.
Black called Cyrus and they filled him in. Wren gave him as detailed of a description of the man as he could manage, what with having been drugged up and out of it at the time.
Cyrus said he’d see what he could do, but they all heard it in his voice. They had nothing but a vague description of the most generic person. Dark hair, dark eyes, short. Cyrus promised to get a sketch artist to work with Wren and see if they had a match in any of their databases, but Wren’s gut told him they’d find nothing.
Whoever that man was, he’d used them and left with what they were after. Just another person pretending to be a friend while holding a knife at their back.
Exhaustion swept over Wren like a tidal wave. He tuned out the voices of their teams trying to come up with solutions or plans, going over everything they knew from every imaginable angle.
He got out of his bed, Blu cradled to his chest, and inched toward Teddy’s. Careful of the tubes and the wires stuck to him, he lifted himself onto the bed and curled into a ball with his forehead against Teddy’s bicep.
His pinky extended, he touched the delicate skin on the inside of Teddy’s wrist, tracing a pale blue vein as he closed his eyes.
“Come back to me,” he whispered. “I’m waiting. I’ll always be waiting.”
Teddy
He awoke to the quiet sound of repetitive beeping and soft, steady breaths against the side of his neck, a warm figure filling the space next to his left arm.
He twitched his finger and felt pain spark, radiating through his entire body. He fought back a pained sound and ended up coughing, trying to catch his breath. The figure next to him shifted, bolting upright, and then there was a cold glass pressed to his lips and cool water entering his mouth as his head was lifted.
He glugged it, letting it soothe his damaged throat, some spilling over the corners of his mouth in his haste.
A familiar voice shushed him, a hand petting his hair back from his sweaty forehead and dabbing at his chin as they helped him lean back among fluffy pillows.
When Teddy could finally unstick his eyes, the dim, familiar room bled into focus. This was his room. His floor. His ceiling.His walls. He turned his head. And right next to him, his little bird.
“Wren?” His voice was wrecked, hoarse and painful, but he didn’t care. He reached out to cup Wren’s cheek, to make sure he was real.
A solid, scarred hand gripped his own and Wren’s beautiful face became clearer. Tired, with purple bruises under his eye and cursemark, sunken cheeks, and chapped lips. Dressed in one of Teddy’s tops, white lock of hair unbraided and mixed with the black. But real.
“It’s me, Teddy. I’m here.”
“Are you okay?” he asked.
Wren shook his head, looking both adoring and incredulous. “That’s always the first thing you ask.”
“It’s always the first thing I think.”
“You’re the one laid up in bed and you’re worried about me?”
