Page 91 of Deacon

My stomach dropped. One trip downstairs from Jade could turn sixteen years of silence into a public collision.

“Put that down,” I called before he could move.

He turned. Farther down the lot, Priest looked over from his truck. Blue stood beside him with one hand on the stroller, both of them close enough to hear.

Jackson looked back at me. “I’m helping.”

Concern gave me the cleanest excuse to get him out of there. I took it. “You’re healing,” I snapped back as I came down the steps. “Put it down.”

He shifted the box higher against his chest. “I can do both.”

The man had nearly died and apparently taken stubbornness as a discharge instruction. “No, you can do one, and you’re choosing wrong.”

Priest and Blue had drifted closer by the time I reached the truck, giving us space while very clearly missing nothing.

“You always this bossy when somebody’s trying to do something nice for you?” Jackson asked.

The question carried enough old familiarity to make my chest ache. I buried it under irritation. “Yes. Especially when that somebody got out of a coma ten minutes ago.”

“It was not ten minutes ago.”

The exact number of days meant nothing while his body was still repairing what had almost killed him. “Close enough.”

He set the box down with all the reluctant dignity of a man planning his next argument. The resentment in his face eased only enough for the point underneath it to show. “I’m trying to help.”

“I know,” I said, too fast. Then, sharper, “Which is why you need to go home. My dad and brother already helped me with all the big stuff. I don’t need you carrying boxes.”

That stopped him. “Excuse me?”

The danger wasn’t his body anymore. It was how quickly he heard what lived underneath my words.

“You should be resting,” I said. “Not out here lifting boxes and playing hero.”

His eyes narrowed. He could have argued about his shoulder or ribs, but his attention moved past me toward the building and came back to me.

I had pushed too hard. Concern might have explained one warning. Panic explained the rest.

Jade could appear at any moment and see the man from those hidden photographs standing within touching distance. Worse, Jackson would see her.

He had left once without a word. I still had questions sharp enough to draw blood, and Jade deserved something better than learning the truth because timing trapped us in a parking lot.

“You trying to get rid of me?” he asked.

“No.” I folded my arms, containing everything my hands wanted to betray. “I’m trying to keep you from putting yourself back in the hospital.”

He studied me long enough to make silence feel dangerous.

Then he glanced toward the building again. “Ghost said you had more going on than I knew about.”

Every instinct in me locked down. Priest had gone still nearby. Blue’s attention sharpened.

Jackson stepped closer, leaving the forgotten box at our feet. “What are you trying to hide, Lila?”

I had no answer I could give him here. My mouth parted, then closed. I needed time. Ten minutes. Five. Anything that let me choose how Jade learned who he was and how Jackson learned she existed.

The apartment door opened upstairs. Jade stepped onto the walkway with her phone in hand, started toward the stairs, then saw him.

Jackson stopped. So did she. Her brows drew together. “Mom?”