Page 89 of Beyond Reason

I couldn’t let that happen.

Which left me with no options.

“Don’t you know anyone who is better at computers than you?” I hissed. Kade turned to me with a glare, advancing to close the space between us like I’d called him a name instead of asking him a question.

“Do you think I’d be sitting around doing nothing if I had a better answer? Trust me, as much as you want Axel back, I want to watch these people suffer. I’m not—”

“Uh, guys?” Seth’s voice cut off whatever threat was about to come out of Kade’s mouth, and his slender, tattooed arm cut between us. “Arguing isn’t going to help. Though…” He turned to me, and I could see the slightest bit of threat behind his sweet expression. “Kade isn’t the only one who had connections. Have you even thought about someone you could call for backup? If you had a tech guy before, it stands to reason that they’re even better at it now if they’re still alive.” He blew out a breath and tugged on Kade’s arm, pulling the larger man away from me. “Come on. You know how you were when they took me.”

I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to hear the last bit of the murmured conversation, and I wondered exactly how many stories there were between the two of them that I would only ever hear about accidentally.

But what Seth said drew me up short, because there was someone I could call. Axel had mentioned him before, on the way home from Marshall’s condo.

“Jensen.”

Kade’s head twisted up, one dark brow arching.

“Who?” Seth sounded curious, but Kade's laughter cut him off.

“Are you telling me you and I both died, but fucking Jenson Lark is still alive?” He sounded incredulous.

I remembered him enough to know that he was more tech savvy than capable with a weapon, and he usually ended up taking jobs that were more hands off. If anyone was prime for getting offed, it would have been him.

“I guess there’s something to say for staying behind a screen instead of getting hands on in the field?” It was the only answer I had, but I was already going through the bag we’d packed before we left Axel’s house.

I fished out his work phone and frowned at the screen. I’d seen him unlock his day to day phone with a fingerprint, but this just wanted numbers.

A passcode.

How was I supposed to know his fucking passcode?

“Try the date you met,” Seth said offhandedly.

“That would be ridiculous.”

Of course it worked. Seth really was far more suited to be friends with Axel than me.

I also hadn’t realized that Axel changed the background of his work phone to a picture of me—not who I was, but me now. Lying on the dock at the lake house, before we’d fought. Before I’d stormed off.

Fuck, would we still be there if I’d just kept my mouth shut about working? But… no, that wasn’t who we were.

That wasn’t what our relationship was. I was honest with him, and he called me out on my shit when I needed him to.

And we always came back to each other.

We always found each other, and this wasn’t going to be any different. I’d found him beyond all reason and odds after I’d died. Something as simple as him being taken captive wasn’t going to stop me now.

I took a deep breath and flipped to Axel’s contacts. It would have made sense for him to have everyone stored in some kind of code, on the off chance that someone caught him, took his phone, and tried to use it to bring down his client list.

Either he was more confident than I thought, or he’d just stopped caring as much. He had everyone stored under a single letter, and there were only three J’s and one L in his phone.

Since the J’s left me having to guess, I dialed the L and hoped I’d picked the right person first. I’d go through every contact in his phone if I had to.

“You know, this is the second time you’ve called me when I usually hear from you once a year, if I’m lucky. Axel, if you still haven’t found him, that’s not my fault. You don’t get to back out of your end of the deal.”

He sounded just the way I remembered him. I’d only interacted with Jensen a few times, and Kade’s reaction from earlier really wasn’t that off base.

Jensen Lark was reckless, cocky, and too smart for his own good. If anyone should have been taken out, it was the asshole who was just as likely to double cross you and drain your bank account as he was to help you.

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