Page 100 of Bound By Roses

“Come in,” I say when Tess doesn’t. Apparently she’s done talking.

The door opens, and Jade strides inside. He’s shirtless as usual, but the four jagged lines slicing into his chest are new—and almost the mirror image of mine. “You wanted to see me?”

I did, but I didn’t expect him to show up. “You could have gotten that taken care of first,” I say, nodding to his wound.

“No point. My blood burns through stitches and it’s hard enough not burning this fucking place down without wearing unnecessary fabric. Wrapping me in bandages is an accident waiting to happen. Why am I here?”

Straight to the point, then.

“I heard you were injured.”

He laughs, but I don’t hear the humour in it. “Don’t tell me you were checking on me.”

“I want to know why you were close enough to get scratched. You shouldn’t have been anywhere near Ty.”

He rolls his eyes before stepping aside so Tess can leave the room. She has every reason to still hate the dragon, and she’s already pissed at me. Jade doesn’t say a word to her as she goes,but once we’re alone, he turns his attention back on me. “On a first name basis with the enemy now, are you?”

“He’s not our enemy. Imelda is. Void is.”

“You know as well as I do that you can’t pick and choose when it comes to war.”

I was taught that lesson too, but that doesn’t mean I agree with it. There has to be a better way than blindly killing everyone who wasn’t born on your side. Ty grew up in Lunae. He joined the Guardians to survive. That doesn’t make him my enemy.

I rub the heel of my hand into my eye. I don’t have the patience for this right now and as much as I hate it, I need to sleep if my body is going to heal enough to be ready for the next part of our plan. We have two days to get Ty ready to return to Lunae, and I’m not trusting anyone else to make sure he gets there. I heal fast, but not when I’m running around and overexerting myself.

I can’t help Abby with this—but Jade can.

“Why did you let him hurt you?” The truth is, I already know why. Jade shouldn’t have been there to begin with, and even if he was, he’s more than capable of putting a wolf down without spilling a drop of his own blood. Yet he’s here, sporting almost the exact same injury as me while Ty was entirely unharmed. There’s only one explanation for that. “Say it.”

Jade hesitates and turns his back to me. The silver lines of old scars that match Abby’s stand out in the fire’s glow illuminating the room. “They would have killed him if he’d killed one of them. I wasn’t about to let you fuck up the plan because you couldn’t stick around.”

He’s using his anger to avoid the real question I’m asking. “Why can’t you just admit that you saved someone else?” I already know about the siren whose back was turned when Ty broke out. They didn’t see Jade step between them at the last second, but Ellis did. Not only did Jade save that person’s life,his interference gave Ellis the precious seconds he needed to shift and lead Ty out before he could go on a rampage through the tunnels. If he’d tasted blood, there might have been no stopping him.

And yet here Jade stands, choosing anger and denial rather than accepting the thanks he deserves. Not just from me. From everyone.

“Because I’m not the kind of person who saves anyone.”

He is, but I can tell he’s not going to admit it. “I don’t think that’s true. I saw Ty’s thoughts projected by that siren. You were going to kill him, but then you hesitated. Why? Was this idea of yours an after thought, or did you spare him because he’s hardly old enough to fight in this war?”

Jade’s hands ball into fists at his sides, and I prepare myself for his rage. But then he blows out a breath and his hands relax. “I let him live because he’s the only one out of the three of them who didn’t hurt me.”

What is he talking about? When would any of them have had a chance to hurt him? Unless… “You remember, don’t you?”

He shakes his head. “Not everything. I remember Lunae. I remember being whipped. I remember being beaten, starved, ridiculed. I remembered those Guardians, just as I can see the faces of so many more who deserve far worse deaths than those two got.”

“You don’t remember Abby.” It’s not a question. His reaction to her scars is more than enough proof of that.

“I remember her. I remember her watching at every execution. I remember her at mine. At least, until the memory goes black. I don’t remember her stepping in, but enough people have confirmed that she did.”

He’s a lot more messed up than I thought, but at least this explains the rage he still feels toward Lunae. Even the rage hefelt towards Abby. She was just another face in his memories, but it was twisted in cruelty that wasn’t her doing.

“Abby is with Ty right now and I don’t trust him enough not to lose himself again.”

Jade scoffs. “And yet you’re hiding out in here.”

“I’m not hiding. I’m trying to do right by her by taking care of myself like she keeps asking me to. But I can’t do that if I’m worried about her. The wolves are there, but I’d feel a heck of a lot better if you were there, too.”

He turns back to me and gestures to his mangled chest. I can already tell the bleeding has stopped, and I wonder if that has something to do with the fire in his blood. “This isn’t enough for you?”

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