Page 55 of Drift

How many times had Gray carried that same apology around him, that Ray had carried bruises under his shirt and denied himself access to a doctor…?

Was this why it was really so tense between Ray and Jack at times? The bastardness never really stopped whether it was Jack or Martin?

Giving a frown, Jan turned and took his coat.

Chapter 17

CATCHING THE FALL

Watching Jan head out as Ray left him alone to take the night off, more if he called it, Gray eventually turned away and headed into the kitchen. After staring down at something next to the microwave, he picked it up and turned it over once, twice, before he headed back into the Oval.

Jack still knelt in the corner. He still kept his hands locked behind his head. Still rested his head down against the panelling even if his body language said he fought against walking.

Keeping it quiet, Gray went over and placed the Polaroid photo close to Jack’s knee, out of alignment with the skirting board.

Then after drifting a touch down the back of Jack’s neck, letting him know he was here despite how Jack shifted, shaking his touch off, he slipped Jack’s iPhone from his pocket and headed over to a drawer in his desk. Bluetooth headphones came out, and Gray synched them to Jack’s phone before he headed back over.

Headphones slipped on, blocking out any other noise for Jack, Gray set his playlist to repeat, then rested the phone next to Jack’s Polaroid.

One last drift of finger down Jack’s neck, a watch on how his touch was still shaken off, Gray sat at his desk and sent a message to Simon to delete the repaired onboard camera footage. Simon was too sharp not to tie Jack to it all, as Ray had been, but that knowledge, like so much more, wouldn’t see the light of day. If Ray hadn’t been able to repair the footage, the MC would struggle too, and it would stay that way.

He had potential biological warfare and a Substantial threat upgrade to UK streets to oversee, a pounding in his own head… heart, but… routine.

The corner was one that had played out so many times before in Jack’s youth when he’d stood shouting at the world, not understanding why the ground shifted under his feet and left him stumbling.

So back to Jack’s youth it was. The corner it would be as Gray checked on the status on the security alert upgrade and what measures were being put in place by each department. It was a more brutal routine that put Jack’s will up against Gray’s with silence the weapon, only Jack was older, with so much more damn coldness emanating from his corner. Maybe rightly so, too.

Sometimes the corner was the only part of them to rely on when the world did crumble underfoot. And Jack’s world seemed to be crumbling so badly into unknown territory, taking Gray right along with it.

Jan sat outside the MC psych unit, staring over to the reception. Halliday’s car sat in his reserved space, but no call had been made to talk to him. He had been Jan’s first thought, but…?

Giving a rough sigh, he wiped a hand over his face. He wouldn’t go behind Jack’s back, not this time. And with Gray back there, the look in his eyes and such an old knowledge over handling Jack, he trusted Gray’s way of walking Jack back through to where his head needed to be, at least enough to try and reason what was wrong.

So sitting here on the car park for the past half hour it had been, trying to sort his own head and heart.

“Fuck.” Jan rubbed at his temple. He hated making the call he was going to make, but pieces needed to be slotted into place for everyone’s peace of mind. Not knowing them and having to scramble around and wait was only going to dig between them more.

So this would be Jan’s call, and he needed Jack and Gray to trust him to do it.

Turning his radio off, he tugged out his phone and thumbed in a number.

Someone picked up a moment later. “Lo. Lucy here. Who you want talk to?”

Jan managed a smile hearing Lucy’s voice. It had taken her so long to find it in the MC psych unit, but then she’d seen her mother raped and murdered, a butterfly stuffed into her hip and coated in semen to make her lose it.

“Hey, Lucy. I’m Jan.” He kept it as formal as she’d tried to, a whisper off someone coaching her behind her on the phone. “May I speak to Raif, please?”

“Dad.”

He winced at the shout, but he’d have loved to have seen Raif’s smile hearing that fall from her lips. The one complication had been that Lucy’s language had regressed, making her sound younger than her years, but he knew Raif would take anything offered his way.

“Okay, Okay, Voodoo. Right here. I’m sitting right here. Give me my phone, honey.”

Raif came more fully onto the line. “Jan? Hey. What can I do you for?”

Jan frowned. “Any chance you can meet me in the carpark, away from Monique?” He kind of kept to his word over keeping his distance.

“Mine? Now?” A pause came, and Jan caught a shift of blind at one of the flat windows to the MC psych flats. “Sure. On my way down.”

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