Page 90 of Drift

“Westie.” Brighty started to scramble up the covers, lips puckering up for a kiss, but Drift shoved him off. “Hey, I was just saying mornin’.”

“Mornin, nosewipe.” West raised up on her elbows and yawned his way. “And tell Jackson anything ’bout me being under the covers with Drift, I’ll put you on toilet duty for a month—afterLeon’s been in there.”

“Fuck no. His turds are bigger than me.” Brighty was suddenly off and legging it to the door. West turned her head to watch him go, and Drift eased the strap up on her slip top when it shifted, almost revealing more than she’d be comfortable with. A soft smile came his way, and Drift let his touch fall as he buried heat in his cheeks.

“It’s Jackson who wants you up anyway.” Brighty grinned around the door. “He was in here earlier.”

“Fuck.” Drift scrambled out from under the covers himself as if Jackson still lurked.

Giving a sigh, West tossed back the sleeping bag, looking as resigned as Drift felt about needing to get up.

“Just Drift,” said Brighty, losing his smile. “Not you, Westie.”

West flicked Drift a look, and Drift nodded as he dug his hands in his back pocket. “Okay,” he mumbled. “Tell him I’m just washing up.”

“Will do.” Brighty disappeared as Staffs from the next bed down covered her head and groaned.

“Too early for this shit, West. Give me a break, yeah?”

Drift winced as West tossed a pillow at Staffs and gave her the V. As West settled back in the sleeping bag, he headed on through to the shared bathroom. This one took care of twenty-eight kids all under the age of twenty, so finding it empty was… ball-saving. He took time scrubbing the colour out of his hair and getting rid of the tattoos to his arms before heading out.

On the next floor down, the alarm clock in Jackson’s bedroom called outtoo damn earlyat 5:30 a.m., and as Drift made it down to the ground floor, only the shirt on Jackson’s back as he sat at the kitchen table said he’d been back to bed and got some sleep.

Just a few weeks from Christmas, themed stickers lined the kitchen window and patio door, and a Santa and reindeer winked at him from the fridge, almost keeping watch over the food in there, more so with Drift walking in. No doubt the kids would have run wild with decorations in the living room, but he hadn’t noticed much last night.

But the recently lit tealight candle and first aid box that sat on the table stole his attention.

Fuck. Hehadfucked up.

Sickness hitting heavy in his stomach, he pulled out a chair and sat down, arms folded protectively across his chest.

The kitchen was the only place Jackson kept free of bodies. “We good?” said Drift.

Not looking up from his phone, Jackson held his free hand out on the table.

Drift stared down at it, and after just a second, Jackson put his phone down—then grabbed Drift by the wrist and pulled his arm across the table before he shoved his jumper sleeve up his arm.

“The car that was hit with a Molotov Cocktail, plus the supermarket guard that was beaten to a pulp a few weeks back,” Jackson said flatly. “Was that you?”

Drift’s heart pounding hard, he frowned.

Jackson pulled his arm an inch over the candle, leaving the flame flickering in the backdraft.

The flame settled, and heat seared into the soft skin just below Drift’s wrist, and he blinked, once… twice.

“Let me rephrase that.” Jackson’s focus stayed down on his phone as he flicked through it. “Whywas it you?”

Pain…. It was a… strange thing. Unfriendly. It didn’t force him to cry out, only take a step back from the cold look it sent his way. He knew it touched his body, that a part of him was hurting, that it would hurt for a while to come afterwards, but in the… distance of it here, all he really feared was the aftermath. When he knew he’d step back up to it and the burn would kick back in like it had after Light had hit him in the hall.

“That’s you not talking when you really should learn to.” It came again so quietly, and Jackson looked his way as he lowered Drift’s wrist over the flame a little more. “Tell me why.”

He held Jackson’s look, knowing the longer he didn’t talk, the more it would hurt when he did step back into it. “Ava.” It scared him how there was no pain, not on his body, not when it came to Ava, just this… dead feeling inside, the need to let it burn away his skin. “Bitch was there. And no guard got beaten up.”

Blood. It had been on his hand, dripping to the floor as a man lay groaning on the floor, but he’d hurt it breaking the car window, right?

Jackson watched him for a moment. “A guardwasbeaten to a pulp.” He released the grip on his wrist

Drift finally sucked in a breath, cupping his arm to his chest to stop being forced back in to face the hurt, but also avoiding that look in Jackson’s eyes.

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