Page 170 of The Wrong Play

It was only a few minutes before I turned to him, my voice quieter than usual. “How did you find me?”

Jace didn’t even blink. “I was tracking you.”

I scoffed, half-expecting a smirk, some cocky little grin to tell me he was joking. But he didn’t look at me. His eyes stayed on the road, his thumb still moving in slow, absentminded circles over my skin.

I blinked. “Wait…what?”

Now he smirked, just a little. “Relax, babycakes. I’m not crazy.”

I narrowed my eyes. “That’s exactly what someone whowascrazy would say.”

He shrugged. “It’s just a precaution.” His tone was casual, like we were talking about checking the weather. “You disappeara lot, Riley. I figured I should make sure I could find you when you get it in your head to run.”

A strange tension coiled in my stomach, but not in the way it should have. I should have been freaked out. I should have pulled my hand away.

But instead, warmth spread through my chest.

Because even if he wasn’t joking—even if he’d really found a way to keep tabs on me—I didn’t mind.

Because it was Jace.

Because he had always found me, even when I was breaking, even when I was slipping through the cracks.

And I’d been an idiot for ever thinking I could leave him.

Callum’s control had been about power—about diminishing me, keeping me small and hidden—while Jace’s possessiveness was about protection, about pulling me into his world and making sure I never had to face anything alone again.

I squeezed his hand back, staring at him in the dim glow of the dashboard. At his sharp jawline, the focused set of his mouth…the warmth in his brown eyes, even when he was looking at the road instead of me.

This is home.

I exhaled softly, turning back to the window, watching the world blur by as he drove me back to where I belonged.

Jace didn’t let go of my hand, not for a second. His grip was firm but careful, his touch steady against my skin as he pulled me inside the house. The door clicked shut behind us, the quiet hum of the house wrapping around us like a cocoon. My pulse hammered, not from fear—but from the weight of everything pressing down on us, on me.

He guided me through the living room, past the soft glow of the lamp by the couch, past the framed photos and the jacket he’d left draped over a chair. The warmth of the house, of him, settled into my skin, loosening something tight in my chest.

And then, we were in his room.

Ourroom.

The one he’d made mine without ever asking, the one I’d never once resisted making ours. My things were woven into his space like I had always belonged there—clothes tossed across his desk chair, a book left open on the nightstand, hair ties scattered around the room. A quiet invasion I hadn’t realized was happening until it was already done.

Jace let the door swing shut behind us, but it wasn’t violent. It didn’t slam. It just settled, like the shift in the air. Thick with something unspoken, something heavy.

I turned to face him, my breath catching at the storm in his eyes.

Dark. Feral.

Like holding back was costing him.

“You don’t leave me.” His voice was rough, low, and filled with something dangerous…something desperate. He stepped closer, slow but deliberate, each movement pressing into my space until I had nowhere to go. “Ever.”

The word crackled between us, raw and possessive, burning through my skin. My heart slammed against my ribs, my hands curling into fists at my sides as I fought the urge to reach for him.

Jace’s jaw clenched as his fingers flexed. “Do you have any idea what it did to me?” His voice was quieter now, but no less intense. “First, watching you run away terrified at the game? Then, finding out afterwards that you’d left me?”

I swallowed hard, my throat dry. “Jace?—”

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