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Chapter Fourteen

Jagger

Sutton’s eyes flashed red when I reached her.

She wanted to hit me over the head with a heavy stick, and I wanted to drop to my knees and beg her to forgive me. I wasn’t sure that was the right play though. I’d hurt her, repeatedly. It would take more than that to win her back, if it was even possible at all.

But right now, her safety was more important than anything else.

“Why are you here alone?” I asked, my gaze sliding over her. “And why were you hiding in there?”

She drew in a deep breath, her eyes rolling upwards as she looked to the parking lot behind me. “Why do you think, Charming?”

“I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking you.”

“I was trying to avoid…this,” she said waving a hand between us.

“You were hiding from me?”

Her jaw lifted. “Well, yeah. I know this is hard for you to get through your head, but I don’t want to see you, and I don’t want to talk to you.”

I could hear her heart thudding in her chest. Her cheeks were pink and her hands trembled slightly. Even if avoiding me was her goal, she still felt the pull between us.

“Let me take you home. It’s not safe here,” I said, choosing not to address what she’d just said, that wouldn’t help an already tenuous situation. A situation that I’d created, yes, but even I knew talking about all the ways I’d let her down wouldn’t help my cause.

“Nope. I’m not going anywhere with you.” She shook her head and gave me another of her humorless laughs.

I scowled, clenching my fists. “Tell me what you’re thinking.” The demand slipped free before I could stop it.

“You really don’t know?”

“No.”

“Are all hounds as emotionally stunted as you?”

“Yes.” Though, I wasn’t as stunted emotionally as I had been several months ago. Not even close.

“Fine. Let’s do this, one more time.”

I frowned. “Do what?”

“Again, I will ask you, what the hell do you want from me, Jagger? You made your feelings and wishes, when it comes to me, crystal clear , yet, here you are, again , inserting yourself into my life, meddling, interfering, following me around and messing with my emotions. I have to know, are you purposely trying to be cruel? Or are you just this clueless?”

I jerked back, her words a fucking gut punch. “Cruel?” She thought I was being cruel. The mere notion made me feel ill. “I would never hurt you, Sutton. Never.” The words came out rough, harsh—fuck, my voice shook.

She crossed her arms, her pretty eyes sad as they traveled over my face, then finally landed and held mine. “But you are hurting me. Every time you pull this shit, you’re hurting me.”

I shook my head in denial, not wanting to believe it but seeing the truth in her gaze all the same.

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Jagger.”

“I was wrong,” I said, my voice like rusted steel.

She crossed her arms, frustration on her face. “About what?”

I curled my fingers into tight fists at my side. “All of it. I…I didn’t know, and I was wrong about fucking all of it, Sutton.”

Sutton

No.

No fucking way. He couldn’t mean what I thought he meant. He couldn’t.

“Shut the hell up!” I fired at him. “Stop talking and walk away.” I turned to leave, and he grabbed my arm.

“You need to let me explain.”

I pulled out of his hold. “I don’t need to let you do anything, and honestly, I don’t want to hear it.” My lips trembled and my heart was a cold lump in my chest. I couldn’t do this. The pain was just too deep. He’d hurt me too fucking much.

“Sutton…” He cupped the side of my face. “Please.”

I jerked back, spun away, and ran. He could catch me easily if he wanted to, and I was surprised when I made it to my car without him stopping me.

Jumping in, my gaze flew to my rearview mirror.

He stood right behind me. So close, he could touch the trunk.

He didn’t though. He just stared back, a pained look in his eyes.

No. I didn’t care about that look or what it could mean.

He’d shredded me, over and over again, and now he thought he could just say he was wrong ?

And all would be forgiven? That I would just forget how the male I was supposed to be able to trust most in this world broke me, rejected me so publicly, without a care or thought for my feelings?

Or how he’d walked away twice, making it clear he didn’t want me?

No fucking way.

Starting the car, my heart pounding, I tore out of the parking lot. Traffic was heavy with everyone leaving, and I knew Jagger was still following—gods, I felt him close. I glanced in my rearview mirror again. There. He was striding along the street.

He ducked behind a building and I lost sight of him, then a few minutes later, I passed him on the side of the road. This happened repeatedly. He chased me, vanishing, then reappearing, stepping out from behind a building or bus stop, or the wooded area that edged the other side of the road.

When I finally pulled up outside my apartment, the dark street was quiet. There weren’t any bars or restaurants, and mine was the only apartment on this block.

I got out of my car, gripping my keys tight in my hand. I scanned the pavement, then across the street—Jagger stepped forward out of the shadowed eave of a store.

My heart slammed in my chest as I stared back at him. “I want you to leave. I want you to go away and don’t come back,” I called out.

He was breathing heavily, and as he took another step forward. I took one back.

He stopped abruptly and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Can’t do that, Sutton. I tried, but it’s no good.”

My eyes stung, but I refused to let the tears fall. “I’m asking you to leave me alone.”

His green gaze lit up like a light had been switched on behind them. “Don’t you understand? I can’t. I can never leave you alone.”

I spun away, unlocked my door, and ran up to my apartment, closing myself in.

He didn’t mean it. He said he couldn’t , that he’d tried to leave me alone. In other words, he didn’t want to be here, but instinct was forcing his hand.

He didn’t want me, what he was feeling had nothing to do with me. If the fates had matched him with another female, he’d be standing outside her door right now.

My heart couldn’t take another rejection, not from him, and I sure as hell didn’t trust him to protect it.

What he was offering wasn’t enough.

It was too late.

He was too late.

Sutton

I opened the door at the bottom of the stairs and almost tripped over a box. What the hell? My name was written on top with black marker.

I searched both sides of the street. No one was nearby. It was late, the night after my run-in with Jagger, and all the stores around me closed. Leaning back, in case something burst out of it, I flicked back the top flap with the toe of my boot—and blinked down at its contents.

Herbs. Bunches of them. Held together with different-colored ribbon, like a box full of gorgeous flower arrangements, but better.

Crouching, I took a better look. Well, shit. These were rare varieties, and almost all of them out of season, so seriously expensive. I scanned the street again. No one was watching me.

My phone vibrated in my back pocket, and I pulled it out. A Nightscape notification from Jagger. Against my better judgement, I opened it.

Jagger: Thought you could use them.

I stared down at the message, then back up.

Was he watching me? I had to assume he was.

After his altercation with my mother, the way he’d defended me, covered for me when I’d been seen stealing herbs, he’d obviously realized how much I needed them.

I could use them, honestly. I had an order I still needed to fulfill, and time was running out.

There were several herbs in this box that I’d been struggling to source.

With a huff, in case he was still watching, I picked up the box, carried it up to my apartment, put the arrangements in water, then locked the door and headed back out.

Yes, it was a nice thing to do, but if he thought buying me herbs was enough to get me to forgive him, he was wrong—because this wasn’t about forgiveness, it was about trust. Jagger didn’t seem to understand that, though.

I got in my car and headed to the clinic, and while I drove, I worked at clearing my head.

I needed to be focused, people’s lives depended on me.

But it was an impossible task. I worried about Luke constantly—was he okay, were they hurting him?

Then there was Rune and what he wanted me to do.

I’d called him last night, after my confrontation with Jagger, and told him what I saw at the dance party.

He wanted to get together soon for a debrief and would call with a time.

Considering what happened at our last meeting, I wasn’t all that fired up for a repeat—and then there was Jagger and his sharp one-eighty.

I gripped the steering wheel. My life was a mess. Add in Fern and Phoebe calling and texting all the time, checking on me, worrying about me, and being unable to share with them why I was acting this way, and I was a female on the verge of a freaking breakdown. Literally.

My phone chimed and I glanced down at it.

Poe.

My stomach rebelled, gripping hard. Shit.

I wrenched the car to the side of the road, shoved the door open, and threw up.

My nerves were getting the better of me.

I was jittery, on the brink of a panic attack, just…

fucking terrified, all the time. Hand trembling, I grabbed a takeout napkin and wiped my face.

Then took a swig of water from my bottle, spat it out, then dug around in my bag for some gum, before forcing myself to pick up my phone.

Poe: Tarrant wants an update, meet me before the fights.

Why did he need a face-to-face meeting for that all of a sudden? Probably so he could torment me some more, the creep.

Sutton: Everything is on schedule. I’m working tonight, so meeting up is impossible.

I knew what would happen next. He’d demand I do as he said. Maybe it was a stupid thing to do, no, it definitely was, but I couldn’t deal with him, or Jagger, with any of it right then, so I turned off my phone and shoved it in my bag.