Page 164 of Shrapnel

He found the Dusty Trail on their way down south. His laptop perched on his knees while Jackson drove. Abandoned five years ago, it was a poorly planned attempt at a theme park. Its biggest problem was the location. Miles into the desert, and impossible to get to, the reason it failed was the reason someone like Dominic would pick it for his hideout.

Owen couldn’t explain why, but he knew Jamie was there. Jackson hadn’t questioned him, just accelerated.

Now the first buildings were beginning to populate the landscape and Owen couldn’t help but feel his anxiety ratchet. He wanted a shower. He wanted to sit on his couch and watch garbage TV a million miles away from all of this.

And he wanted to do it with Jamie.

Jackson didn’t brake until the road narrowed and he couldn’t go any farther. Like most wild west towns, The Dusty Trail was set along a central main street. On either side buildings made to look like old Sedona or Tombstone framed the street. Owen doubted most of them had anything inside them besides machinery and whatever they needed to make the place run. For being abandoned for as long as it had, The Dusty Trail didn’t look too bad.

The truck idled while they waited for the dust to settle. Jackson fiddled with his eyepatch, grousing that he couldn’t see anything with it. Owen was about to ask why they let the guy with impaired vision drive when the cloud of dust finally settled.

In the middle of the main street, a body was lying on the ground beneath the steps to the saloon. Owen didn’t need to ask to know the man was dead. There was an unnatural stillness to the way he was lying face down. Grant tapped the comm in his ear, instructing the Weavers in the other cars to do something but Owen couldn’t hear anything except the blood rushing in his ears.

Through the dusty windshield, movement caught his attention. Jamie was standing on the top of the steps. Owen scrambled from the back seat, shading his eyes with his hand to see better. Jamie was holding a gun.

Owen pushed off the car only to have his hoodie snagged by Grant. “Slow down, we don’t know what mental state he’s in—”

“He won’t hurt me,” Owen said breathlessly, wrenching out of Grant’s grip. “I’m not afraid of him.”

He took off running. Kicking up sand behind him, he didn’t take his eyes off Jamie. He was thin, tattered shirt open to expose black and blue ribs. His face was gaunt and his hair a mess. There was duct tape around his ankle.

But he was there. Alive.

Owen didn’t see the body. He didn’t see anything except Jamie and theclick, click, clickof his empty gun.

Thundering up the steps, he batted the gun out of Jamie’s hand and tackled him in a hug. They fell in a tangle of limbs, falling to the porch. Owen grabbed Jamie’s face, fingers digging into his cheeks like he needed proof. He needed to feel Jamie’s skin brimming with life under his fingertips.

His eyes were unfocused, staring right through Owen like he didn’t see him. Owen pressed his lips to Jamie’s forehead, littering kisses and words. He didn’t know what he was saying. Grit and sweat tickled his lips but he kept whispering, hushed pleas for Jamie to see him. To come back to him.

Slowly, Jamie’s eyes focused. The vacant stare abated, and his gold-flecked eyes reflected the red evening sun. He took in Owen.

“You’re here?”

“I’m here.” Owen nodded quickly, stroking Jamie’s cheeks.

Jamie stared at him like he didn’t believe it. His hands were lifeless at his side, cracked and bleeding. He inhaled a shuddering breath.

“I killed him.” his eyes widened as he said it like saying it out loud made it real. “I killed him this time.”

“I don’t care,” Owen answered, not looking behind Jamie to see the damage he wrought. None of it mattered when Jamie was here, in his arms. He grabbed Jamie’s hand in his good one, bringing it up between them.

“None of that matters. Nothing else matters but this.” He squeezed his hand.

Jamie crumpled. He grabbed Owen and tugged him close. Even when there was no space between them, hands flattened between their chests, Jamie still clung to him. His breathing was shaky and uneven. Tiny, aborted breaths ghosting across Owen’s neck.

“I’m a monster.”

“No,” Owen shook Jamie, thumping his hip with his cast. “You’re a wildfire.” He tugged Jamie back so he could look him in the eyes, close enough that their noses were almost brushing.

“You’re bright and beautiful. Warm and strong. You are capable of destruction, but you are no monster.”

He didn’t know that something so beautiful could come out of self-destruction. But Jamie turned cruel beginnings and a soulless ending into the most goddamn beautiful thing Owen had ever seen. His eyes burned light and color into Owen’s world, banishing the shadows of his fear.

“You burned it all to the ground so that you could start over.”

Owen kissed him, lips fitting against Jamie’s so perfectly it made his heart ache. He didn’t know how badly he had missed him until he was breathing him in. Until Jamie’s soul, battered and bruised, could rest against his own. Because now, with Jamie’s lips on his, he was sure that’s what his soul was made for. Together, they completed the other.

Owen was afraid to get too close to the sun, but it didn’t matter. Not when Jamie was there to bring him the light.