Sorrow rushed.
How could Joseph have hidden this from me?
How could I not have seen it?
Anger rose inside me, this slow beat through my blood that increased with each thrum.
Something horrifying flashed through Jace’s being.
The way his big body shuddered in the moonlight, his voice going so low.
“I warned him, Faith. I warned him that I was done. That I wouldn’t get involved anymore.”
My throat went dry, and I swore that I could feel my heart shriveling right in the center of me. “What do you mean?”
“He came to me . . . and . . . fuck.”
Guilt twisted his face in a grimace of his own torment.
“I sent him away, Faith. He came to me. Begged me to help him. Told me they were going to kill him, and I sent him away.”
All the air was gone.
The empty space it’d left swelled with the most gutting kind of pain.
“No,” I whimpered. “You wouldn’t do somethin’ so horrible. I don’t believe you.”
Jace’s voice turned rough with the admission. “I sent him away. I told him I didn’t give a shit what he’d gotten himself into. That it was his fault, and I was no longer responsible. I’d warned him that I was done. I warned him.”
The last cracked on his own grief.
Grief that was overwhelming.
Slamming between the two of us.
The awareness of what could have been stopped.
Jace brushed his fingers over my face. My face that was pinched with the horror of it all.
With Joseph’s choices.
With Jace’s.
With what he’d ignored.
What could have been stopped.
“I’m so fucking sorry.”
I winced against the feeling of his hand on my face.
Was that another betrayal, too?
Another lie?
“You . . . you knew they were gonna kill him, and you turned your back on him? You let him die?”
It was all a spill of horror. Pain and guilt and remorse as tears broke free and streaked down my cheeks.
“You came here . . . knowing all of this? What Joseph was into? And you didn’t tell me any of it? Why didn’t you tell me, the first day you showed up here, what you knew? Why didn’t you tell me?”
The last left me on a screech of confusion. With too many emotions binding up my insides. The reality of everything feeling as if it was goin’ to finally bury me.
Jace was tied to Joseph in a way I’d never known. Had had an inside into everything Joseph had been involved in, even a say in it. All the while, both of them had left me a fool floundering in the dark.
Shame.
Jace had always worn some of it.
But I wasn’t sure I’d seen him wear as much of it as he was right then.
But this was the quiet kind.
Because it was real.
Maybe for the first time, he had something to feel shameful for.
I clutched the towel to my chest. “How could you have kept that from me?”
A sob wrenched free.
One for Joseph.
One for me.
One for Jace.
How could we ever get past all these things?
“I loved you. Trusted you. I don’t understand how you could just lie to me this way.”
He sat back on his heels. “I told you a long time ago I’d never be good enough for you. Do you finally believe it?”
That was the problem. I didn’t want to believe it. But the truth glared back at me.
Both men who I’d loved, trusted, had lied to me.
Kept me in the dark.
Made me a fool and put my family in danger.
I stared at the man I could feel crushing my heart with each second that passed.
“It was never a question of you being good enough for me, Jace. It was a question of what you did with your life. The choices you made. And you made the choice to lie to me.”
Those fingers fluttered across my face. So soft and full of sorrow.
His and mine.
I didn’t think either of us knew what to do with that.
“I knew you would hate me before I left here. But coming here? Protecting you and Bailey. I won’t regret that. Not for a second.” Jace’s expression crumpled. Just as quickly, determination raced in. “I have to go. End this. For the two of you. Felix is going to be parked outside as the lookout. I know you hate me. I accept that.”
His voice twisted in deep emphasis. “I just want you to know that my love for you? It was always the truth. I could never tell a lie that great.”
Then he pushed to standing, turned his back, and strode out the door.
Grief crashed into me.
Stunning and extreme.
Annihilating.
My body swayed, and I slipped from the bed and onto my knees.
Sobs ripped out of me.
Loud and pummeling.
Blows against the walls that echoed and shook.
I wanted to scream out for him. Beg him to stay.
A new kind of fear rumbled through my spirit as I heard him grab a few things from the room next door, his hesitating footsteps out in the hall before he hustled down the stairs.