Page 108 of Ravage
Jackson reaches under his hoodie and whips out a folded paper. And now I’m convinced he must have all sorts of hooks and pockets and things on the inside of it. Or he’s a magician.
My hand closes over it, but he doesn’t let go right away.
“I found out who told GE you were here.”
“Who? You mean someone ratted me out?” I thought I’d slipped up somewhere.
Jack nods slowly and then releases it.
I stare at it, then unfold it. It’s an article in some fancy newsletter I’ve never heard of, but the main picture grabs my attention first. It’s of Elias and I walking into the gala.
Shit. I should have worn a mask the moment we left Hype.
The article barely mentions the photograph. What it does include is my name. How would the photographers have gotten my name? I was just Elias’s date that night.
I skim through the rest of it and check the back, then look up at Jack in confusion. “Who gave them my name?”
“Dane.”
My heart seizes and the article crumples in my clenched fist.
I can understand him hating me and trying to get his revenge. But to involve them? To put everyone else in this city at risk? Hype? Aiden’s Guild? His brothers?
Going after me is one thing.
Putting everyone else I care about at risk, and other innocents around them, is going too far. Even if Jackson foiled his first attempt at taking me out, did he become a coward in our time apart that he would resort to having his enemy take the revenge for him?
A cold hand grips the back of my neck, and I shudder. I didn’t realize I’d closed my eyes and begun to shake with rage at Dane’s selfishness. My eyes open. Jackson’s watching me. Waiting to see what I’ll do next.
“You’re sure it was him?” I growl out.
His eyes clock mine, like he’s reading my every emotion deep down in my soul through them. “It was him,” he confirms without an ounce of doubt.
My gift stirs and grows heated in my gut. I feel it trying to force its way out. To consume me in it so I can destroy everything and everyone around me until my fury is abated. I struggle to keep it contained, even as the darkness in me crows about justice.
I’m sure now that he’s the reason behind the attack on the beach. The reason that Congressman Joe was assigned to bring me in. Why Gordon showed up at the Tower.
He’s so far gone in his need for revenge that he’s stopped caring about who else he hurts. He’s become a danger to Jackson and the others. To this city and the other gifted people hiding in it.
“Would you stand by if I killed him?” I ask Jackson. He says he has my back. That I’m the most important person to him. But would he stand by my side if I went after one of his brothers?
He doesn’t seem shocked or upset by my question. His expression hasn’t changed at all aside from looking…interested. In me. In whatever I’m about to say or do. He cocks his head to the side. “Is that what you really want?”
“Just answer the question,” I snap back. Because I have no fucking clue what I want to do right now.
His eyes darken, and he closes in on me. I take a half step back, but he’s faster and takes my face in his hand. His fingertips are ice against my heated skin. I’m sure he can feel my gift burning beneath the surface and so close to coming out that a flicker of worry pierces through the rage at him touching me right now.
“I know you, little one. Perhaps better than you know yourself right now.” I open my mouth to argue, but he continues before I can get a word in. “I will stand by you and whatever you decide to do.”
He kisses my forehead, and my heart stutters out of its raging beat.
It’s not as clear-cut of an answer as I’d hoped for, but I suppose it’s enough.
“Let’s go, then.”
Chapter twenty-seven
Raegan
