Page 92 of Jace
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
JACE
Goddamn,brothers and their ability to be dickheads without words.
Impatiently, Grant bounces his knee, noisily shifting in his chair, pointedly tapping the airline app on his phone. He cranes his thick, inked neck, scanning the arrival area for Vivian’s flight, grumbling like I pissed on his gummy bears. He’s chomping on them so loudly, he’s going to break a tooth.
I grin. “Something you wanna say?”
He grunts.
“I’m not leaving without her.”
He harumphs like I’ve challenged him to a duel. Lifting his phone, he starts banging out a text he won’t let me see.
“Don’t you dare stress out Loch,” I warn. “We’re not late yet.”
“We will be.” He won’t look up from his screen, firing texts back and forth, chiding me, “It’s Alena’s initiation, and you know better; we can’t miss it.”
“She’ll be here soon.”
No, she won’t. The gate sign says differently. A storm has delayed Vivian’s flight for two hours.
We will be late.
I’ve never felt so torn in my life. My priority is my future queen. She texted me from her seat on the plane in Palm B. They’re waiting on the tarmac for the storm to pass.
But it’s nothing to the storm in my heart.
I won’t leave Vivian at the airport, but we can’t do this to Loch and Alena.
If I thought I’d waited long for Vivian—which I have—it’s nothing to the lifetime Loch has waited for Alena. I swear they were born to be together, and they’ve fought through hell to get here. They deserve tonight.
We can’t let them down.
But I won’t leave Vivian unguarded. She’s at risk of retaliation now that we’ve stolen those servers. So I made a deal with the devil to make sure she’d be safe.
“Gotta tell you something.”
“You’re an asshole who’s giving me an ulcer?” Grant grumbles. “I’m well aware.”
“No, it’s about the devil.”
He cocks an angry brow at me. He knows who I’m talking about, how I confronted Ruslan in Palm Beach.
“I made a deal with him. Well, two deals. One, I want him on his knees, saying he’s sorry to Mom and us. And two, I asked him to have a couple of his soldiers grab the scumbro when he landed.”
Grant’s slow nod drips with sarcasm. “Smart. Because dear old Dad has always had our backs.” His face falls. “Stabbing them.”
“He’s changed.”
“That’s what they all say.”
“He’s dying.”
“We all are.”
“But we have the one thing he wants.”
