Where Death Meets the Devil by L.J. Hayward

Author:L.J. Hayward [Hayward, L.J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Published: 2017-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

Thanks to the meeting with Harraway, Jack had lost his last doubts by the time he reached his desk. Barely pausing, he picked up the fudge and descended to the sublevels and Ethan’s cell, Shadow One and Two dutifully following him.

“Again?” Shadow Two asked wearily.

“Dropping off another bribe.” Jack brandished the confectionary. “I won’t be long.”

They went through the whole rigmarole again and it dragged out, time expanding around Jack so every movement of the guards seemed absurdly slow. He watched for a sign they suspected him or Ethan, hyperaware of anything that might escalate into a threat. It saddened him that this place he’d once believed to be safe suddenly seemed hostile, like he’d been dropped behind enemy lines in a foreign land.

Finally the door opened and Jack entered. It was getting easier to leave his doubts at the door the more times he did this. Each time reinforced the idea Ethan really was here, was truly back in Jack’s life, making it as perplexing and dangerous as he had in the desert.

“Another visit so soon,” Ethan murmured. “I’m flattered.”

“Not a long one.” Jack put the fudge on the table. “As requested, two logs of mint-choc swirl. Do try to make these last longer. I can’t keep bringing you stuff like this.”

Leaning against the wall, Ethan nodded, those predator eyes glinting. Like with the tiger in Cambodia, there was an intimate understanding in his expression. Ethan knew exactly what Jack was doing, knew why he was doing it.

“I’ll do my best. Thank you, Jack.” No hint of teasing.

Jack could only nod in acknowledgement, his throat suddenly tight. He reached behind himself and knocked on the door. The minute passed in silence. Ethan held his gaze the entire time. Conversely, time seemed to speed up, the sixty seconds flying by in a single beat of his heart.

Time is relative, Dad used to say. A minute surrounded by the enemy felt like an hour. An hour with your loved ones felt like a minute.

The door opened, and Jack forced himself not to race out.

He wanted to go back to the roof. Needed to see the open sky, breathe the free air. But he couldn’t, not after Maxwell’s earlier tirade. He ended up running the stairs, up and down. Told the Shadows he needed the exercise or he would go crazy.

At one point, he managed to lose his watchdogs. They’d taken to handing him off at the halfway mark, but as he was sprinting upwards towards the roof, Shadow Two dropped back, swearing breathlessly. In the confines of the stairwell, Jack managed to evade his watcher for nearly three minutes. When he was caught again, he got an earbashing from Maxwell and was further confined to the eighth floor. Apparently trusting the Shadows had performed better than Tall and Silent, Maxwell left them with Jack, but tasked them to keep him under better control.

By the time he reached his desk, they were down to two hours. He’d been sitting there for several minutes before he realised what he was looking at.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.