12. Jared

TWELVE

I feel like shit.Like I got beat up, then shot, then thrown around the back of a vehicle in the middle of a car chase.

Oh, wait.

I try to open my eyes, but they feel heavy, then pain blossoms over my face. I groan and it sounds muffled, like I have cotton balls stuffed in my ears.

"Jay? Shit, I mean, Jared? You awake?" The voice is frantic, but the hands that touch my shoulder and caress my forehead are gentle.

"Logan," I croak, forcing my eyes open to see if it's actually him.

"Yeah, yeah, it's me. I'm right here. Hold on a sec." He disappears. "Doctor! Nurse! He's awake! He's awake!"

Then he's by my side again. "Hey, hey, I'm here. I'm here."

He's got cuts and bruises on his face, but otherwise, he looks cleaned up. He's wearing standard-issue FBI shirts and sweats, the same ones most of us wear as workout clothes.

Relief trickles through me, easing some of my pain. We made it out, and we're both alive. I lift my hand toward him. "You okay?" I ask, to be sure.

He slides his hand into mine and brings it to his lips for a kiss. Tears well up in his eyes, then escape down his cheeks as he nods. "Yes, yes, I'm fine. A few stitches, but that's all. You're the one who—" He chokes and presses my hand to his face.

Better me than him. Injuries are an occupational hazard for me. I wouldn't have forgiven myself if Logan had gotten hurt. "Must be all those smoothies you drink. Make you indestructible. What the hell do you put in them?"

Logan laughs, or at least he tries to, but the chuckles quickly turn into sobs. "Don't joke about that. You almost died, you asshole!"

"Eh, I'm fine."

"Actually, your boyfriend is correct, Mr. Sable. You lost a lot of blood." A doctor in a white coat comes in. She's in her forties with her hair pulled back in a neat bun. She's flipping through a binder as she marches into the room.

"I'm Doctor Young. How are you feeling?" The look she gives me is a clear warning: don't try to bullshit her.

"Not great."

She nods. "All things considered, you're lucky. The bullet went straight through your thigh and didn't hit any major blood vessels. Otherwise, you would've bled out in minutes. You also have a few bruised ribs and a concussion."

I grunt in acknowledgment. "I've had worse."

The doctor snaps the binder shut and tucks it under her arm with a grim expression. "You're not trying to set a personal record, you know."

"Don't worry, I'm not." The truth is, I'm relieved by the extent of my injuries. Things could've ended up much, much worse.

But more importantly, if Alonzo Adams is still on the loose, then I need to get back out there and track him down. I don't have time to sit around doing nothing. "Is Victoria here? I thought I heard her voice."

Logan nods just as more footsteps click over the hospital's linoleum floor.

"I'm right here," Victoria announces herself, followed closely by Isaac.

"Did you find him?" I ask, no preamble needed. They know who I'm talking about.

Victoria shakes her head. "We scoured every inch of that facility, but there was no one there. We did recover several stashes of firearms that were reported missing last month."

"Shit," I mutter, eyes falling shut. Alonzo hadn't been in the warehouse during our escape. I suppose it was too much to hope that he would stick around after to wait for the FBI to show up.

"But finding the facility did give us some good leads. We're following up on them now," Isaac adds, then he points to the door. "We've also set up rotating shifts. Only medical staff and approved personnel are allowed into your room."

"We should've anticipated he'd go after you," Victoria's voice has a sharp edge to it.

"That was an oversight on my part." Isaac's expression is hard, and a part of me is grateful that my friends and colleagues are angry on my behalf. Another part of me is so, so tired.

"We've taken over the operation from the Marshals," Isaac explains. "We're better equipped to handle the situation, but they've agreed to provide support if needed."

Good. Support is good.

I try to keep my eyes open, but they're about a thousand pounds heavier than they were a moment before.

"Ja—I mean, Jared? It's going to take me some time to get used to your new name."

I want to smile at Logan's comment, but he sounds so far away.

"I think that's enough visitation for now. He needs a lot of rest during his recovery and I don't want him—or anyone else—pushing him too hard."

I moan in protest. I'll just need a short break to rest my eyes and then I'll be fine. We need to chase down Alonzo before we lose his trail completely.

"Can I stay?" Logan's voice is soft and distant.

"We'll be back later," someone else says.

I slip into blissful sleep.

It's nighttime when I wake up again. There's a hush in the air and all the lights are turned down low. The silence is broken only by the muted beep, beep, beep of the machines I'm hooked up to.

Next to my hospital bed is a low cot with Logan's familiar form curled up in a ball. A rough brown blanket covers him up to his shoulders, and he looks peaceful with his hands tucked under the thin pillow. If it wasn't for the cuts and bruises on his face, I could almost believe our ordeal hadn't ever happened.

My throat itches, like there's a speck of dust floating in there, tickling me. I can't suppress the cough and my mouth is too dry for me to swallow. The sound has Logan sitting bolt upright.

"You're awake. Are you thirsty? Here." Logan scrambles to pour me a cup of water from the pitcher on the C-shaped hospital table at the foot of my bed. "Drink this."

He holds a straw to my lips and even though it's room-temperature water, it feels divine as it trickles down my throat.

"Thanks," I croak when the coughing fit lets me go. "Sorry, I woke you."

Logan shrugs. "I wasn't really sleeping anyway."

"Sorry," I say again. I have so much to apologize for. Keeping the truth from him, getting him dragged into whatever deranged revenge plot Alonzo tried to hatch, and now waking Logan up from what little sleep he could manage on a shitty hospital cot.

"Why are you here?" I ask, then wince when I realize how ungrateful it sounds. "I mean, you should be resting at home."

Logan drops his gaze to a spot next to my shoulder. "I didn't want to leave you alone."

His admission is equally comforting and guilt-tripping.

"I'm sorry."

He wiggles himself onto the bed. "I'm sorry too."

I reach for his hand, not sure if the gesture is welcome, not sure if I'm allowed to ask for that kind of closeness. But Logan doesn't hesitate to intertwine his fingers with mine.

"You have nothing to be sorry for."

He tilts his head, gaze on our clasped hands as he runs his thumb back and forth across the back of my hand. "I shouldn't have tried to spy on you."

I wince at the reminder because that makes me look bad on so many levels. "That's my fault too. If I had come clean with you early on, you would've had no reason to spy on me."

He thinks about that for a moment before shooting me a rueful look. "That's true."

I owe Logan an explanation, a detailed one. And even though it's the middle of the night and we both need our rest, I don't want to go one more minute without the truth laid out between us.

I squeeze his hand. "Can you help me adjust the bed? This is one conversation I can't have while lying on my back."

Logan grows alarmed as I start fiddling with the bed's controls. "Now?"

"Yes, now. I've waited too long already."

The bed's motor kicks in and ever so slowly, the top half rises. Logan lets out an exasperated sigh but hurries to rearrange the pillows around me so I'm propped up and comfortable. Then he settles himself on the bed again, one leg bent at the knee, ankle tucked under the opposite thigh.

"Fine, in that case, talk." The demand is softened by the way he takes my hand back between his own again.

I open my mouth to speak and words fail me. There's so much I haven't told him, so much he needs to know. Where do I start? How can I possibly explain it all in a way that makes any sense?

"I work for the FBI." That's as good a place to start as any.

Logan nods. I suppose he's figured that part out already.

"I've been with the FBI for most of my career."

Logan tilts his head when I pause. "And what did you do during the other parts? Skydiving instructor? Camboy? Hitchhiking through Europe?"

I laugh, then wince as pain throbs across my skull and along my ribs. "No, nothing that exciting. I was with the NYPD for a handful of years before getting accepted into Quantico."

His teasing expression morphs into a stunned one. "Wow, Quantico. That's real? That's not just on TV?"

I fight back the laughter and settle for a smile. "It's very real."

"Wow."

I let him digest that for a second before continuing. "For most of my career, I worked in deep cover. Do you know what that means?"

"Like, undercover secret agent spy stuff?"

"Yeah, something like that."

Logan's being so sweet, so open-minded, I don't know why I was worried about telling him for so long.

"The missions I got sent on were long, like months, sometimes years. I would have these elaborate cover stories and pretend to be another person. Then I would infiltrate criminal organizations, gather intelligence, and help the FBI build a case from the inside."

Logan grows somber. "That's what that Alonzo guy said. That you were in his organization. That you… did bad things."

A flutter of panic rises in the middle of my chest at the reminder. Being tied to the chair. Logan kneeling on the floor. Alonzo bending over him, touching him. I couldn't do anything except sit there and watch Alonzo twist the facts for his own purposes. The panic grows, expanding in my chest. The throbbing in my head grows stronger.

"Jared? Are you okay?" The alarm in Logan's voice brings me back to the present.

Breathe.

"Yeah." I realize I've got his hand in a death grip and I force myself to relax. "Yeah, I'm okay."

"What happened?"

I gingerly turn my head side-to-side. "Nothing, I'm good."

"Jared." There's a steeliness in the way he says my name that I've never heard before. His eyes flash with a combination of hurt and determination.

Shit. I did it again—avoiding difficult truths because it's easier to pretend they don't exist, because I'm too cowardly to be honest.

"I, uh…" I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to clear away some of the brain fog. "I used to get these migraines. Back when I was working in deep cover. I haven't had them in a while, but ever since this Alonzo thing has cropped up, there's been a low-key migraine waiting to attack."

Logan slides off the bed. "Do you have one now? Should I get a nurse?"

"No." I tug him back to me. "I can usually keep them at bay with some breathing exercises."

Logan doesn't look convinced. "But you'll tell me if it gets bad, right? I can track down a nurse, no problem."

"I will, I promise."

He slowly climbs onto the bed again.

"To your original question, I, uh, had to do some things I'm not proud of. Although, none of it was technically illegal."

Logan opens his mouth to speak, then snaps it shut again. "Never mind. I'm not going to ask. I probably don't want to know, do I?"

"You definitely don't. And besides, it's classified, so I can't tell you, even if I want to. Which I don't."

Logan nods. "What about that stuff he said about his wife and kid"

It's a legitimate question, even if it does feed the panic. My head throbs a little more painfully. Breathe.

I could say it's classified, but that will leave the question hanging over us and I don't want Logan to always wonder.

I force the words out of my mouth. "They got caught in the crossfire during the raid on his compound. They weren't the target but…"