They remained in a sort of empty limbo for the next several days, not quite knowing what their next move should be amidst their displacement. Jared would get up before everyone else in the morning and run, sometimes down the winding asphalt road that led away from Gideon’s property and sometimes along the trails hidden back in the woods. He wore a new path in the dirt trails around Hidden Lake, letting the early summer sunshine lighten his hair and warm his skin.

 

Then he’d follow Declan into the woods in the afternoon, and dig his fingers into the frail, fibrous wood of the old stump that was his perch as he watched his brother shoot all his feelings into a bunch of lumpy sandbags that someone, Gideon, he figured, switched out every few days to handle another hundred rounds of Declan’s anger. They never talked, but Jared had always had a hard time being apart from Declan for too long, ever since the day he’d been rescued.  Jared felt like he was ten years old again and Declan was teaching him how to swim, a strong, solid presence in the midst of an unstable ocean.

 

Back then, Jared had clung to his older brother every time the turbulent waves threatened to take him under. These last few days had been no different. Even though Jared saw hurt, pain, anger every time he looked into Declan’s tortured grey eyes, Declan never showed those emotions anywhere else. It was all Jared could do to hold onto that strength again, when the waves of uncertainty and fear threatened every day to pull him under and make him drown.

 

It was that hold on Declan, that connection, that told Jared he was safe. That even though their father, their home, were gone, Jared was still part of a family. That he was no longer an unwanted ditchbreed wandering the streets and watching his back at every turn. Jared’s stomach turned, recalling the nasty term William had used, the name society used to refer to people like him who had been born with the hated stain. Jared wrapped a hand around his left wrist, a wave of uneasiness rolling over him at the loss of the leather cuff that he had worn for so long. It hid the evidence of Jared’s status, or lack thereof, and he felt much too naked without it.

 

Jared frantically sought out Declan, zeroing in on his brother in order to reassure himself of Declan’s presence. Jared was safe, at least for now, from Agents who felt that people with marks like Jared’s were no more than infectious, dirty blights on society to be picked off the streets and put down and killed.

 

Some even took pleasure in it. All Jared had to do was close his eyes, and he could still hear the Agents’ laughter as they rounded up people like Jared, plucking them off the street like rotten apples to be thrown away. Often they were drugged and tossed into vans, or in some cases, taken round back the nearest building to be shot where they stood. Though he topped just over six feet now, Jared had been quite small for his age back then and able to hide in the nearest alleyway, behind a truck or a dumpster, sometimes even inside the closest trash can.

 

Anything to keep from ending up like one of the rotten apples.

 

Johnathan Cooper had changed all that when he had taken Jared off the streets and accepted him as one of his children. And in the two years since he had been gone, the only things that kept Jared from being alone once more were his sister and the younger version of that man, standing twenty feet away, gripping his pistol in angry fingers.

 

Declan caught his eye, his mouth turning up softly upon looking at Jared, and it took every ounce of inner strength Jared possessed not to run to Declan and hold on tight, to bury his face in Declan’s chest the way that he had in Johnathan's on that rainy night when he’d been only ten years old. Panic rose in his throat and Jared forced it down, refusing to lean on his brother any more than he already had. They had always known that working with the Renegades could be dangerous, but Declan, too, had to be feeling the effects of killing their father’s killer and leaving behind their burning home.

 

“Jare?” Declan’s voice penetrated Jared’s messy thoughts. He holstered his gun and walked over to Jared’s stump. “You okay?”

 

Jared’s scar itched, and he clamped his hand over it to stop the irritating burn. He considered lying for less than a second, but he had never been able to lie to Declan. Tears burned Jared's eyes for the first time since his run that first morning at Gideon’s house, and he shook his head, his right hand squeezing tighter over the unsightly scar on his left wrist. “No.” Jared shook his head, and, before he lost it completely, looked up at Declan. “None of us are, are we?”

 

Jared was at once enveloped in Declan's arms, his face pressed against the soft fabric of Declan's jacket. One of Declan’s strong hands curling into the hair at the nape of his neck and Jared clung tightly to his brother, wishing that he would take the pain away.

 

He closed his eyes and let out a shaky breath when Declan vowed fiercely into his ear, “We will be.”

 

 

Later that evening, Jared stepped out of a hot shower that had temporarily served to soothe his nerves and quickly toweled off. He opened the bathroom door and darted across the hall into his bedroom, one hand fisted tightly into the towel around his waist, cursing himself for forgetting to take his change of clothes with him into the bathroom. The stark contrast from Jared’s hot shower to the comparably cool hallway made his teeth start to chatter. The scar on his wrist tingled at the disparity in temperature and Jared pictured his warm pajama pants and the soft, fleecy sweatshirt he was about to wrap himself in.

 

He had just ducked into his bedroom and closed the door behind him when he heard a knock. Jared’s hand loosened around his towel, letting it drop to the floor. He hastily pulled on a pair of black sweatpants that he had long ago stolen from Declan, and opened the door. “Yeah?”

 

“I uh,” Declan looked hesitant. Except for the time spent outside during Declan’s shooting sessions, they'd hardly spent much time together since coming to Gideon’s. They had always been so close, and Declan's comfort earlier that afternoon had gotten Jared’s hopes up that things might be starting to return to normal. Or at least as normal as they could be while they all tried to figure out what to do next.

 

As always, what Jared had been feeling must have showed on his face, because Declan’s softened. “I have something for you.” Declan pulled his arm from behind his back and twirled Jared’s leather cuff around two fingers, circling it in the air. His mouth pulled up at the corners, and Jared wasn't sure what made his chest fill with warmth more; the sight of his beloved bracelet, or the sight of his brother actually almost smiling again.

 

Jared reached out, and Declan met him halfway to place the cuff in his hand. “I thought this was gone.” Jared said, running his fingers over the worn leather.

 

“That bastard had us so distracted I almost missed it. I grabbed it before I left the house,” Declan said.

 

Jared let out a breath of relief as he snapped the bracelet around his wrist again, the leather settling over his scar with warm familiarity. He looked at Declan. “Thanks.” Jared wanted to offer more than that, maybe some kind of comfort like Declan had given him earlier but even though Declan’s mouth had turned up, his eyes were still a stormy, tumultuous grey, his body still strung tight by strings of self-imposed solitary confinement.

 

The question that had been nagging at him since that day left Jared’s mouth. “Declan. What was he looking for?”

 

“Who?”

 

Jared touched the almost completely faded bruise on his cheek, from where William had split his skin. “The Agent.”

 

Declan’s face darkened. “I don’t know.”

 

“He went upstairs. He went through dad’s things, I know it. He-“

 

“Hey.” Declan reached out and flicked Jared's ear, the way he had when they had been kids. “It’s over. He is never going to bother you again, you hear me?”

 

“But-“

 

“Jared. Enough.”

 

Jared clamped his mouth shut, though questions still swirled around his brain. Looking at the firm set of Declan’s jaw, he sighed. “Thanks for my bracelet.”

 

Declan’s hard expression faded. “Don’t mention it,” he said flippantly. He gave Jared a smile that said he knew what the cuff meant to him, what it meant that Declan had snagged it. “Get some sleep.” Declan turned and headed for his own room.

 

“You too,” Jared called out to his brother’s back. Declan gave a dismissive wave and shut his bedroom door behind him.

 

Jared threw on his long sleeved fleece and crawled underneath the covers. He hated how quickly he’d gotten used to sleeping here, in this bed, instead of the one he had had back home. He hated watching Declan walk around under a constant shroud of anger, hated how lately he had heard nothing but uncharacteristic silence from Rae.

 

Jared brushed damp strands of hair from his face as he curled onto his side, his hand wrapping around his scarred wrist, taking comfort in the soft leather that was now back around it as he slowly drifted off to sleep.