Miller

A deep gash stretched violently across his side.

Blood soaked through the bandaging wrapped around his waist so heavily that it looked almost black beneath the night lights.

"Oh my God," I breathed.

Jace’s breathing became uneven afterward.

"He is trying to kill me," he whispered weakly.

Then suddenly his knees gave out beneath him.

"Jace!"

I barely caught him before he collapsed fully onto the concrete.

"LEO!"

The shout tore violently out of my throat.

The elevator doors immediately slid back open seconds later before Leo rushed out again.

The moment his eyes landed on the blood spreading beneath Jace’s hoodie, his entire expression changed instantly as he switched fully into doctor mode.

"Move," he ordered immediately.

I shifted back quickly while Leo dropped to his knees beside Jace and pressed two fingers against his neck.

"His pulse is weak," he muttered quickly. "Blood pressure is probably crashing."

His hands moved fast afterward as he pulled the soaked fabric away from Jace’s side.

The moment he saw the wound clearly, his jaw tightened hard.

"This laceration is deep," he said sharply. "Possible muscular involvement. How long has he been bleeding?"

"I do not know! We literally just found him out here and I have not seen him in years!"

Leo cursed quietly beneath his breath before immediately lifting Jace partly into his arms.

"Help me get him inside. Now."

The three of us somehow managed to get Jace into the elevator and upstairs into my apartment before Leo carefully lowered him onto the couch.

Blood immediately stained the cushions, but Leo did not care because he was already opening the emergency medical kit he grabbed from my room.

Within seconds, he was pulling on gloves at terrifying speed.

I stood nearby feeling completely overwhelmed while watching him work.

"Pressure bandages," Leo ordered without looking up.

I immediately handed them to him.

Leo pressed firmly against the wound while Jace groaned weakly beneath him.

"This needs a hospital," Leo muttered tightly. "He has active blood loss, possible tissue contamination, and a deep untreated wound. I do not have the equipment necessary to properly stabilize him here."

"But he said somebody is trying to kill him," I argued immediately.

Leo finally looked up at me then.

"And keeping him here could implicate both of us if this situation involves criminal activity," he snapped quietly. "Do you understand how dangerous this is?"

"He came to me for help!"

"And that does not automatically mean we should hide an injured omega inside your apartment instead of contacting emergency services!"

"He is scared!"

"And I am trying to stop him from dying!"

The apartment fell silent afterward except for Jace’s weak breathing.

Then suddenly Jace stirred again.

His eyes slowly opened, and for the first time since arriving, genuine fear appeared clearly across his face.

"Please," he whispered weakly. "Please do not send me away."

Before I could say another word, a loud scream suddenly echoed from somewhere downstairs.

"JACE!"

The sound was so loud and violent that it immediately froze all three of us.

Jace’s entire body stiffened beneath Leo’s hands while fear instantly flooded his face.

"No," he whispered weakly. "No... no no no..."

Then another voice echoed violently through the building lobby below. "Break through the elevator if you have to and bring Jace to me!"

I gasped and immediately looked toward Leo.

But instead of panic, his expression had gone frighteningly calm.

The kind of calm people only reached right before violence.

Then both of us slowly looked down toward the omega trembling violently on my couch.

"Jace..." I whispered shakily. "What the hell are you involved in?"

This was definitely not the kind of reunion I imagined having with Jace after all these years.

Everything about tonight felt too strange to be a coincidence.

The fact that he somehow found my penthouse after years of disappearing without a trace was already unsettling enough, but now that the adrenaline from everything happening was finally starting to settle properly inside my chest, another question suddenly started bothering me badly.

Where the hell were my security guards?

Jace was never supposed to be waiting outside my penthouse building like this.

Nobody got into this building without clearance, especially strangers.

And definitely not an injured omega bleeding through his clothes.

"I... I am sorry," Jace whispered shakily from the couch while Leo continued pressing firmly against the wound on his side. "You were the only person I could think about while I was running."

His face looked paler now beneath the apartment lights, and his lips were slowly beginning to lose color.

Leo let out a heavy sigh filled with irritation.

"He is losing too much blood and needs immediate medical intervention," he muttered sharply while adjusting the pressure bandages. "Unfortunately, tonight apparently decided to become medically and psychologically exhausting at the same time."

Before I could answer him, another scream echoed loudly from somewhere downstairs.

"FIND HIM!"

Leo closed his eyes briefly like he was physically restraining himself from committing violence.

"Wonderful," he muttered dryly. "Your unexpected omega reunion apparently came with homicidal side effects."

Honestly, he was right.

As shocked as I was to see Jace again, this was absolutely not how I imagined our reunion happening. Back in college, Jace was not only someone I dated briefly, he was also one of my closest friends during some of the hardest years of my life.

But this?

This was insane.

I rubbed the back of my neck anxiously before immediately pulling my phone from my pocket.

"Who the hell are you calling?" Jace asked weakly the second he noticed.

"The police," I answered immediately while unlocking my phone. "Because whatever the hell is happening tonight clearly needs professional intervention, and honestly, I still do not even understand who you are running away from."

Jace groaned softly before trying to push himself up slightly against the couch cushions.

"It is my..." He swallowed painfully. "My boyfriend."

I exchanged a look with Leo immediately.

Leo only shrugged slightly while keeping pressure against the wound.

"So," he said flatly, "you are hiding from your boyfriend because he attempted to dissect you?" 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝕨𝕖𝗯𝚗𝚘𝕧𝕖𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝕞

Jace laughed weakly at that before immediately wincing in pain.

"He was not always like this," he whispered. "Everything changed after I found out what he really was."

Something about the way he said that immediately made the atmosphere inside the apartment heavier.

"What exactly is he?" I asked carefully.

Jace’s lips trembled as he spoke.

"This should not leave this room, but he is an Enigma."

Silence immediately filled the apartment.