***Jack's POV***
I walked up the sidewalk, hoping that Delaney would be at the apartment. It was starting to get late and I needed his help moving some furniture around in the living room.
I reached the apartment and let myself inside, heading up the stairs. Our third roommate was rarely ever here and sometimes I forgot we even had a third roommate. It was fine with me, though. It just meant one less person to clean up after.
"Dex!" I called as I entered the kitchen, opening the fridge to get a water bottle. "Ay, Dex! You home?"
But Delaney didn't call back to me. I sighed, kicking the fridge shut and heading to his room. I knocked on the door, waiting.
"Delaney, I'm going to kill you if you're in here and ignoring me. But I'm going to kill you, revive you, and kill you again if you're not in here," I announced before shoving his door open.
Sure enough, Delaney wasn't in his bedroom. It was empty, clothes thrown all around. A bag with new liquor bottles in it was next to his dresser.
I pulled my hat off and ran a hand through my hair. There were several places Delaney could be, and all of them made me want to clean the toilet with his toothbrush.
He could be at the bar getting hammered and looking to go home with random guys, he could be out with a group of friends who were the kind of people my mom had warned me about growing up, or he could be with Ace again.
Delaney was one of those kids who'd grown up with strict parents. Now that he wasn't living at home anymore, he was going wild, trying to do everything he'd never been able to do at home. He was experiencing sex, drugs, and alcohol, and loving every second of it. He was able to hang out with people his parents would have otherwise forbidden him from seeing and able to go out on the streets late at night, heading home with random men because he didn't have to worry about being home for a curfew.
I was trying to keep some sort of leash on him, because I worried about him going wild like this. He was going to wind up going home with the wrong person one night and get himself hurt, or worse.
That's why I hated seeing him with this Ace kid. I could tell just by looking at him that Ace was similar to Delaney- someone who'd grown up with little wiggle room running free for the first time. He got off on the excitement of rule breaking and doing the things that society frowned on.
Plus, Ace was the kind of guy who thrived off of manipulation. I'd seen it in his eyes when he'd been using that girl at the bar just for drinks. He was a liar, and a clever one at that.
I didn't want Delaney falling in with him. Delaney was naïve when it came to people like Ace. He didn't understand when he was being used. Sometimes he just didn't care if he was being used.
I pulled out my cellphone, dialing Delaney's number. I leaned against the doorframe as his phone rang.
"Hello?" he answered.
"Where are you?" I asked.
"What do you need?" he asked, attempting to doge my question.
"That depends on how busy you are. Where are you? You're not at the bars," I said. Wherever he was, there was no background noise.
He hesitated. "I'm at Ace's house," he said at last.
"Wow, that sounds like the dumbest sentence that's ever come out of your mouth," I said. "Oh, right, because it is. Come home. I need your help."
"I'm out, Jack. Whatever it is, it can wait," he said.
I knew he got mad at me when I tried to make him stop doing these stupid things. He claimed I was too much in his business and, hell, maybe I was. But I only did it to look out for him. He needed someone to anchor him while he explored all these things.
"Delaney, come home," I said. I rarely called him anything other than Dex.
"I'll see you later, Jack," he said and hung up the phone.
I let out an excessively long sigh before stuffing my phone into my pocket. I could head to Ace's house since I knew where he lived now, but that guy that had been on his porch flashed through my mind. He looked like the kind of guy you didn't want to piss off and I had feeling that showing up at the house would piss him off.
Still, Delaney usually just had one night with a guy and then it was over. So why did he keep going back to Ace?
Actually, a better question was why did Ace keep going back to Delaney? I knew that Ace was pissed I'd stolen his hat and demanded money back from him, but would he really go this far? All he had to do was give Delaney a little money back.
Would I really get the guy fired? No. I wasn't that kind of person. But I needed to scare him a little. I was just trying to teach him a lesson about manipulating and using helpless drunks. That was a low thing to do.
But Delaney, being the idiot he was, kept letting Ace use him to get back at me over this whole thing. A guy with a good heart and a desire to be wild was a shitty combination. God, I felt like such a mom sometimes.
I went upstairs and into my bedroom, turning on my speakers and dropping onto my bed. What the hell was I supposed to do about Delaney? He wasn't going to listen to me.
Ace was hot and cunning. He had Delaney wrapped up in him- literally and metaphorically. But I couldn't let him keep playing Delaney like this.
"What makes the one to shake you down? Each touch belongs to each new sound. Say now you want to shake me too, move down to me, slip into you."
I glanced over at my speakers, raising an eyebrow at them. "I am proving Ace's point. I am a helpless little Tumblr social justice warrior who listens to cliché music."
Getting off my bed, I shut my speakers off. I put my hat back on and pulled my hood up over it, leaving the apartment.
I couldn't stop worrying about Delaney. Ace was not the kind of person he should get involved with. I could tell just by looking at his sharp grin that he was dangerous.
I walked down to the nearby gas station, going back to the drinks section and grabbing myself a Monster. I pushed my hood back and pulled my hat off, ruffling my hair and pushing it out of my eyes.
"Hey!"
The voice sounded irritated, and I prayed that it wasn't directed at me. But sure enough, I turned and there was Ace's friend from his porch.
"Yea?" I asked, keeping calm and making sure I sounded disinterested.
"You're that guy that dropped Ace off," he said, moving closer to me.
"I am," I agreed.
He grabbed his wallet, opening it and throwing $20 at me. I bent down, picking it up off the floor and glancing at him.
"I don't usually have money thrown at me," I said. "I have to say, my stripping experiences are usually restricted to a private audience of a shower."
"There's your money. Don't go to his work, or we're going to have problems," the guy snarled.
I held the money back out to him. "I don't want your money. Ace owes my friend. You don't."
"Ace has a weird view on dignity, so you're not getting a cent from him. Just take the fucking money!" he said.
I pulled my hat back on and shook my head. "No. I'm not taking your money. Ace needs to pay my friend back."
"Is your friend that kid Ace has over?" he demanded.
"Yea, that's Delaney," I said. "Ace owes him. Ace is a big boy; he can pay the money himself."
"What's your name?" the guy asked.
"Jack," I said. "And you are...?"
"Jer. I live with Ace. Just take this money, keep your friend away from Ace, and stay the fuck away," Jer said. Something told me that this boy had never smiled before in his life. The anger on his face seemed permanent.
"Hey, I'm trying to keep my friend away from him," I said.
Jer glared at me. "I'm warning you that he's dangerous. So take the money and stay away."
Despite the fact that I was pretty sure Jer here wasn't afraid to punch my damn head off, I forced the money back into his hands and stepped away. I met his eyes steadily.
"Ace is going to pay Delaney back. I'm not afraid of him," I said.
Jer took a menacing step towards me. "You better just do what I say."
I stayed where I was. "I've never been good at following directions. So you better tell your friend to stop getting himself into so much trouble before the consequences really start catching up with him."
I started to walk away from Jer, but paused and turned back to face him. "What's Ace's last name?" I asked.
He eyed me suspiciously. "Foley."
I tried to think if I'd ever heard the name before, but it didn't ring any bells. Shrugging, I turned and walked up to the register. I paid for my drink before leaving the gas station, sneaking a glance over my shoulder to make sure that Jer wasn't following me.
Great, now Ace's friend was going to try to kill me. Man, I really should've just kept a better eye on Delaney and stopped him from bringing Ace home that night.
Sure, Delaney had gotten himself into this mess. But Ace was the one who'd been prowling the bar in search of anyone drunk enough to manipulate. I couldn't let him get away with that. He'd used my best friend as his wallet and fuck toy.
And now he was continuing to use Delaney to get back at me. Oh man, what a pain in the ass this situation was.
I went back to the apartment, letting myself in. I opened my Monster as I went upstairs and sat up on the kitchen counter.
Trying to talk sense into Delaney was pointless. He'd lost all common sense the second he was released from his parents' tight clutches.
God, I just hoped that this guy wasn't too much trouble. I hopped off of the counter and went to my bedroom, turning on my laptop and sitting on my bed with it.
Call me creepy, but I was going to search this guy. If he had any legal trouble, I was going to head over to his house and get Delaney the hell out of there. Something told me that this Ace Foley kid mustered up trouble wherever he went.
I typed in his name and hit enter. Tapping my finger against the keyboard as I waited for the results, I just hoped that Delaney wasn't involved with a guy with arrests on his hands.
But what came up made my eyes widen.
Because there was a picture of a younger Ace with the word "MISSING" screaming out from under it.
I clicked on the picture, reading the description. A 16 year old boy, last seen by his father going to bed, believed to have stolen money from his home and runaway in the middle of the night.
I scrolled down, realizing that the longer Ace had been gone for, the more money his father had begun to offer for information that would bring Ace home. But when Ace's 18th birthday had come around, the cops had stopped searching for him. His father had continued the search, with the most recent thing being that same picture of Ace in the newspaper of a small town just a few months ago.
I continued to search through the articles and flyers on this missing boy. Single parent home, good kid with good grades and no history of trouble until just a week or two before he disappeared, and a family searching endlessly for him for roughly two years before everyone but his father abandoned the search.
But no one had ever found Ace. Judging by his hometown, that boy really wasn't all that far from home. Maybe an hour or so drive away.
So how the hell had he managed to stay hidden? He worked at one of the most popular restaurants in the area. He hadn't changed his name to keep hidden. And he looked exactly the same as he had when he was 16, only with a more mature set to his body and face.
This is what he had been talking about when he said he'd been homeless. He had run away from home, probably run out of money for a bit.
But what the hell had driven Ace to run away from home? What drove a 16 year old kid to steal his dad's money and runaway in the middle of the night, not even making him desperate enough to head back when he found himself homeless and broke?
I heard someone moving through the kitchen and got up. I shut my laptop and went downstairs.
"I didn't have sex with him," Delaney said, not turning around as he searched the fridge for something to eat. "We were just hanging out."
"Why?" I asked.
Delaney sighed, standing up with half a sandwich in his hand and shutting the fridge. "Because he's a hot guy who's interested in me for more than just sex. Can't you just leave it alone, Jack?"
"I'd leave it alone if that's all it was, Dex. But Ace isn't a guy who's interested in you for more than sex," I said. "He's interested in pissing me off and using you to do it."
Delaney sat at the table, biting into the sandwich and shaking his head. "You're a real piece of work, you know that? Not everything is about you. Ace isn't trying to piss you off. Although you better leave him alone. Don't threaten him or his job anymore."
"Do you even know anything about him?" I asked.
"We spent all night just hanging out and talking," he said. "It was nice, Jack. Sometimes it's nice to just get to know someone. Maybe I can actually have a relationship with Ace."
Which would be great and all, if it wasn't for the fact that Ace was clearly dangerous. But Delaney wasn't going to believe that.
"Dex, no offense, but I highly doubt that sex with you was so great that Ace wanted to get to know your personality, too," I said, crossing my arms. "Please take note of how he didn't give a shit about you on anything other than a sexual level until I pissed him off." I sighed, running a hand through my hair. "Do you even know his last name?"
"Foley," he said.
"So tell me what you do know about this guy," I said.
"His name is Ace Foley, he's 21, he lives with his three friends, his mom left him when he was a kid, he works as a waiter, he has good music taste, and he likes to pass time by playing cards," he said with a shrug. "Do you want me to write an essay on the guy? We're just slowly getting to know each other now."
"I don't trust it," I said.
"Of course you don't," he said, looking annoyed. "Because for once, a hot guy is actually interested in me instead of you."
"That's not it!" I said. "I'm not shallow like that, Dex. Ace is not good for you."
Delaney stood up, shooting me an annoyed look. "Not every guy is going to fall for you. Yea, you're pretty hot yourself. But for once, your shitty personality drove away a guy."
"My shitty personality?" I nearly smiled. "That's a bit rude. I think I have a great personality. If you overlook my tendencies to insult people and have no interest in conversation."
"Just leave me and Ace alone," he said, trying to head to his room.
I stuck out my arm, stopping him. "I ran into Ace's scary friend at the gas station a little while ago. Jer, he said his name was. Know what he told me? He told me Ace is dangerous. Ace's own friend told me that."
Delaney shoved my arm away. "Yea, well, Ace isn't on the best of terms with his friends. And you're not helping that."
"There's probably a reason why he's not on the best of terms with his friends," I said, following Delaney to his bedroom.
"He didn't go into it. Seriously though, Jack, you're taking this too far. You're going to get him kicked out of his house!" Delaney glared at me.
I mentally groaned. Great. So Delaney was already wrapped around the guy's finger. I could already see what Ace was up to, using Delaney to defend himself and get back at me.
"Look, I get that you're head over heels for the hot guy who's suddenly being all nice to you, but you really need to think with the head on your shoulders, not the one in your pants. You can find yourself a nice, cute guy who isn't using you," I said.
Delaney came over, shoving me out of his room. "I already did." He shut the door in my face, locking it.
I turned and went upstairs, back into my bedroom. I opened my laptop, staring at that picture of Ace with "MISSING" glaring out at me.
Fine, Ace wanted to use my friend against me? Something told me that his friends had some persuasive ways. I would fight fire with fire before Ace could hurt Delaney.
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A.N.- Sorry for the super delay, but I was posting this story to Radish before I posted it here. It's completed on Radish (which now has an app for Apple and Android, yay), but I will be posting the whole thing here too!