hihi , everyone! back with the next chapter. thank you so much for your responses and messages, i always absolutely love hearing what your thoughts are, it really means a lot. i hope you enjoy the next instalment;

Clary wasn't going to admit on her way home to anyone that she cried.

She fucking hated that she had been set off over Jace, because she had been on the verge of crying for a few days now. Since finding out about Lydia and Jordan, and then hearing whatever she heard from Jace's friends, she had only cried the one time. In all honesty, she didn't cry that much, because she had never really had anything big to cry over. Now, it seemed as though she was dealing with the shitty stuff all at once, and she really didn't know how to handle it.

Because it wasn't just Lydia and Jordan, and Jace. It was also whatever the hell was going on with her brother and her father, and why Valentine had said that Jonathon wasn't going to be coming home soon.

She just felt frustrated and confused and angry and it manifested in tears as she indicated to pull off the main road. Jace's motorbike had followed her from the school grounds and even over the noise of the cars passing by her and her radio playing softly, she could hear the rev of his bike when they came to a stop at traffic lights, and her stomach twisted a little, nervous that he hadn't listened to her, that maybe he was going to follow her all the way home.

But he didn't.

When she pulled onto an off-ramp close to her home, he continued straight, and Clary exhaled heavily, a mixture of relief and...Something else. But she couldn't focus on that right now, if she thought about going back to her house and her room alone, then she would start thinking about how lonely she was, and she might reach out to Jace and she couldn't. She had to try and keep her thoughts straight.

Clary swiped her fingers carefully underneath her eyes and looked in the rearview mirror. It was dark and she couldn't see her reflection all that well, but when they stopped at a set of lights, she managed to clear her face up well enough that it didn't look like she had been crying, other than her eyes looking a little bloodshot. Her makeup was all waterproof, and she blinked a few times to get rid of the few droplets that were clinging to her eyelashes. When Clary got to the driveway, she raised an eyebrow when she saw that her fathers car was gone.

Although she really shouldn't be surprised.

It wasn't as though he was usually around.

She probably took the shortest, quickest shower she had in years—even Essex looked surprised—before she was climbing into bed and sinking her fingers into the soft fur around Essex's neck and tried to go to sleep.

It took a lot longer than it usually did.

XXXXXXXXX

Clary blinked at the sound of her phone ringing. It was happy and obnoxious, playing Touch by Little Mix, and Clary groaned as she rolled over, reaching for her phone, which was always plugged into the charger beside her bed and resting on the bedside table.

Except it wasn't.

She hadn't even bothered to plug it in last night, and needed to fumble around in her blankets to find where she had dropped it.

"Fuck," Clary grunted, rubbing her hand over her face and then cringing as she realized that she still had most of her makeup on from the night before, the quick shower she had taken not enough to get it all off. She managed to slide her finger across her screen before it rang out, and she lifted her phone to her ear. "Simon?" She rasped.

"Clary? I'm downstairs," Simon stated, his words sounded abrupt. He then ended the call, so Clary guessed she wasn't imagining things when she thought he sounded short. Clary sighed, because she really hadn't been prepared for this today, and she slumped her shoulders as she walked back into her room. She dressed quickly and quietly, pulling her hair out of the floppy pigtails they were still hanging in since last night, and then headed down the stairs with a slightly apprehensive feeling in her chest. Simon was standing in the foyer, knelt down and rubbing his hand through Essex's fur, wearing a loose hoodie and a pair of sweatpants.

It looked as though he had just rolled out of bed and headed straight over to her place.

"That explains why Essie wasn't in bed with me," Clary murmured as her husky spared her a glance before staring lovingly up at Simon, who was now scratching behind her ears.

"Maybe she just felt as though the bed was a little overcrowded," Simon responded. Clary's eyes narrowed.

"There's no one else in my bed. And even if there was, you've seen my bed," she retorted. "I've got enough room for six people and all their dogs." Simon just rolled his eyes at the comment and pursed his lips together, knowing that her walls were going up as a defensive tactic. They both fell quiet, and Essex seemed to sense the tension. She looked between them both before she got back on her feet and walked over to where Clary was and nudged her knee with her nose.

"I saw his bike following you when you left the game last night," Simon said after a few minutes. "I'm assuming this is the biker guy, right? The one that you've been hiding."

"No, it's the zoo keeper that I see on weekends," Clary snipped and rolled her eyes at him this time, and Simon just leveled her with a look. "Yes, that was him," she muttered. "But he's not here. I told him I wanted to be alone." Which wasn't the whole truth, but she didn't even know where to begin.

"So much for it not being anything serious," Simon stated and Clary pressed her lips together, because it was obvious that he wasn't going to let it go. They were quiet again before Simon sighed and stepped closer, around Essex so that he could stand directly in front of her. "You've been upset for the past week or so," he began, his eyes serious and his hands twitching at his side before he reached out for her, resting his hands gently on her shoulders. "He did something that upset you—clearly he hurt you, and then he showed up last night. What happened?" Clary licked her lips quickly, and she wanted to fold her arms over her chest and draw herself to her full height by straightening up and pushing back her shoulders, but she couldn't, because it was Simon.

It just didn't feel right.

"He said that there's a good reason—or, no, he said there was an explanation for..." Clary searched for the right thing to say, because she wasn't ready to tell him what she had heard since she didn't have that explanation yet. Something that Simon would definitely push her about. "He said that there was an explanation," she repeated, this time ending the sentence there. "And I...Trust him." Simon didn't look happy at that, and his fingers on her shoulders tightened slightly, his thumbs pressing in.

"You sure about that?" Simon asked. Clary didn't answer straight away, thinking over her statement and his question and then she nodded.

"Yeah," she murmured, even though her heart rattled in her chest at her words. "Yeah, I do."

She was a fucking idiot, and Simon obviously thought so based on his expression, but he didn't verbalize that.

"Alright," he said, taking in a deep breath and his eyes flicked past her, looking up the stairs, maybe toward her bedroom and wondering about Jace spending time up there. Although, to him, it was more of a faceless biker, and given his cynical attitude, he was probably imagining some heavily tattooed, greasy haired man in her bed, still fully clad in his leathers. "Well, if you're sure you've got this...I'll leave you to do your thing." Clary was surprised that he was giving in that easily, but that was good, because she needed to get herself ready to have a conversation with Jace.

"Okay," Clary let out a breath that she hadn't realized that she had been holding, and gave Simon a wobbly smile.

"So you've got this?" He checked, sounding a whole lot more like himself than just deciding to leave and her smile stretched a little wider, more steady, and dipped her head in a nod. Simon kissed her forehead and then headed for the front door, which Clary couldn't actually remember locking last night.

That had to be a first.

Clary waited until Simon shut the front door behind him and turned around toward the stairs to walk up them toward her bedroom and then jerked to a stop when she heard the familiar sound of an engine outside, in her driveway. She stopped on the stairway, her hand tightening on the banister and Essex paused beside her, and she knew that if she let herself stand there and overthink things, she would remain frozen and she wouldn't open the door.

And she needed to.

She needed answers.

Clary clenched her teeth together, pushing back the fact she was still in her pyjamas, before walking down the stairs and back to the front door. There were a few loud, rapid knocks on the door before she reached it, but she stopped to take in a deep breath before throwing it open abruptly. Jace was standing there, broad and handsome and filling the doorway, and her fingers tightened around the door to stop herself from physically reacting to his presence. He paused, his eyes sliding over her and down her bare legs before jerking back up to her face.

"You need to get dressed," he stated, his voice short.

"What?" Clary squinted up at him.

"You need to get dressed," he repeated. "We need to go."

"Go where?" Clary snapped, feeling all her frustrations from the past week beginning to rise back up inside her chest. "No, I don't want to go somewhere," Clary's voice rose, and she was glad that her father hadn't come home last night or else he would have been storming out at the yelling.

"I don't want to go somewhere because we need to talk. You only came back here because you told me that you could explain what I heard," Clary gritted her teeth together and then rolled her eyes, tossing her hair. "And, honestly? I don't know why I even fell for that last night—or why I stuck up for you with Simon! Because what kind of explanation is there, other than the fact that your friends are fucking assholes?!" Jace sighed, his shoulders slumping a little as he glanced to the side, rubbing a hand over his forehead. He looked as though she was the one that was being difficult. "I feel like an idiot," Clary's voice dropped, more talking to herself, her breathing shallow. "Letting you come back here—getting involved with you in the first place—"

"Clary!" Jace interrupted her with a loud voice, stepping forward, towering over her. "Look—you're right. You're right to feel like an idiot, and you're right to be pissed—although, honestly, you change your mind so fast you're giving me whiplash," he gave her a long-suffering look and Clary just narrowed her eyes, and her lips parted, getting herself ready to fire something off at him, but he kept on talking. "But I get that you're confused and I also get that you don't understand what's going on." The words sounded a little patronizing, but Clary let him continue as she gritted her teeth. "And that's what I want to tell you, to try and have you understand." Clary pressed her lips together and took in a deep breath.

"So why do I need to get dressed? I'm already dressed," Clary waved down at what she was wearing, her pyjama pants and a singlet. "We can talk here, I don't think anyone will be home for a while."

"Because it's...It's not just me who needs to tell you," Jace replied. "I need—no, I want you to hear it from—from someone else as well." He could see that she was still hesitant, and he took in a breath before lowering his voice. "I just heard you telling your friend that you trust me, sweet thing. Were you lying to him?" Clary clenched her teeth together and narrowed her eyes even more.

"No," she told him stubbornly and probably a little stupidly. "I wasn't." He obviously saw that spark in her green eyes, and his lips curled, knowing that he'd won, leaning forward to squeeze her forearm firmly, before his hand dropped to hers and he tugged her up the stairs to her room.

ahhh so we're so close to finding out everything. please let me know what you think! and if you'd like to reach and discuss any commission pieces, please reach out via my social media because the messages on here are very icky and i don't get notifications.

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