AHHHHHH SORRY FOR SUCH A LATE UPDATE! So busy with school …

And I'm sorry for not replying back to all of your reviews. I really want to, but I just haven't gotten enough time, so I'll just answer some questions here :D Uhmmm…so there'll be about 25 chapters for Infect My Heart, so theres only like 2/3 more chapters left until this story wraps up. And as for the other story I mentioned earlier, I'm pretty sure I'm still going to write it….pretty sure…I've got most of the plot planned out, but I'm not sure if I'll have enough time to write it, and if I do, I'll probably only be updating like once or twice a month.

And lastly, I WANT TO THANK ALL OF YOU FOR READING AND REVIEWING! :) THANKYOUSOMUCH3333

On with the story, extra long this time(:

The velvety couch tickled Alec's forearm, wedged between the couch and Magnus. His boyfriend's lips, however, were soft and smooth on his, sliding ad pecking and…it was done lacking its usual charm and luster. Actually, it felt like he was pulling himself out of a soggy, muddy swamp.

Alec pulled back, frowning, and raised a questioning eyebrow. "Wow. I must have improved a lot, because your kissing skills used to make my knees weak. Now you make them fall asleep."

Magnus good-naturedly wrapped his fingers around Alec's face and squeezed his cheeks. His fingernails were long, purple, and perfect. "The tongue that had just been stuffed in your mouth has had eons of experience, Alexander," he admonished, using Alexander to purposely tick Alec off. "No matter what happens, you will never reach even half of my level."

Alec waggled his eyebrows. "Yeah? You wanna go?"
Magnus, however, ran his fingers through his dyed spiked hair and shrugged. This uncharacteristic motion jerked Alec upright. He scooted back a couple of inches.

Magnus rarely, if ever, acted like this.

"What's wrong?"

Magnus seemed to work the words through his mouth several times before answering. "Do you think…that Clary would sabotage SAI for Valentine and his crew?"

"No…"

"Yeah, I didn't think so either."

"Why?"

Magnus's eyes slitted and flitted away as he answered. "Well, it's just that Clary, she got – look, I know you're close with Jace Wayland too, and don't take this the wrong way, but I think, well, there's a possibility that, I believe…"

Alec's fingernails were beginning to turn blue. He was that cold, like his blood had frozen in his veins. "Think what?"

"I think Jace got Clary fired."

He jumped up from the couch. "What? You think what?"

"Alec," Magnus's voice turned to an agitated, apologetic tone. "Don't be like this."

"I don't believe you."

Jace wouldn't do that…would he?

"Just hear me out," Magnus pleaded. "I find it hard to believe too. But after what happened at the meeting today…"

…

Jace didn't understand girls. Sure, he understood their anatomy from inside out, and it wasn't like they were an alien species, but sometimes, they sure seemed like it.

One moment they were mad at you, the next moment so heartbreakingly sweet, and then they were crying and screaming.

He didn't get Clary. Honestly, he never fully got her. With most girls he'd been with, it'd been a piece of cake to figure out what they wanted, but with Clary, he hardly ever knew what she was thinking, much less what she wanted.

He didn't get why she had run out of SAI, looking lost and dazed. Or why she had cried and screamed at him, sounding so broken and miserable.

Her sorrow made him sad.

Jace picked up his briefcase and slid out of his new Porsche. Even mustering a smile at the beautiful car was a difficult task, as every time he looked at it, he remembered how Clary's face had collapsed at the sight of it.

He walked into the garage level, turning a corner towards the elevator when a hand yanked his collar backward and slammed him against the cement wall, so hard he saw stars. After choking and coughing for a couple of seconds, Jace finally caught his breath. Just in time to deflect a punch aimed at his nose.

"What the hell?"

A tall, shaggy haired guy stood before him, his green eyes blazing with anger. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Going to work?"

"You're more of a dick than I thought," the guy snarled, planting his coarse hands on Jace's chest and shoving him back.

Jack got right back in his face. "Who the hell do you think you are?"

"Who the hell do you think you are? To have the nerve to show up after what you've done?"

He frowned, perplexed but still angry. "Care to enlighten me on exactly what I've done?"

"You – " Snarling, lips drawn back, the guy rushed at Jace, who grabbed both of his wrists, both men straining against each other.

"What the hell is wrong?" Jace growled. "All I know is that some sick bastard upset Clary."

"You're the sick bastard, you asshole."

"What?"

"You're seriously going to play dumb?"

Eyes wild and teeth bared, the guy looked like a freaking werewolf, and suddenly, Jace knew exactly who he was. Jordan.

"You stole our product."

"What product?" This was getting more confusing by the second.

"Hells Loose. You stole our product, and you got Clary fired in the worst possible way ever."

Dimly, Jace remembered something called Hells Loose, but regardless of how hard he tried, its origin remained obscure. One word, however, rang as clear as day.

Clary. Fired.

"I did what to Clary?"

"You got her fired in front of all the managers in SAI. She was yelled out by our CEO, humiliated by the VPs, and dragged out of the room by guards," Jordan smirked at the shocked expression on Jace's face. "I have to congratulate you, asshole. You really know how to break hearts."

Jace's numbed fingers slipped from Jordan's wrist. "Holy shit. Clary…holy shit."

He was so going to kill Jocelyn. How could anyone do that to someone as sweet and kind as Clary? How could Jocelyn have had the heart to even think of doing something cruel like that?

Hot blood pounded in his veins, and he pushed past Jordan, storming towards SAI to punch the daylights out of the guards who had laid a hand on Clary.

Jordan's hand shot out to grab Jace's arm in a vise-like grip. "Where the hell do you think you're going now?"

Jace really could not believe the nerve of this guy. He raised an eyebrow. "Obviously to shoot bullets from my nostrils that will hopefully implant themselves into Jocelyn's vital organs."

Jordan's eyes popped out. "You can't do that! They'll arrest you for going in there. You stole our product, remember?" He trailed off, eyes wide. "Holy shit, I've been talking to a criminal." He shot a quick look at Jace. "Stay here."

Does he think I'm stupid or something? Jace thought.

"Wait," he shouted, effectively startling Jordan. "I didn't steal it. I had no clue of any of this until you told me."

Jordan shot him a skeptic look.

"Seriously, would I be standing out in the open like this, waiting for the police to just come and catch me, if I'd known?"

"Well…"

Jace rolled his eyes. "Look, all I want now is to avenge Clary, and to figure out what's at the bottom of this. And I," he swallowed, "I can't do this without your help."

It stung, having to say those words.

Jordan didn't budge.

"For Clary," Jace sighed. "You can punch me to death afterwards."

"You can count on that, asshole." Jordan spit into his hand and stuck it out, his eyes still suspicious.

Jace shook it, grimacing slightly as their spit smeared into each other and onto their hands. "Good," he smiled. "Now give me your clothes."

"WHAT?"

…

"Your pants are a bit tight in the crotch area," Jace muttered, reaching down and pulling the groin area lower for the fourth time in ten minutes. "Must be because of my gargantuan dick. Either that, or you must be seriously lacking in the baggage compartment."

"Shut the fuck up, asshole." Jordan growled, suppressing a smile. "I'm only doing this for Clary, so hurry the hell up before I change my mind."

Jace pulled Jordan's cap low over his eyes, and stealthily walked out of the men's restroom into SAI. He made no eye contact with anyone, and stepped nonchalantly into the, thankfully empty, elevator, pressing the button to his floor.

Safe inside, he let out a relieved sigh. Jordan had lent him his clothes so he could sneak into his office and see if there was any way to correct this situation. The elevator opened silently, and he stepped out, reaching the end of the hallway to his office.

It was weird, knowing that Clary wouldn't be in there, but still feeling her presence. He'd go in, and she'd swing around in her chair with that half smirk on her face and a snide comment.

He pushed the door and almost collapsed on it.

Clary's presence disappeared in an instance. The office looked as if one side of it had been sucked into a giant vacuum. Clary's cabinet's – all gone. Her computer – gone. Her papers on her side of the desk – gone, gone, gone.

Numb, Jace ran his fingers absentmindedly along the faded black line they had established on the very first day, dividing the table in half. He had hated her then, and yet had still been unexplainably attracted at the same time. Now his heart clenched with a bitter nostalgia for those days.

Then he noticed his papers: messy, crumpled, and out of order. Someone had definitely rummaged through them.

And that someone would most likely come back.

Jace sprang into action, searching for any signs of incriminating evidence. His computer files, his cabinets, all of his USBs. His head swam with all the freaking info, but nothing looked suspicious. Nothing was the answer to the problem.

Too much time had passed. Jordan had to be pissed beyond imagination. The guy was bound to bust in any time.

Jace couldn't breathe. He bent over, hands on his knees, his head lowered, gasping for oxygen.

Goggly eyes stared disapprovingly at him.

"Goddammit!" he shouted. "Don't fucking stare at me!"

The eyes continued their judging glare. Jace yelled in fury, forgetting himself, and grabbed the ugly beanie dog, crushing it in his fist.

And crushed something hard. Something sharp. Something that should not be in a stuffed animal at all.

Heart pounding, he ripped the dog open by its seams, digging out the cotton stuffing and spilling the beans all over the floor before shaking out the contents into his hand.

In his palm, two pieces of broken lens and one tiny, crushed camera smiled gruesomely up at him, glinting – just like Valentine's eyes when he had given the present to him.

"Oh, God," Jace whispered.

…

He could report Valentine.

But no, of course he couldn't. How could he? Valentine was his boss, and he would lose his job if he did.

He could let it go and throw the creepy dog away.

But that would mean letting a felony go uncharged, and he couldn't allow that. It would be choosing his job over Clary, and he would never do that either.

Yet by not reporting Valentine, wasn't that what he was doing?

Jace groaned, flipping over on his back on the couch, and stuffed more Cheetos into his mouth.

Who cared about calories? He could afford some fat, and even if he lost his current physique, he was too depressed and miserable to care.

On screen, Ross and Rachel danced and sang a perverted song to their baby, much to their friends' horrors, and even that couldn't elicit a half-hearted attempt at smiling. Friends had always cheered him on. Now he wanted to punch in all their faces because of their happiness.

Misery had never felt so terrible.

The guilt of knowing that Valentine was the culprit and doing absolutely nothing about it ripped him up from the inside out, twisting his gut and yanking his heart. Even worse, the more he waited, the more Clary was hurt. And the more he betrayed her.

He stuffed more Cheetos into his mouth, sucked on the cheesy, orange residue stuck on his fingers, and glared at the TV.

Now Clary hated his guts because she thought that he had snuck the USB file from her. And even worse, it meant that Sebastian was also in on this game. Sebastian, one of the few people he trusted. Sebastian, who had tricked him into tricking Clary.

God, life was so complicated sometimes.

A knock on the door pulled him to his feet. Jace dragged himself across the room and opened the door.

"Alec!" He said, surprised and slightly grateful. "Why are you – "

His head slammed into the wall so hard that the football trophies on the bookshelf shook. Dazed, he lay there, hissing and groaning as stabs of pain shot from his jaw and the back of his head.

"Jesus Christ, Alec," he muttered resentfully when he could finally form a complete thought after the pain died down.

"I told you that if you broke her heart, I'd break you." Alec leaned forward and jabbed one sharp nail into the inflicted bruise.

"Alec!" Jace yelled, placing both hands on his friend's chest, and shoved. "God, just wait until I explain, can you?"

Alec's lip curled. "Is there anything to explain?"

Jace pinched the bridge of his nose. So he was the bad guy.

"Yes," he said, and the desperateness in it surprised both him and Alec. His fists clenched and unclenched with the revelation that he had been so vulnerable.

Because the Jace Wayland everyone knew, the one he chose to show, was invincible. He couldn't be hurt, not when the defenders had tackled him and broken his arm three different places in high school, not when his dad had kicked him out of the house, and definitely not now because of some girl.

But as Alec kneeled beside him with concerned eyes and placed a hand on his shoulder, he thought that maybe this time he didn't have to hold it in anymore. Didn't have to swallow it like a bitter pill again. Didn't have to suffer by himself, alone, one more time.

And Clary, she wasn't just some girl. She was his girl.

Maybe people didn't need to be strong all the time. Maybe letting go once in a while made them stronger.

The problem was, could the people he knew accept him for who he really was? That he wasn't as strong as they'd liked him to be, or as brave, as snarky, as rude, manipulative, and heartless like he'd led them to believe? Would they forgive him for deceiving them?

His teeth grinded against each other as he stuffed his hands into his hair, pulling in anger and confusion.

"Goddammit," Jace groaned.

Alec's nails dug into his shoulder. "It's alright, you know. It takes courage to let go."

Jace did want to let go. He did, but he only wanted one person to be there to comfort him afterwards, to tell him that she still loved him and all that he was, even when he was weak.

But that girl wouldn't be there if he broke now. He didn't know if she'd ever be there for him again.

Jace took a shuddering breath. He could hold on for a little bit longer.

"Call Izzy," he said. "I'll explain it to both of you at once."

…

For the third day in a row, Clary sat on her bed, curled against the wall, staring at nothing. Her hair was a mess, her face, undoubtably, was even worse, and she smelled like the garbage dump. Her clothes were the same clothes she'd worn the day she got fired.

It took too much energy to change, to do anything, really. The milk was rotting in the fridge, and the pizza she'd ordered, half eaten, was stuffed slightly underneath her bed, rotting too.

Clary sighed, hugging her knees to her chest. She didn't cry – all her tears had been spent – but the same ache was still there. It tore into her every breath she took.

Why was it that every guy she fell for had broken her heart? And that she put all her faith and trust in people who only let her down?

Maybe it was because she was too weak.

Well, Clary thought, she'd show them. She'd become the heartbreaker of hearts, in her the place of her own heart there would be a shard of ice, and in her veins, not warm blood, but the cold, Antarctic waters would flow. That way, she could never be hurt again.

Or she could move to a country in the Mideast and live there in recluse, pretending to be asexual.

Or she could just stay here, at home, wallowing in self pity, misery, and hatred.

God, why did he have to break her heart and stomp all over it? Smash it into pieces, and just leave it there, broken like glass, like Humpty Dumpty who couldn't be put together again?

How could he be so heartless?

How could he have done this to her?

Clary buried her face in her knees.

What did I do wrong?

And Jocelyn's face as she had delivered the death sentence, kicking her from Shadowhunter Academy: disappointed, hateful, and loathing.

And her friends' expressions. They'd hurt her even more, the disbelief and shock mirrored in their eyes as they'd stared open-mouthed at her. They had believed that she could do such a terrible thing. They hadn't even doubted the veracity and the truthfulness of the whole situation and had just accused her. Just like that.

The doorbell rang, but she didn't move. If it was him, well, he could go rot in hell. She never wanted to see his sorry face again. If it was Isabelle or Alec, she wasn't ready to face them yet. To have them judge her too.

The doorbell rang again, and again, and again.

And then – "Clary! Clary Fray, open up already!"

She bolted out of bed. "Simon?"

"Yeah, believe it or not," his voice came irritatedly through the door. "Now can you open up so I'm not standing here stupidly? Seriously, your neighbor is giving me the death glare. I think I woke her up from her beauty sleep."

Clary yanked the door open. "Simon."

He still looked the same as she'd last seen him. Same square glasses, same sloppy, brown hair, some crooked, nerdy smile. She hadn't seen him in such a long time, since she broke his heart.

Simon took one look at her and opened his arms. "Oh, Clary…"

She buried her face in his chest. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

His hand smoothed her hair. "For what?"

"For being so – so awful to you. I'm the worst friend in the world, Simon. I'm so sorry for everything."

He led her to the sofa, gently pushing her shoulders to make her sit. Even as she sat, she had one first clenched on his arm, lest he disappeared once more.

"It's my fault actually," he said.

"Simon…"

"No, seriously. It's my fault because I couldn't stand the fact that you didn't feel the same way about me. I couldn't accept what you told me, and I ran off like an immature fifth grader." He pushed his glasses up his nose, his mouth curling in a grimace. "If I was a good friend, I would have at least tried to be happy for you."

"We both made mistakes," Clary said. "I think we're both responsible for what happened."

Curled against her best friend, she sighed sadly, reflecting over their loss. And although it made her sad, it still hurt less than thinking of Jace.

…

"So what you're saying," Isabelle mused, sitting cross-legged and picking at the dirty carpet with her manicured fingernails, "is that Valentine and Sebastian tricked you into bringing the file to them. They're the ones behind this scandal."

"Exactly," Jace nodded. "And your thong is showing."

Isabelle glared at him but made no move to smooth down her dress. "So don't look, pervert."

"You're the one flaunting it like it's on display."

She threw a cheeto at him.

"Oh, good," said Alec. "You're still sarcastic. I was beginning to be scared at how depressed you were acting."

"I am depressed."

"But don't flirt with my sister," Alec continued as if Jace hadn't spoken. "It's disgusting."

Isabelle simpered at Jace with a smug smile and flipped her glossy black hair over her shoulder. "What I don't get is how you could have just given the USB over without inspecting, even bothering to wonder, what was on there. You're not that much of a bonehead."

"I know," he groaned, dropping his head in his hands. "But Clary had just promised me…something every man needs after weeks without it…"

Alec snorted. "Okay, we get the point. Anyway, this dog – or what remains of it – was actually a camera for Valentine to look at Clary's computer to see how to access her files."

"Yes," Jace said.

"The problem is, how do we prove that Valentine was the one who gave it to Jace?" Isabelle asked.

Jace's eyes dulled. "He keeps a camera in his office to prevent anyone from stealing anything."

The siblings turned simultaneously, their expressions sharp. "You've thought of this before," Isabelle accused.

He nodded miserably.

"Then why are we here? Why haven't you done anything?"

"Can I?" Jace shot back, exasperated. Isabelle's eyes, ever so dark and black, stared at him so intensely he found that he could not hold them and had to turn to Alec. "This is my job we're dealing with – "

"This is Clary we're dealing with," Isabelle cut him off.

Jace stared at her. This was the Isabelle he knew, the Isabelle the Lightwoods knew. She was blunt, told no lies, and made no fake promises. She dove right to the heart of issues and never let you off the hook.

"Don't you think I've already thought about that too?" He asked softly. "It's been haunting me, how I know what is right, what I should do, what I need to, and will do, and yet I can't do it? How much Clary means to me, and how much I owe it to her to do this? To finally do something right in my life?"

"You give yourself way less credit than you deserve," Alec said. "You're not bad, Jace."

"Besides all those hearts you broke in high school," Isabelle added.

Alec glared. "Isabelle."

"What?" Isabelle said crossly.

"Just shut up."

She did, much to Alec's surprise. Not that Jace noticed. He still had his head buried in his hands, his back bent and shoulders caved in, looking as vulnerable as the siblings had ever seen him.

"Jace," Isabelle said, breaking her vow of silence. "What you do, we'll be here for you."

He looked up at them, gold eyes empty, tortured, and bleak. "And what about Clary?"

She sighed and looked down. "She hasn't called me yet. To be honest, I don't think she wants to talk to me, because talking to me would remind her of you." She scooted forward to place her hands over his. "I believe you'll make the right decision, and I believe that when you do, she will try to find a way to forgive you."

A tidal wave of emotion engulfed him, and it was all he could do to nod and not cry.

He glanced down, still choking in gratitude.

Thank you, guys. Thank you,

"And Jace, I know that the sight of red butterflies swirling over black lace and these long, toned legs render most men senseless, please, try and make an effort to advert your eyes!"

Knowing how much effort Isabelle was putting to cheer him up, Jace pasted on a small smile. "I'm sorry Izzy, but I believe that most women need to pay a respectable sum before I grace their panties with my eyes."

"Both of you," Alec shouted, "just shut up!"

Haha, Izzy and Alec(:

Once again, sorry for the long hiatus, but I hoped you enjoyed this chapter! (hope you didn't fall asleep reading it halfway through LOL)

REVIEW!