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Thirty-six

"Drake." Hudson stops dead in his tracks. Jaxon squeezes his hand, keeping his eyes trained on Hudson's brother. "What do you want?"

"Come home." Drake stands from his spot on the curb and brushes off the back of his pants. "Mom's worried."

"Did you tell her why I left in the first place?" Hudson spits, narrowing his eyes. Eli slips his phone out of his pocket and opens the camera, hitting record. "You beat me because I'm not straight. You beat me before then. You think you can waltz back into my life and just pretend like everything is all fine and dandy and ask me to go back to that hellhole?"

"Hudson, Mom and I love you. You know that."

"You don't-"

"Jaxon." Hudson pulls his hand from Jaxon's and holds it up. Jaxon nods and slams his mouth shut. "You don't know what love is. I don't know who taught you that it's hitting and screaming and making me feel like shit, but it doesn't matter. You don't love me. You love hurting me."

"You think I wanted to hit you?" Drake hisses. "You needed to learn- you needed to- to-"

"Needed to learn what?"

Jaxon rests a hand on Hudson's shoulder in an attempt to calm him down.

"Needed to learn a lesson? Congratulations, you taught me a very valuable lesson!" Hudson rolls Jaxon's hand off his shoulder. "I learned that my family is these three. My family is made of my friends, not the people I'm related to by blood. You are not my brother. Eli is, and Jack, and Brendon, Cameron, Chase, Darren. Holly is my sister. As far as I'm concerned, you're just someone I happen to share DNA with."

"Do you know what the police do with runaway cases?" Drake tilts his head and smiles without it reaching his eyes. "If I call them, Jack's family gets put in jail. You get brought back to us."

"You go to jail because we have photo evidence of what you did to Hudson that night we got him out of there," Jaxon says. "This entire confrontation is being recorded right now. You admitted to hitting him. You think any cops are going to bring Hudson back to you?"

"Right." Drake rolls his eyes and laughs. "You think the cops are going to be on your side? Who's to say Hudson didn't get the few bruises on his legs and arms from falling? It's not like they all happened at the same time."

"They have photos of my entire upper body." Hudson grabs Jaxon's hand with trembling fingers. "That combined with this encounter is enough to land you in jail for child abuse."

"All I have to do is break the SIM card." Drake shrugs. "How long do you think that'll take?"

As if we rehearsed it, Jaxon and I pull out our phones and start recording. Who knew we'd be doing something like this twice?

"You now have to break three phones." Jaxon tilts his head and smiles. "Three SIM cards. Three charges of destruction of property. You think you can get all of our phones before we get to a public place?"

Drake narrows his eyes.

"I'll make you a deal." He starts pacing in front of Hudson and Jaxon. "If you three stop recording and Hudson agrees to come back home, I'll leave right now."

"You think you're in a position to negotiate?" Eli asks. "We hold the cards, Drake. You don't get to cut a deal. We do. Here it is: you turn and walk away right now and I delete this recording. You leave Hudson alone from now on and we don't contact the police."

"And the other two recordings?"

"Gone."

Drake cocks his head. "Deal."