Page 223 of The Devil's Fire

I remember my mother said he attacked sooner rather than later. Someone was after her, and she was aware of it. However, the attack in our own home caught her off guard.

I let out a small gasp when it hit me.

Maybe she wanted to talk to Mr. Vasiliev for protection?

Well, there was only one way to find out.

I grabbed the basket I had filled with delicacies and a nice bottle of wine, making my way over to Ava and Samantha. As soon as I reached their front porch, the door opened. Since I knew they worked for Damiano, they didn’t bother hiding that they were watching me; hence why they opened the door before I even had the chance to step close enough to knock on the door.

“Sup, Althaia!” Ava said happily, making me smile at her chipper mood.

“You’re really watching my every move, huh?” I joked, to which she laughed.

“Yeah, I don’t feel like being discreet anymore now the cat is out of the bag, anyway. Plus, a certain someone would have my head if I wasn’t being thorough.” She gave me a knowing look.

“I guess you’re right.” I chuckled.

“Come on in. Cecilia has just baked you a chocolate cake.”

“Cecilia?” I asked.

“Oh, shoot! I forgot you didn’t know her real name. Samantha was just a cover name in case you would get suspicious of her name sounding Italian.” She explained with an innocent grin on her lip.

“That makes sense. Wait, is your real name Ava, then?” I squinted my eyes at her, making her laugh.

“It sure is. I’m not Italian anyway, so I thought it was pretty safe.” She said as we made our way to the living room. “But we had a feeling you were already onto us the moment we bumped into you.”

“I had my suspicions, but I wasn’t too sure. When you asked if I had a boyfriend and I said no, you seemed surprised, like you already knew the answer.” I pointed out, and she looked impressed.

“Damn you’re good! And here I thought you would be easy to trick. I totally underestimated you.” Ava shook her head in amusement.

“I learned from the best.” I winked with a smile.

Cecilia made an appearance in the living room, her apron covered in flour.

“I thought I heard your voice! I had my headphones in while baking because Ava wouldn’t shut up about being bored.” She said, glaring at Ava, who gave her a sour look in return.

“I guess I haven’t given you much to do lately.” I said a bit awkwardly. I stayed inside most of the time, except when I went out to do some shopping for the house and Kiara.

“Which is a good thing, but Ava seems to forget that.” She kept scolding her, and Ava just rolled her eyes at her while mumbling something under her breath.

“By the way, this is for you guys.” I said, coming to Ava’s rescue and holding up the basket. “I just wanted to thank you for watching Kiara that day.” I smiled softly at them, to which they returned.

“Well, I’m not about to turn down that bottle of wine! I will get the glasses.” Ava turned around and made her way to the kitchen.

“I made a chocolate cake for you. I heard it’s your favorite.” Cecilia smiled.

“Chocolate cake or not, I’m not going to say no to whatever you’ve baked.” I said, making her face brighten before she followed Ava to the kitchen.

I placed the basket on the coffee table and decided to look around the living room. They had made it look like they had been living here for a while, with many personal touches and frames of pictures scattered around. They really thought of everything to make things as believable as possible.

A vibrating sound caught my attention, and I looked over to see a phone ringing on the couch. I picked it up to hand it over to either of them but stopped in my tracks when I saw the name flashing on the screen, causing my heart to pound.

Damiano.

Damiano was calling, making me stand still and just stare at the phone. I really wanted to answer the call, just to hear his voice for a second. My finger hovered over to accept the call, but Arianna’s words stopped me. Still, I kept debating if I should answer the call, but it was already decided for me when the call ended for taking too long.

I let out a breath, my heart squeezing as I placed the phone down on the couch. The phone buzzed again. I couldn't resist and peeked at the screen. It was a text message from him. But when Ava and Cecilia returned quickly, I moved away from the phone and sat on the opposite couch.

---