Page 90 of Shattered Empire (Shattered World)

“That’s impossible,” he told me harshly. Matthias growled at him and stepped forward.

“Watch your tone,” my husband snarled at my father. Goosebumps broke across my skin at his protectiveness over me. The fucker was still in the doghouse, but damn if my body wasn’t catching up to that.

My father’s shoulders fell, and he looked contrite as he said, “Your mother had one exactly like it,” he explained. “It was handmade, and a family heirloom given to her by your great-grandmother. There are only two in existence.”

“Who has the other one?” I asked curiously.

“Your grandmother.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

“Does she still have it?” Ava asked her father.

Liam shrugged. “As far as I know,” he said. “I’ve never actually seen it. It was just what your mother told me when we were children. Your great-grandmother gave it to her upon her birth.”

My wife was silent for a moment, and I recognized that the gears in her head were working out a puzzle. I hadn’t missed the look in her eyes when she saw the box. Like she recognized it, and the minute she remembered where, her eyes lit up like fire.

“We need to go back to my old house.” She snapped her fingers and smiled. “That’s where I’ve seen this before.”

“Where in the house?” I asked, because if one of her mother’s enemies had seen it, they might have taken it.

“In one of my hiding places in the kitchen,” she told me excitedly. “I always thought it was a recipe box.”

I nodded my assent.

“Vas.” We both called for him at the same time. This could get awkward. My wife looked at me askance as Vas stepped forward with a broad grin.

“Yes, bosses.” He gave a dramatic pause before adding the extra -es on the end. Fucking asshole.

“You and Maxim follow us to the house,” Ava ordered before I could get a word in edgewise. It was fine. This was her mission, and I’d let her have that.

For now.

I wasn’t sure how I planned to take back over theBratvawhen I came back, but I knew I didn’t want Ava near it if I could help it. I did, however, want her to become the face and full-time CEO of Arctic Security. She’d proven several times over that she was intelligent enough to be able to run it.

Even if she had learned about the company less than a week ago.

“Sully, you’re welcome to join if you wish,” she told him. Sully nodded and leaned over to whisper to one of his men. “Matthias, my father, and I will take another car.”

“Does that mean I’m not fired?” Vas joked, but I could see the seriousness behind his eyes. Vas was the closest thing Ava had ever had to a best friend that wasn’t one of her sisters, and for the last month or so, he had been lying to her. Withholding information. Keeping secrets.

“Still on my shitlist,” she muttered darkly as she brushed past him. Vas’s shoulders slumped.

“She just needs time,” I told him, handing him the key fob to Liam’s Ferrari. “See you there.”

Vas nodded, looking like someone had kicked his puppy.

Ava would forgive him a lot easier than she’d forgive me. That I was sure of. It would just take time for her heart to heal.

* * *

The drive to Ava’s childhood home was quiet. No one was sure what to say. My wife gripped the small box tightly, as if she was afraid someone would take it from her. I understood her reticence to let it go. This was her smoking gun. It was going to be whether her father believed her that mattered.

I stared up at the two-story family home, and for a moment, I wondered what Ava’s childhood here was like. She never really spoke of her time with her mother, and that was my fault. I’d never taken an interest in her past as she had in mine.

Over our time together, she had revealed snippets every now and then, but I got the feeling that most of her memories from this time were repressed. I just wasn’t sure if it was purposeful on my wife’s part, or if someone had forced her to do it.

She wasted no time throwing open the rickety front door and barging inside like a woman on a mission. Ava passed directly through the living room and into the large, homey kitchen. This was where Ava’s love for baking had come from. On several occasions, I had caught her and Mia baking up a batch of cookies or brownies. Sometimes even cakes.

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