Page 44 of White Rabbit

We weren’t there yet.

Love?

Love.

It couldn’t be love. I didn’t do love.

Love was all soft and mushy, hearts and flowers. It wasn’t that complicated—she was mine, and I was hers. We were a carnal, raw, intense, all-consuming obsession. Hard and fast with an instant connection. That wasn’t love, was it?

“Anyways, is there a reason for this delightful call?” Cato sounds bored as they let out another small sigh. “I’m about to teach my puppy a lesson and you're interrupting.”

“Tell Nicco, I said hi.” I grin. “Anyway, I need you to look into Ava’s brother.”

“She doesn’t have a brother.”

“She does.”

I hear a noise, as if Cato’s tapping their nails on something in annoyance. “There are literally no records of a brother, Elijah. I know how to do my job.”

Putting on an annoying sing-song voice because the fucker first-named me I say, “Well then you missed something, my friend because there’s a brother.”

“Oh, for fucks sake.” They grumble before calling out, almost deafening me. “Lassie!”

The line goes quiet before I burst out laughing. Some of the other inmates walking by eye me like I’ve gone crazy and they’re afraid I might attack them. “What the fuck is Lassie?”

Cato mutters something under their breath before they grunt. “It’s called a safe word. No, don’t ask. And you owe me, fucker.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

AVA

Swapping some of my shifts with Cass meant I hadn’t seen Elijah Creed for a few days and with class today canceled, I’ve driven myself crazy thinking about him. Obsessing over who Elijah Creed was. It’s like he’s in my blood and I can’t escape him.

He claimed to have killed his father, but I can’t find anything that says he did. There’s no proof, not even a niggling suspicion from the authorities.

Augustine Creed went missing after a drunken fight with his wife when Eli was seventeen. Seventeen years old. There’s no way a teenager killed his father and then managed to successfully cover it up, is there? He was a teen, not some hardened criminal at that age. The more I read, the more I know in my heart that Creed did it.

Office Foxx had asked some friends down at the police department for some files, and now I wish I hadn’t mentioned it.

Hospital records from that night show his mother was admitted with a broken jaw, a fractured arm and the bottom of her feet had been cut with a razor blade. What kind of home life did Elijah have? His own nose was broken and the files show he had old and new scarring on his back, presumably from a belt and buckle.

He was beaten by his father regularly. His bones were broken and reset. No wonder Elijah became this big, bad, ruthless Left Hand. No one fucks with the Left Hand. Creed became a monster to protect himself and his mother from the monster who raised him. He did what he had to.

I can’t stop the tears that fall, dripping from my cheeks and splatting onto the papers in front of me. How could his father have treated him that way? How could his mother stay? Was this what being in The Family was?

My phone pings, and I glance down. There’s a text from my brother asking where I am. Why would Andrew text me? He hates me, blames me for whatever is happening in his life…I check again and notice the time. Fuck! I’m late for our weekly dinner.

Thirty minutes later, after potentially earning myself a speeding ticket, I’m sitting opposite my brother, with my father positioned at the head of the table like always. I’ve pushed down the emotions from earlier, leaving them in a box to unpack later, away from my father and his prying eyes.

“Late again, Ava,” my father chides with a disapproving glare.

“I apologize.” Bowing my head, I stare down at the food Elsie has brought out. My father and Andrew have huge bloody steaks on their plates with pasta and salad sides. I only have a bowl of pasta and some salad. This quiet anger fills me as they eat, missing my glass when they pour the wine.

My father clearly isn’t done with the topic as he tuts, his knife screeching against the bone china. “Chad will never marry you if you can’t fix those lazy habits of yours.”

I inhale slowly, before blurting out, “We broke up.”

“What?”

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