Page 40 of Hunting Pretty

My fingers reached automatically for my knife, and I pulled my black hood up over my head, ready to step out of the shadows.

A tiny part inside me warned that there weretoo many fucking witnesses.

But I didn’t care.

Nobodydisrespects my girl.

Nobody touches Ava.

But before I could step out, Ava wrenched her arm away.

“Touch me again and I’ll sue you for sexual harassment.”Ava pointed to the box positioned on the wall above them. “Wave to our security cameras,neighbor.”

His gaze flicked up to the security camera on the wall over the gate.

He scowled, his features screwing up into an evil mask.

I froze, my breath caught in my throat, ready to leap out and stab him in the face.

But he stepped aside, letting Ava get to the gate.

I dropped my knife back into its sheath. For now.

Pride made my chest swell.

My girl handled it all on her own without me needing to get my hands dirty in front of her.

Such a good girl.

But I could hear the catch of fear in her breath, could see the panic in the way she slammed the gate shut behind her with a clang and hurried away, her arms clutched over her chest.

Deep down, she was askingmeto protect her.Even if she didn’t realize it.

Her fear was my permission.

The way he held on to the railing and leered at her ass through the bars as she hurried up the pathway to the house was the nail in his coffin.

You don’t have to be afraid, I promised her.He won’t touch you again.

Her safety was my absolution for the sin I was about to commit.

Later that evening, the hallway ahead of me was dark and silent.

I made my way through, each step placed carefully, as I hunted my unknowing prey.

I paused at the door, open a crack but in darkness, from where I could hear a wet repetitive sound coming.

With a gloved hand, I pushed it open, slowly so as not to make a sound.

Thomas Peterson was at the window in the dark, holding a pair of binoculars, with his silk pajama bottoms bunched around his ankles, his sickly pale legs, thin as twigs, bare as they shook.

“Take that dick, bitch,” he grunted under his breath, panting as his hand pumped himself with a frenzied impatience. “Little fucking whore.”

His pale ass, half-covered by his pajama top, clenched.

I knew the layout of Ava’s neighboring mansion well enough that this window was directly opposite hers.

He was watchingAva.

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