Page 141 of Safe and Sound

When I hung up with Gianni, I called Niall. “I want a double team on Ava’s house.”

“Did the fucker escape?” Niall questioned.

“There’s a new threat.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“I wish I was.”

“I’m on it.”

“Great. Thanks.”

As I turned to go back into the room, my blood thirst had tempered. More than anything, I just wanted to get back to Ava and Piper. When I stalked back over to him, Wesley was weeping softly. “In lieu of the information you gave me, my plans have changed.”

Hope bloomed in his eyes at my words. “You’re letting me go?”

A cruel smile curved on my lips. “Why would I do that?”

“So I can find the information for you.”

“What makes you think I need you?”

“But…I…”

Reaching into my suit pocket, I pulled out a gleaming knife. “No, no! Please!” Wesley screamed.

Reaching for his belt buckle, I said, “I’m just going to fast forward to the showstopper. You remember, don’t you? The part where you choke to death on your own cock.”

And in that moment, I became the monster Ava feared I was.

Chapter Thirty-Six: Ava

Aweek had passed since Dare had ended Wesley’s threat against me. When he returned from Boston, we didn’t talk about it. Instead, he swaggered in with his usual bravado, teasing Piper by pretending to talk for her kittens and leaving me breathless from a make-out session in the walk-in pantry.

He’d accompanied Piper and me to dinner with my parents. Regardless of how charming he was, my parents simply weren’t having it. When Dare would try to initiate conversation withthem, they would reply in very vague terms. They tried as best they could to ignore him.

Of course, that was a hard thing with Piper sitting in his lap looking like his spitting image.

When we’d had a moment alone, I called Mom out on it. “It’s not that we don’t like him,” she argued.

“Then what’s the problem?”

“It’s who he is.”

“He’s so much more than that,” I had argued.

But deep down, I was starting to worry that maybe he wasn’t. After his trip to Boston to take care of Wesley, something remained off with him.

He claimed the reason bodyguards remained at the house was because he was staying there now. He claimed his presence made it necessary. He claimed he had his head buried in his phone because of the casino opening.

I didn’t want to think he was lying to me. But deep in my heart, I knew there was more going on than he was telling me.

And it scared the hell out of me.

For tonight, I chose to ignore my fears. Tonight was about feeling alive and having fun being on the arm of an extremely handsome man. Tonight was about an expensive designer dress and having my hair and makeup professionally done. Tonight was about glamour and excess.

Tonight was the opening of the Celtic Grand in Philadelphia.

---