Page 95 of Unspoken Promises

“Goddamn it, Ava!” I give Estrella a little kick, and she bolts, but I spin around ahead and come back toward Hector too erratically.

Ava pulls on the reins, backing him up. “Enzo!”

“Sorry… just… fuck!” My voice is louder than I want it to be and yet not loud enough to express my exasperation.

Emotion overwhelms her but I’m full steam ahead.

“What on earth were you thinking? Not telling me immediately?”

“You don’t get it, Enzo, because you refuse to believe me. You refuse to believe Anton was a prisoner, too. But he was. I worried if I told you, you’d go after him.”

I teeter on the edge of going after him now. “Damn right I would. And I will.”

Her words are impassioned, full of equal parts anger and hurt. “He was kept there, too. I worried that maybe, he was forced to possibly commit crimes. I just… I needed some time to think.”

“You mean to let him get away…”

“No.” She’s shaken. “Maybe. Enzo, I don’t know what I was thinking. I needed time. I believe him being safe means I am, too.”

“How on earth do you figure that?”

“Because nobody could reason I’m here but him. If he’saway from Father, Anton can’t be tortured into giving information.”

A humorless, out-of-control laugh leaves my lips. “How do you even know it was him? How do you know it wasn’t your father?”

She stills. Uncertainty passes over her features. “He called me Menace. Nobody knows he called me that.”

I take my hat off and tug at my hair. “This is bad. You have to admit it. Do you know if Anton is capable of a data breach like this? On his own?”

She says the word like she wishes it was a different answer. “No.”

“Ava, you’ve given dangerous men who are after you two days’ lead by not telling me. Or Rio. Or fucking someone, anyone in cybersecurity would have done!”

I jump down off my horse and stride over to snatch Ava off hers, too.

She smooths hair behind her ears, features somewhere between bursting into tears and sinking her claws into me.

“You think I’m being silly when in actual fact you’re basing everything off assumptions. You don’t know Anton like I do. You don’t understand my situation. It’s complicated.”

I hold her in my arms and stare her dead in the eyes, hoping I can burst through some of this power her past has over her.

“That’s just your problem. It isn’t complicated. Men do not keep little girls locked up away from the world unless they are very bad, Scottie. I know you’ve seen things and I feel for you. You know if anyone offers you empathy it’s me. But at the same time, you don’t have the first clue just how evil people are. The things we’ve unearthed here at GhostEye? The atrocities? The depraved, disgusting scum ofhumanity is what I learn about day in and day out. Your father, your uncle, arenotcomplicated. They’re evil.”

She’s fuming and matches my thunder. “That’s just the problem with you, Enzo. You want to tell me I’m gullible? Maybe you’re the simpleton! You think the world is perfectly arranged in opposites. Good and evil? Black and white? This perfect symmetry doesn’t exist, and I’m goddamned smart enough to know that, andyou’renot. This world and people are shades of gray. You’re telling me you’re perfect? You have some lily-white reputation? No, we’re all a little fucked up.”

“There’s a big difference between making mistakes and torturing people.”

“That’s true. And Ihatemy father.” She pauses, unable to continue, choking up with emotion. “But my uncle?” Tears flood her eyes.

“Don’t say it…”

Please, Ava. Don’t protect him.

I desperately don’t want her to think good of a man who kept her captive, because if she’s truly been brainwashed by her uncle, that will break me into a million pieces.

A tear escapes down her cheek. “He deserves freedom. I know he does. I’ve clung to that as my beacon of hope in this world, Enzo. I have to believe he’s good or my anchor pulls up.”

Her cheeks are completely tearstained and flushed, and my throat tightens with compassion. I haul her into my chest. Her words are muffled against my neck.

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