Page 54 of Brutal Collateral

“Be at my townhouse in ten minutes.” I hang up before he can argue. “Change of plans. Zervas is coming to us.”

I glance back into the car, my heart breaking at how Ava has curled into a ball again. I don’t have the training to heal the kind of trauma she’s been through. I have an empire to run. That includes working out of a new office building with a team of project managers Kai Powers hired to coordinate the UN land deal.

What am I supposed to do? Leave her tied up all day?

I lean against the rear passenger door. “Ava,” I address her by her real name again.

“My name is Hadleigh,” she whispers.

“Ava,” I stress. I have to accept it and so does she. “Your brother wants you to stay with me.”

Her eyes go wide and she uncurls herself. As if she were the Hulk and turning green and growing, the fight returns to her in an instant.

I reach in and grip her throat again, resting my knees on the bench seat. “I’d like nothing better than to drop you off. Get you out of my hair until our wedding. My hands are tied.”

“Now you know how it feels.” She shoves her sore wrists in my face, knocking my hands from her throat.

“Ava, show me you can behave, and I’ll keep you untied. Give you all the freedom you want.”

“With guards,” she hisses.

“Of course with guards, that’s nothing new to you.”

Wait, it is new to her if she’s been living as Hadleigh for nearly a decade.

With watery eyes, she confesses, “Alexander said I’d be fighting alongside him. I don’t need a guard when I’m the tip of the spear.”

I tilt my head at the military phrase I’ve not heard in a long time. “Tip of the spear. That’s what Alexander said?”

“Yeah.” She looks away, but I see her jaw ticking. “My father tried to give me away to pay a debt. Alexander saw my value as more than a trophy wife.”

There’s more here to unravel. But knowing what she wants, what she’s willing to tear the flesh off my bones for is her weakness. I’m prepared to give her anything she wants. I don’t want this marriage either. But Ineedpeace with her brothers if I’m to head the Irish Mob with any kind of success.

“You and I have to sit down and figure out a way to get over the past,” I tell her to get out of my head. “That includes what I need presently to keep peace between our families. People are fucking dying, Ava. Greek and Irish blood have been spilled. The truce will only hold if we show our alignment through marriage. That we’re a family and we’re stronger together.”

She turns her dark eyes toward me like something I said struck a nerve. “Past. Present. What about the future?”

“I have a deal for you. But it requires me to trust you.”

“Trust me to do what?”

“To not fucking kill me, for one.” I can’t believe I’m afraid of a female, but this one can and will murder me in my sleep. Maybe even eat me.

Ava glances behind me, at my brothers. “I suspect they’ll kill me right back.”

“In a heartbeat.” I stroke her hair. The deep ebony hue is fucking jarring as all hell. All these years I remembered her as a blonde. “I’m getting the feeling you and Alexander were closer than you and Ares. That Alexander cared more about your dreams. Knew your potential.”

When she doesn’t argue, I keep going, “I don’t think your brother Ares cares about your dreams and might even secretly wished Brandon killed you.” I find it easy to be honest with her. “Maybe he wants an excuse to break the truce. Then what? I’m dead, and you’re dead. I assume you want to disappear again, stay far away from me.”

She squints at me. “You betcha.”

My heart lands in my throat at how shereallywants nothing to do with me. How the idea of marrying me makes her sick.

My anger flames back to life, and I’m sickened to feel unworthy of the crown I was handed. “Let’s get you settled into my house. There’s a wedding to plan. Appearances at galas. We have to make this work.”

“And?”

“Scooch over while we drive to my townhouse. I have a proposal I don’t think you’ll say no to.”

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