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More silence before she murmurs a goodbye and hangs up.
I hear her crying, which has me clenching my fists tightly. Does she have another man? Fucking figures. Whatever she came back for, it sure as shit wasn’t me and Hawk. Not with another motherfucker warming her bed. Not unless she’s come for a divorce.
Fuck.
Somehow, the thought hurts worse when I think about her wanting a divorce rather than me being the one to initiate it. I don’t care how much of a dick that makes me sound. She’s called the shots the whole time. And while we’ve been living here in limbo, she’s been living it up with a new guy.
Well, fuck that, and fuck her too.
She tosses the phone down with a clank, making me believe it hit the bedside table. Silently, she strips out of the borrowed scrubs she’s wearing and her sneakers, letting everything drop to the floor before she walks into the bathroom and runs the water.
I lie here listening to the sounds of her cleaning herself before she walks back out and crawls into bed with a whimper. I wait for her breathing to even out before I roll out from under the bed and slowly get to my feet.
I stare down at her, pissed off all over again, though the tear tracks across her cheeks make me swallow hard. I hate the way she still affects me, even after all this time. For a moment, I’d toyed with her being mine again. Her coming here had to mean something, but I should have known better.
I pull out my cell phone and text Hawk that the coast is clear before carefully pushing the dresser away from the door. He opens it a few minutes later, his eyes going to Avery’s sleeping form.
“Pack everything of hers so we can take it with us. The water bottle from the trash too. If, for some reason, someone comes looking for her, I don’t want to leave anything that might make them think she did anything other than leave of her own free will.”
“On it.”
I walk around the bed and snag the cell phone from the bedside table. It’s a flip phone. Nothing special, so I’m not surprised when I open it and find next to no contacts inside it.
The ones I do find make me growl.
Seems Hawk might have a point about Greg and Ev. Their numbers, besides the diner’s, are the only ones in the contacts list. The last number she called has been deleted, making me curse. If I could give it to Ev, I would. But right now, that’s not an option.
Instead, I pop the back off the phone, remove the SIM card, and flush it down the toilet. I leave the phone on the bedside table, hoping it will look as if she left it on purpose so she can’t be traced. With that done, I pull back the covers and freeze when I see she’s not wearing anything other than a pair of pale blue panties, not even her sling.
“Fuck,” Hawk curses from behind me.
I yank the bag out from under the bed and grab the first thing I find inside it, which, thankfully, is a large T-shirt. “Help me get this on her.”
Hawk moves around me and bends down, sliding his arm behind Avery, mindful of her injury, and lifts her into a sitting position.
My eyes fall on her breasts. Her nipples are hard in the cool air, making me want to bend down and suck one into my mouth, but I know now is not the time or place. I slip the T-shirt over her head, and Hawk helps me slide it down her body, hiding her nakedness from us once more.
My lips twitch when I see what’s written on the front.
“What?”
He looks down and snorts before shaking his head at the writing that says, Eat a bag of dicks.
“We need to get a move on in case Ev or Greg come looking for her.”
“I’ve got her. You grab the bag and her clothes,” Hawk says as he carefully sweeps Avery up into his arms and holds her against his chest. “Do a walk-through to make sure I got everything. I’ll meet you at the truck.”
He keeps his head down as if he’s talking to her as he walks out.
I make the bed, knowing it’s something Avery would do before checking out, and then do a sweep of the bathroom and bedroom to make sure we have everything. I notice the bag she brought home from the hospital on the bed and grab it, finding the room key inside, along with her dirty clothes and a chain. I reach in and pull out the chain, my jaw dropping when I see the familiar rings hanging from it. Two rings. Wedding bands. The ones that Hawk and I gave her on our wedding day.
I drop them back in the bag as if they burned me, unsure what to make of them. I shove the dirty clothes from the floor into the bag before shoving it inside the larger gym bag and tossing it over my shoulder. I push the dresser back into its proper place and take one last look at the room before walking out to the truck.
I pull my ball cap low as I toss the bag in the back before climbing into the front seat, my eyes on Avery in the middle with her head rolled to the side. I strap myself in and tug her until she is resting her head on my shoulder.
“You good?”
“Yeah. There’s a drop box near the exit for keys. I need to toss this one in so it doesn’t raise any red flags.”
