AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Ava stands like a statue, barely even blinking while she regards me. I feel that I’ve somehow overstepped a line, but I don’t know what else there is for me to say at this point. I’m only telling the truth, and my homesickness for the people I care about is real.
“I suppose I can talk to Killian.”
I pull away from the door. “Really?!”
“Yeah, maybe, but I can’t promise you anything. He’ll most likely want to monitor it, so you won’t be able to have any private conversations or talk to her without one of us listening.”
I don’t care about any of that. All I care about is that I heard the word ‘maybe’.
“That’s fine. I can deal with that.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Without saying anything more, Ava turns around and heads down the hall. I watch her descend the steps to head back downstairs and slowly close my door again. She’s so strange.
I breathe out slowly, calming myself enough so that my hands stop shaking. I try not to get my hopes up, but I’m glad that she is willing to talk to him. He certainly won’t listen to me about anything, but there is a small chance that he will listen to her.
I head back over to my spot on the floor and slide down the wall again until I sit on the carpet. I grab my needles and wrap the string around my finger again to continue along my row.
I hope he reacts reasonably after Ava asks and doesn’t come up here, all guns blazing, to tell me off for getting her involved. But she didn’t say ‘no’. That’s victory enough for now.
I look down at my row of stitches.
Am I an idiot for wanting to trust him? Despite his track record?
My head and my heart say two completely opposite things.
Of course, I miss my brother—and my mother in a weird way. Not that she cares where I am or who I’m with. She would follow whatever orders my father gave her, even if it was against her own child.
But there is no way that Enzo wouldn’t want to come after me. I’m sure he has tried to at least, and my father had been too stubborn to listen to him, blowing him off and telling him that I was either fine or dead to the family.
It’s something that Enzo would see right through, no matter how much our father tried to shove it down his throat. He always had a good head on his shoulders, and he was never one to leave me high and dry. No matter what our father did to him.
I wish I could get a note to him somehow.
Now that I think about it, the thought of going back to my father makes my stomach hurt. Even if Enzo were to rescue me, where would I stay? It isn’t like my parents or the rest of the mob would invite me back with open arms if they truly believed that I killed Ben. The repercussions alone are too much to think of.
They might all think I’m a traitor now.
I let my head hit the back of the wall and close my eyes. I really hope Killian is exaggerating, making it seem like my father is way angrier than he actually is. I hope he doesn’t actually label me as a traitor, that he believes in me, that he’s trying to find me.
I hope I still have a home to come back to at the end of all of this. No matter where this road takes me. The thought makes my stomach squeeze, and I taste bile.
I want to trust Killian, I really do. At the end of this, maybe we can part ways amicably. I hope to hell that none of this will bite me in the ass later.
* * *
I feel like I’m going insane by the time the sun dips below the horizon.
I’ve knit almost half a sweater, a small blanket for Leo, and two bucket hats by the time my back started to cramp so bad it forced me to begin pacing around my room.
I tell myself over and over again that my need to see Killian is irrational, that I just want to know more about what he has been doing, about how the meeting with my father went, since I never got any answers when I first asked him. However, the more I pace around, the longer it takes to convince myself of those facts.
Eventually, I force myself to head downstairs to see if Ava knows anything. I hope she’s still around and hasn’t busied herself somewhere I can’t follow.
When I reach the bottom of the stairs, I hear the soft sound of the TV playing in the living room. Maybe she’d let me text Etta. I’d get her to give me her phone, even while she monitored it—anything to stop myself going crazy while I wait for him to come back.
I reach the landing and turn into the living area, ready to ask Ava.
