The Devil's Beauty (Crime Lord Interconnected Standalone Book 2) (22 page)

He’d studied her carefully.
“I am the monster,”
he said at last.

Ava had snorted in disgust. She’d rolled her eyes and his had widened.

“Not this again. You’re not so big. I could easily beat you in a race.”

He had simply stared at her, almost like she’d smacked him.

“Shouldn’t you be in school?”
she countered when he said nothing.

“I graduated this summer.”
His voice had dropped several notches and wavered with confusion that confused her.

“And you’re spending your days following me around? Haven’t you got any friends?”

“No.”

Ava had considered this a moment.
“I haven’t got any either,”
she’d confessed.
“The teachers say I exhibit antisocial and destructive behavior, but they’re all idiots.”
She’d offered him a half grin.
“Maybe we can be friends.”

“Why?”

She’d shrugged.
“Because I would rather introduce you as my friend than as my stalker.”

She had never seen anyone look more appalled.
“Introduce me? To who?”

“To whom,”
she’d corrected smartly.
“And I don’t know … people, I suppose. What if we were at the movies and—?”

“Why would you be talking in a movie?”
he’d interrupted.

Ava had blinked.
“Don’t you?”

“No! It’s for watching … silently.”

“What fun is that? I like discussing it while it’s happening.”

His face had bunched up in absolute disgust.
“You’re one of those people I always want to hit with my popcorn bucket.”

“Hey now!”

He’d scoffed and shook his head.
“We are never going to the movies together.”

“Fine!”
She’d folded her arms.
“I don’t want to go to the movies with you anyway.”

They’d fallen silent as a car roared past. It hadn’t stopped or slowed, but Ava had recognized one of John Paul’s neighbor behind the wheel. She’d waved and Ava had waved back. Then she was gone.

“Why do they say you’re destructive?”

“I’m not.”
She’d looked at him, exasperated.
“I hit a boy with a chair one time and knocked him out, but only after he and his friends had shoved me into the puddles nearly every day for a bloody month and I was forced to wear dirty clothes for the entire day. Retaliation, apparently, isn’t proper behavior. I think he had it coming.”

“With a chair?”
he’d blurted.
“You are crazy.”
A grin had ghosted his mouth.
“I would have stabbed him with a pen.”

Ava had laughed.
“And I’m crazy?”

Things had changed between them after that. He no longer kept to his side of the street and she got to see the boy behind the yellow eyes. Their mutual need for someone had pulled them into an odd sort of friendship that extended well into her teens and his early twenties. He’d become her best friend, her confidant, the one person she could trust to never fail her. She liked to think she’d brought something to his table as well, though she could never guess what that was. It had always felt like she was getting the better end of the friendship.

“There was a boy I liked back in Germany,” Ilsa murmured. “Alois.” She smiled a little. “He had glasses and a million freckles, but he was always nice when other kids were making fun of me.” Her smile faded. “I’m never going to see him again.”

It was becoming increasingly difficult keeping morale up when she was the only one. The very air smelled of defeat. Even Ava was having a harder time than usual reminding herself this wouldn’t be the way she died. It was harder still to remember Ilsa was just a little girl.

It was horrible, the annoyance that always surged up every time the girl brought down Ava’s mood. She was constantly trying to keep herself from grabbing the tiny blonde and shaking her, and telling her that she wouldn’t let anything happen to her, that they would get out of this. There wasn’t a single flicker of doubt in Ava’s mind that Dimitri and John Paul weren’t looking for her at that very moment. They would find her and she would get Ilsa back to Germany and the freckle faced Alois.  

But she kept her mouth shut and focused instead on the hum of the motor vibrating up the wall against her back. It was a strange sort of comfort, but it was all she had.

“Ava, stop it!” The agitation reverberated through the clenched force of Charlotte’s teeth. The only thing missing was the sharp slap of Charlotte’s hand, but Ava could see the whitening of her mother’s knuckles around the
Gucci
clutch, a sure sign the woman was barely containing the urge.

“I’m not doing anything,” she muttered, too restless to take her mother’s fussing seriously.

She peeked at her watch again.

“For Christ sakes! Ava!” Charlotte did slap her then, a flick of her dainty wrist that stung against the back of Ava’s hand.

“Ow!” She rubbed anxiously at the three strips of white rising out of a hue of red. “I haven’t done anything!”

“I swear, you look at that stupid thing again, I will rip it off and—”

“There’s my girls.” John Paul appeared seemingly as though he’d been summoned by the sheer force of Ava’s mind. He looked at the spot Ava was still rubbing at, at the welts, and focused on his wife. “What’s going on?”

Charlotte huffed and stuffed her clutch between her ribs and elbow. “It’s that ridiculous watch you bought her. She won’t stop staring at it. It’s rude.”

Ava glowered. “It’s not ridiculous.”

John Paul settled a loving hand against Charlotte’s lower back. “Darling, it’s her party.”

“Exactly!” Charlotte hissed, careful to do so while maintaining a beautiful smile. “She’s eighteen, not two.”

Exhaling, Ava looked out over the crowd and the sea of faces she barely recognized. The majority were friends of John Paul, people she’d met in passing, but had no real thoughts towards. The rest were people Ava didn’t care if she ever saw again. But they were all there for the same purpose, to celebrate the day of her birth while simultaneously rubbing shoulders with some of the world’s most powerful people. It was more the latter. No one really cared who Ava was or why she was there. Most barely even glanced at her.

“I need a drink.” Her mother turned to John Paul. “I think I’ll get one in my room.”

It was ridiculous. Waiters were circulating the room with silver tray laden with flutes of champagne. All she had to do was wait. But it was clear her mother had had enough of the evening. She’d come. She’d smiled and shown her support and happiness at having a grown, legal daughter. Her job was complete. There wasn’t enough bribery in the world to persuade her to stay.

This was the night she had been dreading since the day of Ava’s birth. It was the night the entire world would know that Charlotte Morel was no longer young. She was no doubt on her way to spend the remainder of the night in a blissful, drug induced hue. No one would see her for days, weeks even. Then she’d sweep out of the room, a glowing radiance off to some exotic place for some recovery.

Ava was happy to see her leave. While she hadn’t been counting down those minutes, it had certainly come up a time or two.

“Of course.” John Paul turned away from the woman at his side and focused on Ava. “Will you be all right—”

“Of course she’ll be all right,” Charlotte snapped. “She’s an adult now. Completely grown. She can legally leave now.”

From the moment it had come to light that Ava was her daughter, Charlotte had practically counted the days until the time when Ava would leave and give Charlotte back her life. It was a very fine razor blade she walked, Ava thought miserably.

“Nonsense.” John Paul frowned. “There is no need for her to go anywhere until she’s finished school and started a successful career.”

“It’s fine,” Ava interrupted. “I have plans to see the world, anyway.”

“Of course you do,” Charlotte muttered under her breath before turning away and making a quick exit.

“Don’t listen to her.” John Paul set a hand on her arm. “It’s your life now. Do what you want.”

With a loving squeeze, he followed his wife from the room.

Ava watched them go wondering yet again how someone like John Paul could stand being married to someone like Charlotte. The mysteries made no sense. She wasn’t rich or influential, at least not as rich or influential as he was. She wasn’t kind, generous, or loving. She was awful and brought nothing to the table, but he stayed.

Shaking her head slowly, she glanced at her watch. The tiny hands sitting precociously on the twelve had her heart jumping. Her skin prickled with a familiar sort of anticipation and her stomach cinched.

It was finally midnight. It was time. It was the moment she’d been waiting for nearly her entire life.

Lip caught between her teeth, Ava skirted the dancefloor. There was no need to creep when no one was paying any attention to her, but she moved quickly, quietly on the balls of her feet, careful not to let her heels touch the marble. One hand held tight to the soft fabric of her soft, crimson dress, elevating the hem off the tops of her strappy sandals.

The French doors had been left open to the remaining few warm nights of August. The balmy temperature whispered into the room, carrying with it the subtle scent of her mother’s garden and the approaching thunderstorm they’d been promised. The sky was a subtle black edged in a light, glowing blue where the moon hid behind a shroud of clouds. It was the perfect kind of night to trace the curving paths through the acres of manicured lawns and shivering trees.

They rustled as she hurried beneath them, heels clipping on stone as she followed the familiar trail. Fairy lights glimmered between the leaves, making up for the lack of stars and filling the moment with an ethereal hue that only fueled her anticipation. Solar lamps lead the way along the edges of her path, dipping and bending as the stones did. Not that she needed the guidance. She could have found her way if all the lights of the world had gone out and absolute darkness ruled supreme. 

The guesthouse was rarely used by anyone outside the family. The estate was large enough, with plenty of space for guests, but Ava had always loved the two story cabin style with its simple décor and beach house feel. Plus, it was as far from her mother as she could get most days when she’d been younger. It had been her own personal little home. Her place of sanctuary. But it was also the one place no one ever thought to come looking for her, which always made it ideal for other things.

The glass doors swung inward without a sound. She shut them quickly behind her and turned to the silhouettes of slumbering furniture. In the semi darkness, each one reminded her of a lurking monster.

“Dimitri?” she murmured into the eerie quiet.

Her own voice echoed back, small and uncertain. She started to check her watch again, wondering if maybe it had lied to her when his voice broke through the silence.

“Ava.”

Her heart leaped even before the shadows parted to reveal him. They became the heavy drapes of a play, bending and slipping away to expose the beautiful poetry that he was. Ava’s breath caught even as he closed the distance between them and came to stand before her.

“Sz dnum rohzdeenyeh,” he murmured, wishing her a happy birthday.

Pale light toyed in the glossy locks swept back from his gorgeous features in thick waves. They glinted off the ends where they curled over the collar of his leather floor duster. The front hung open over the tight material of his white t-shirt and the dark cargo pants. Not many men she knew could pull off the Bohemian-gypsy look, but on him, it was perfect.

“You made it.”

An elegant eyebrow lifted. “When have I not?”

He had a point.

“All right.” She extended her hand, waiting dramatically for it with her palm open. “Where is my present?”

Heavy lashes dipped and his gaze fixed on the vulnerable flesh of her wrist and the tiny pulse beating rapidly under the pale skin. It was such an uninteresting spot and yet, standing there with it exposed, rushed her with a wave of embarrassment, the sort one felt when getting naked in front of another person the first time. The intimacy behind such a small gesture nearly made her pull away. Then he was reaching for her hand and she froze.