Chapter Ten
Marshal’s favorite food was meat spaghetti with cheese. Ava didn’t know why it was his favorite, but it was something he asked her to cook often. He loved to have it with a mix of cheese. There were also times he loved it spicy, other times mild, but always flavorful.
Ava grabbed some cream cheese out of the fridge, along with some Gouda and Cheddar she thought would be really nice.
After chopping up some onion and garlic, she placed them in a pot with a couple of tablespoons of butter, and got to cooking.
She stirred the onions, adding some salt and pepper, and her mind drifted to Knox.
Three years was not that long ago, and yet it felt like a lifetime.
Ava had gone to a bar. She didn’t even know why she had gone, but after a long day working in a law firm, listening to one bullshit after another, as she cleaned up the mess and was treated like dirt, she decided to do something radical.
After seeing what alcohol did to people, she was never interested in touching the stuff.
But that day, something called to her to go to a bar.
She took her drink, and even to this day, she didn’t know how the guy was able to drug her.
She figured the bartender had been in on it too.
Either way, a sip of her drink and the next moment, she was strapped to a human dartboard, waking up to actual fucking darts imbedded into her skin.
The man had left her bra and panties on.
Ava didn’t know why she hadn’t panicked.
No matter what she had been through, she had always wanted to survive.
Her kidnapper had expected her to scream and beg for mercy.
The truth was, she’d been frozen to the spot.
She could have argued that she was in her predicament because she was a kid, because her parents didn’t love her.
There were so many different excuses, but as an adult, the only person she had to blame was herself.
Her kidnapper talked about the women that had come before her. He called her a freak because she refused to beg. She stayed silent, waiting for the inevitable. Ava had known there was no way out. In her world, there was no hero. No savior.
Until Knox.
He burst into that basement and killed her attacker.
He saved her. He became her hero. No one ever did that for her, and she knew witnessing him kill a man should have affected her, but it didn’t.
That night, she had fallen in love with him, and over the past three years, that love had bloomed in a way she didn’t think was possible.
Now, as she stood, adding some Italian seasoning to her pot of onions and garlic, she couldn’t help but think about a future with him.
Just as she grabbed the cans of tomatoes she knew were the best part of the sauce, Ava heard a noise.
It sounded like a grunt, or was it movement?
She put the cans down and turned off the stove.
No one was home. Neither Marshal nor Knox had arrived.
She had been in this house for a short time now, and she had never heard a single strange noise.
She grabbed a knife from the butcher block, then kicked off her shoes so she didn’t make any noise.
There was that sound again. Feet moving. She held onto the knife as tightly as she could. All the time, her stomach began to twist.
Her cell phone was upstairs, and Marshal kept a landline in his office. She had to get to his office, but to do that, she had to pass the stairs. Ava didn’t know if anyone was in the home. If Marshal had left a window open, maybe a stray cat had come in.
Ava went to the doorway of the dining room.
Straight across the hall was Marshal’s office.
She could even see one of the ugly chairs he insisted were comfortable, but for her, it was never so.
He had tried to get her to sit in it and relax, and she hated it with a fiery passion.
There was more movement, and Ava looked around the dining room, trying to see if there was anything out of place.
Marshal had left random stuff lying around, and on one of the cabinets, she saw a mirror which his third wife had insisted on him getting. She had to listen to one of his wife’s tales about how she had to have a mirror in every room.
He had actually smashed most of them, but this one he kept as a reminder of the shallowness of his wife.
Marshal had said he needed token reminders so he didn’t fuck up and marry a poisonous viper.
His whole house should be covered with mementos of the women he’d been with, and who had fucked with his life. It was sad.
She knew it hurt him that he’d not found a person to love. The truth was, she had a feeling he hadn’t gone looking for someone to love, but someone to take care of him. He was looking for all the wrong reasons. She didn’t tell him that.
Picking up the mirror gently, she walked back to the doorway and crouched down. She had seen Knox do this many times. Her heart raced and she felt sick to her stomach, but she pushed the mirror out and then pointed it up toward the stairs.
She hoped she was just hearing things, or there might be a cat that had somehow made its way over and was treating the place as if he owned it. Why didn’t dogs ever do that? She was not a cat person, but she loved dogs. Maybe she should ask Knox if they could get a dog. A nice big, lovable dog.
Someone was in the fucking house.
Ava pulled the mirror back inside the dining room.
They were coming downstairs. She stepped away from the dining room and went back into the kitchen.
There was only one exit, the back door. She went to it, but the only problem with the fucking back door was, it made noise.
Marshal had said he’d been meaning to get it fixed.
In Marshal language, he didn’t know how to, and Ava hadn’t made it a priority.
If she opened this door, they would know.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck,” she said.
The only other place to hide was the pantry. Holding the knife, she took a deep breath, and then made the decision, and twisted the doorknob. She opened the door only to come face to face with a man with slicked back hair, evil looking eyes, and a smirk that instantly irritated.
“Well, hello. I have to say, I was expecting you to make this a little harder.”
He grabbed her around the throat, and his grip was tight. Ava didn’t recognize him.
“So, you’re the person Knox is protecting.” He tutted. “He should have known I would find a way of getting to him.”
“What do you want?” Ava asked.
“Oh, it’s simple, I want Knox’s head, and I think I have found the perfect way of getting it.”
She didn’t get a chance to dispute him, as he drew back his fist and connected it with her face, making everything go dark.
****
“Do you think we could stop and grab a couple of burgers?” Marshal asked.
“No.”
“But I’m hungry.”
“That’s why Ava’s making you dinner.”
“She is?”
“Yeah, of course.”
Marshal gave a fist bump. “I wonder if she’s making my favorite meat spaghetti. She likes to keep me guessing how she is going to serve it, and she changes the cheeses to keep it exciting.”
“Meat spaghetti?”
“Yeah, I love it, and I don’t know why, I just do, and I don’t question my taste buds.”
Knox pulled the car into Marshal’s drive and stopped.
“What’s going on? Come on, it doesn’t take long to make meat spaghetti, and I’m hungry.”
“I closed this gate,” Knox said.
“What?”
“I closed this gate when I left to keep Ava safe.” He turned to Marshal. “Did you open it?”
“No. Once it’s set, you can only open it from the inside. Ava must have opened it,” Marshal said.
“To who? You don’t have guests. Your lawyer doesn’t turn up.”
Knox didn’t like this.
“You’re getting that look on your face, and I think you need to stop because there is nothing going on. Ava is fine, okay? Remember, you’re the target here, and Ava and I don’t have enemies.”
Knox pressed his foot to the gas. Ava had no reason to open the gate.
“Dude, be careful,” Marshal said.
“Something’s up.”
“Not everything is bad, okay? Some people open gates and perhaps Ava has opened the gate to be ready for us to come home.”
Knox parked the car, and then rushed inside. The front door was closed.
“Ava!” He yelled her name, and no response came.
He went straight to the kitchen, and when he got there, he saw the stove had been turned off. Onions, garlic, and some seasonings were in the pot. The meat was in a different pan. The tomatoes were open, but not in the sauce.
Knox reached into his boot and pulled out his gun. He always kept a weapon on him at all costs.
Moving around the counter, he saw the back door, and on the floor, a knife.
Marshal entered the kitchen. “She’s not in the study, my office, the sitting room, the library, or the game room.”
“Someone took her,” Knox said.
“You don’t know that.”
“You leave random knives on the floor?” Knox asked.
“Well, no, and besides, I left this morning. I have nothing to do with any of this. Who could have taken her?”
Knox picked up the knife, but it was cold. He didn’t know what he was hoping for, maybe to find the handle warm from Ava’s grip. He was being fucking hopeful.
“Your security cameras,” he said.
“Shit, I don’t even know if I have them on,” Marshal said.
“I activated them when I brought Ava to you. Fuck.” He went straight to Marshal’s computer, used the password, and brought up the security cameras.
Whoever had taken Ava had to have been watching the house. The guards the cops had placed on Marshal had only stayed for a couple of days, then left. There was no threat to Marshal. Knox had thought Ava would be safe.
Bringing up the garden security cameras, he saw it. Before Knox had even left, someone had climbed the backyard fence and had hung out at the fucking pool. The fucker was right there, with the lights shining on him, and even looked up at the camera and gave a wave.
“What the fuck?” Marshal asked.
Knox sped up the timer, and it wasn’t long after he left that the guy was joined by a second man. He watched as Ava went into the kitchen and started preparing food. At the same time, the second man climbed into Marshal’s open bedroom window.
“Okay, I think I’m getting why Ava told me to start closing and locking my windows. None of this happens to me.”
“Your wife put a hit out on you, this shit happens to you,” Knox said.
He pulled up the kitchen, and saw the other man approaching the house, as Ava tried to assess the noise she heard. Knox watched as she went into the dining room, finding the mirror. He saw all of it and knew she must have started to panic.
With it being dark outside, she didn’t see the man, and he watched as she literally rushed into the man’s arms, and he also saw her getting punched in the face. Her whole body dropped to the floor. The knife landed where he found it.
The man was masked, and he didn’t take it off, not even as he picked Ava up off the floor and threw her over his shoulder.
Knox’s hands clenched into fists. The beast he reserved for work slowly began to awake. His woman had been taken.
“What do we do?” Marshal asked. “I don’t have a clue who has taken her.”
“I do,” Knox said.
He pulled out his cell phone and waited for his guy to answer.
“I want to know where Ava is,” Knox said.
Marshal frowned at him. “What are you doing?”
He got the address in less than a minute. Knox thanked him and quickly sent him the money he needed.
“When I saved Ava three years ago and she offered to be my PA, I asked her to have a tracking system installed in her. She agreed that in the event of her being taken, I’d know exactly where to find her. We just activated it, and now I am going to get her.”
“You mean we,” Marshal said.
Knox stopped and looked at Marshal. “I’m not taking you.”
“You can’t be serious right now. You’ve got no choice but to take me.”
“How do you figure that?” He wasn’t used to arguing with anyone. This was his life. This is what he did, but at the same time, this was Ava, not some random rescue. This was his freaking soul, and what was worse, Ava didn’t even know what she meant to him.
“You’re going to need backup and I’m your guy.”
“You’re not my guy.”
“Damn it, Knox, you’re not doing this alone. I’m right here, and you don’t think I feel responsible for her being taken? You came looking for me.”
He was not interested in playing the guilt game.
The fact was, Ava had been taken and now it was up to him to get her back.
Taking Marshal would be a big mistake. He was tempted to just knock him out and go get her.
Only, most of the bounty hunters he encountered knew he worked alone.
Having an extra hand might become useful.
“You’ve handled a gun?”
“Well, not exactly. I own a couple of guns, but I’ve never needed to use them.”
Knox put his hands on his hips. This was going to be a big mistake. “That all changes tonight.”
He started making his way toward Marshal’s garage, where he had stored a large bag of weapons. It didn’t matter where he went, he always came prepared. Marshal followed him without a command, and when he grabbed the bag and pulled it onto the table, opening it up, Marshal gasped.
“Is that mine or yours?”
“It’s mine,” Knox said. “You better listen closely to what I’m going to tell you, because if you fail me tonight and anything happens to Ava, I will kill you myself. Do you understand?”
“I’m all ears,” Marshal said. “Tell me what you need me to do.”
He needed Marshal to keep his shit together.