9. Ava #2
My brain short-circuits. Heat travels through my veins, and I shift awkwardly in my chair at the rough tone of his voice. I swirl my tongue around his fingers in my mouth in a momentary lapse of judgement, I’m not sure I’ll ever recover from.
“That’s it. Good girl.”
God, save me.
Defiantly, I nip the pad of his finger in protest. His grin only deepens, satisfied and thoroughly unbothered, before he finally, slowly, drags his fingers from my mouth.
The way he looks at me… like he’s already imagined a thousand more ways to ruin me.
And God help me, I might let him.
He trails his thumb along my lower lip, watching it glisten. My whole body is on fire.
This is Levi Cross. The man who’s made it his personal mission to torment me since the day I set foot on Cross Estate. I do not want him.
Not in the real, meaningful sense. Not in the let’s-ruin-our-lives sense.
. . . Right?
Just like I said: I need to get laid. Maybe then my body will stop throwing itself at the human equivalent of a hurricane in dark jeans.
“Baby girl…” he drawls, leaning in close. “You make it really hard not to ruin you.”
I blink at him. “W-what?” I stammer. My brain has officially entered blender mode.
He smirks, and it’s devastating. That kind of smile should be outlawed.
“Oh no,” Mila’s voice giggles from the doorway, and I nearly fall out of my chair.
I jerk back so fast I nearly crash to the floor, heart hammering like it’s trying to escape my chest.
Mila raises a brow, barely hiding her delight, while Christian lingers behind her looking—well, like Christian. Slightly scowling. Perpetually unimpressed.
All eyes are on me. My cheeks go up in flames.
Fantastic.
I glare at Mila’s too-wide smile. No doubt she’s already inventing some elaborate story where Levi and I are secretly star-crossed lovers instead of combatants. The throbbing in my core? Probably just indigestion. Has nothing to do with Levi. Or the way his jeans hug his stupid perfect—
God, I sound like an idiot.
I hate grapefruit. I hate him .
But the way his fingers tasted—sweet, tart, sinful—I’m scared I’d do it again tomorrow if he asked.
Levi leans back like nothing just happened, casually stealing the air from the room with his presence alone. Mila looks like she just found out Santa’s real. Christian still looks vaguely bored, but that’s nothing new for him. If it doesn’t have to do with Mila, it may as well not exist.
I can’t do this.
“I have work to do,” I mutter, already halfway out of my seat, and heading toward the door before I let Levi feed me any more sinful fruit.
I need to put some distance between us, especially if I’m going to follow through with my end of the deal.
Right now, I want to be anywhere but here.
Anywhere but near him .
I listen to the sound of his door closing while I silently pace through my room.
This is either a really stupid plan, or—no, scratch that. It’s just stupid. Maybe even suicidal.
Levi Cross isn’t one to fuck with, and here I am, plotting grand theft flash drive while I listen to the sounds of his footsteps retreat downstairs.
What if he catches me? Maybe he’ll just kill me on the spot. Maybe he’ll drag me out of here by my hair.
A shudder slips through me at a creak down the hall.
That damned room. I swear it haunts me, plaguing my dreams with thumps and thuds in the night. Why can’t the dead just stay dead? Why does he have to torment us from the afterlife? Was one lifetime not enough?
“Shut up, Ava,” I grumble to myself, flexing my sweaty hands. “You sound insane.”
Maybe I am going insane.
Blowing out a breath, I try to calm my breathing and focus on the plan. Get in and get out. He’s leaving for the night, so that means I’ll have a few hours to find what I’m looking for before he gets home. By then, I should be long asleep. Maybe then I’ll be able to breathe a little easier.
Who am I kidding? There’s always something else.
I just hope next time, it’s not something impossible.
My heart beats unsteadily in my chest when I step over to the door, listening for any sounds of anyone awake.
I know for a fact: Bella is out with her boyfriend, Rob.
She probably won’t be home tonight. Paulina is down in the den reading one of her monster pornos she thinks no one knows about, so she’ll be busy for the next few hours.
Mila and Christian are at their house, and Javier is doing whatever Javier does when he’s not cooking the best food on planet earth.
Levi . . . well, who knows where he goes most nights?
Carefully, I twist the knob, and the door creaks when it opens. Instinctually, I shush it, like a kid trying to sneak out of their room at night to grab a cookie.
The hall is dark, and I don’t waste any time, hurrying across and knocking tentatively on the door.
I don’t know what I’ll do if he answers. I didn’t think that far ahead.
I knock again, and when no answer comes, I try the handle, pushing the door open to the dark bedroom beyond.
His room smells like him.
Like whiskey and tobacco, mixed with that little bit of the forest beyond these four walls. My mouth waters, and I inhale instinctively as I step into the room and carefully shut the door behind me.
Then, I stop.
“Well, shit.”
Now what?
With no time to waste, I shake myself, hurrying over to his dresser. I pull open the top drawer, blushing when I see the boxers lined up neatly in a row.
Levi Cross needs some color in his life. All his boxers are black.
Steeling myself, I root around the bottom of the drawer, and when I find nothing, I shut it tight, blowing out a breath.
Why is it so hot in here?
I move on to the next, searching through every T-shirt, sock, or pair of jeans I can find, but every drawer is empty.
I search the closet, the dressers. Under the bed, and I even go so far as to look in the bathroom. It’s nowhere to be found, and the more time that ticks by, the more desperate I become.
Where the hell would he hide it? More importantly, what is he hiding on it?
Why is this little piece of plastic the balance between life and death?
I suck in a deep breath, my hands shaking, as panic slips over me.
I scrub a hand over my face, turning back toward the bed.
Throughout the time I’ve worked here, I’ve learned things about that bed.
I’ve heard the moans of the women he brings home.
I can’t stop the bitter stab of something dark and envious swirling in my gut when I step over to the edge of the Alaskan King bed, looking down at the carefully made sheets from when I made it this morning.
I hate him. I hate him because deep down, I know I don’t. I hate him because he’s the reason I’m here and because he made me care, even though he’s given me no reason to.
I grab the mattress and lift it as best I can, inspecting underneath it.
Nothing.
“Goddamnit,” I growl. “Where the fuck is it?”
I fall to the bed, running my hands through my hair.
I’m fucked. I’m fucked. I’m fucked.
And then, movement to my left catches my attention, and I nearly collapse when my heart falls to my toes.
Oh, I am sooo fucked.
Levi smirks at me from the door, leaning against the frame with a sinister grin on his face like he just found out his favorite toy is broken.
. . . And now he gets to destroy it.
“Hello, little ghost.”