Chapter Eleven
Ava came to with her vision slightly blurry. She closed her eyes then opened them and closed them again. Slowly, her vision started to clear and as it did, she glanced around her surroundings. They were at ... the docks?
Was that the ocean she heard? She inhaled and it smelled fresh. Well, as fresh as a rotting sea shed could smell. She saw several hooks and what appeared to be fishing tackle.
She tried to move, but she was tied to a chair and the rope was cutting into her body. It was tight. It had been a long time since she’d been tied to anything, and she had no choice but to slow her breathing down. Panicking would not be ideal.
As she looked across the shed, she then noticed someone hanging upside down. The man wore all black, only his mask had been pulled off and his throat slit. The blood dripped onto the floor, and she imagined it soaking through the floorboards and into the ocean below.
Her mind went straight to sharks. Either sharks or alligators or crocodiles, maybe even octopus, but then she was going through all the sea and water monster movies she’d seen.
This was not good. Not because of the risk of a shark, but did they attack through wood? Crap, this was not helping her to stay calm.
“Ah, I see you’re awake.”
She turned to look in the direction of the voice, and the door had opened up, and in came a man. Not one she recognized. He had blonde hair to his shoulders. Like his buddy, he was dressed all in black, only his throat wasn’t cut and he wasn’t hanging upside down.
“Who are you?” she asked.
He chuckled. “I’m surprised you don’t know, being Knox’s PA and all that. I thought the rumors were false, but then I did a little digging and I realized the best way to Knox is through you.”
“You’re the guy who attacked the house?”
“Actually, I am and I’m not. I did pay a couple of guys to attack the house, but I just wanted them to bring me Knox. That man has cost me a fortune, the little pest he is.”
Ava looked at him, and he wasn’t anyone she recognized.
“You’re making a big mistake.”
“You think I am?” he asked, laughing. “Trust me, Knox doesn’t know who he is dealing with.”
Ava looked at him. “This your place?”
He didn’t answer.
“Let me guess, you have an issue with Knox because he took away your funding?” She started to fill in the blanks. “You were fucking Blondie’s wife, weren’t you?”
He glared at her.
“Yeah, that’s your problem. You saw a little meal ticket in the gold-digging bitch, and because Knox made sure she was put behind bars for nearly killing her husband, you want a little payback.”
“Shut your fucking mouth.”
Ava gritted her teeth as he struck. It was an open palm slap this time, but it still smarted. She hated being punched in the fucking face. It had been a long time since she last got hit.
“You don’t want to talk?” Ava asked.
When she was a kid, she would not have talked back. She’d have done everything she could to be invisible.
Ava knew she had to give Knox time. He had to remember the GPS he installed in her. Completely harmless, at least to her, but hopefully, if he got that thing working, it would save her life. This was not going to end well. Knox needed to make it here.
“You’ve got a smart mouth on you, don’t you?”
“I flunked high school. I’m not smart,” Ava said.
She wasn’t about to tell him that Knox was already ten steps ahead of him.
He started to laugh. “You’ve got that right, you decided to work for Knox, and trust me, that isn’t smart.”
She tilted her head to the side. It irritated her that he would insult her man. Knox belonged to her. The smart thing would be to keep her mouth shut and just let the time slip away.
“So, tell me, if Knox isn’t smart, and he didn’t rely on a woman’s pussy to get where he is, what does that make you? Because, you, I’ve never heard of,” she said.
In the back of her mind, she was screaming at herself to just shut up.
Ava was not known for making her life easier.
She had made a few bad decisions. Yet, they had also led to great ones.
Sure, getting drugged at a bar and being kidnapped by a rapist and serial killer were not her finer moments.
However, looking at the glass half full, without that, she would never have met Knox—the one and only man that had saved her life.
The man she loved more than anything in the world.
The same man she still hadn’t told how she felt, which she did regret.
He slapped her three times. She felt the sting of her lip, and she didn’t need to look down to know that it was split. Shit.
“You think you’re so smart. I wonder what Knox will think when I gut you and feed your entrails to the fishes.”
“Go ahead, you wouldn’t make it out alive,” she said. “You can kill me, but that is just signing your life away.”
“You’re sure?” he asked, coming in closer and crouching down in front of her.
“You have no idea who you’re dealing with.
You’ve kidnapped me for petty revenge, because he took away your meal ticket.
Knox is the real deal.” She pointed her head toward the dead man.
“You think that is supposed to scare me? I’ve seen a hell of a lot worse, and I’ve watched him do even more to a man who only intended to do me harm.
I bet you’ve bruised me, and these chains are cutting into my body, so I know there is going to be more damage. ”
She didn’t even know what she was saying anymore. All she could do was talk and hope to distract him.
Knox would come. Of that, she was certain. He would never allow her to be hurt. This was her Knox.
She stared at her opponent and waited, hoping he would take her words seriously. It no longer mattered. He was going to die. Knox was going to kill him. Even if he left and allowed her to live, Knox would hunt him down and kill him, because he dared raise a hand to her. He was going to die.
She only wondered if she would live long enough to see it.
****
“What’s the plan?” Marshal asked.
Knox was not used to anyone tagging along when he was on a mission. He knew he shouldn’t have brought him along, but he needed a distraction. Checking through the binoculars that used heat detector technology, he saw that Ava was tied to a chair. There was also another body crouched close to her.
Pulling the binoculars away, he looked around at the port.
It had been a long time since he had to come to the damn ocean.
There were no other boats or ships in dock.
In fact, the port looked very badly set up.
The wooden dock looked old, and the boards looked brittle.
This was not what he wanted. Clearly, the guy was an amateur, even more so than he imagined.
“I need you to knock on that door,” Knox said.
“What?”
“Go knock on that door.”
“You’ve got to be joking. How do you expect me to not get shot?”
“You wanted to help. You insisted on coming.”
“Yeah, so that I was helpful, not to be shot at instantly,” Marshal said.
“Say you’re delivering a pizza.”
“I have never delivered a pizza in my life. I don’t even have a box.”
Knox pointed his gun at Marshal. “He doesn’t have a little peephole to see if you have a fucking pizza box. My woman is in that fucking place, and she could die with you acting like a coward. Do as you’re told, or I will shoot you in the face, do you understand?”
Marshal swallowed. “Fine. Fine. It’s a shit plan, but you’re the boss.”
Knox was close behind Marshal.
“What are you doing?” Marshal asked.
“I’m going to be the fucking pizza.” This is why he worked alone. What surprised him was how talkative Marshal was, and how nervous. Ava held herself together just a little more.
He crouched behind Marshal, staying out of the line of sight.
Marshal knocked on the door. “I’ve got a pizza delivery. Three pizzas, and there is one with pineapple. I must say, that is a good choice. I do love a little pineapple on pizza.”
“I didn’t order fucking pizza. Go away.”
“Sorry, no can do, this pizza is so delicious, and I’m not going anywhere until I get paid.”
Knox didn’t know if the man would answer, or if he would make Ava answer. The desire to just shoot him in the face was strong.
Suddenly the door opened, and it was his assailant.
Knox reacted, shoving Marshal out of the way.
His enemy had a gun, and he fired it, but Knox ignored the pain as the bullet hit his shoulder.
He shoved at his assailant, taking him to the ground.
Slamming his fist in the man’s face, he looked up to see Ava.
“I knew you’d come,” she said.
“Always.”
“Say goodbye,” his enemy said, and Knox hadn’t seen where the chair had been, as the latch suddenly opened up, and Ava, chained to a chair, fell through the floor, into the ocean below.
Knox grabbed the man’s throat, and they were rolling across the floor.
“Get Ava,” he said, seeing Marshal.
Marshal looked down at the water, but this time he didn’t hesitate but dived right in. Knox didn’t know if Marshal would be able to save Ava. He didn’t know how deep the water was, and Ava was chained to a chair.
Getting to his feet, he kicked out, and the man went flying across the room. “Who are you?” Knox asked.
“The name’s Dean,” he said, getting to his feet.
“Never heard of you.”
“Yeah, well, that doesn’t matter. I’ll be known as the one that killed the infamous Knox.” He charged at him, and Knox had already reached for his knife and sliced across the man’s body.
The shock on his face would have been funny, if not for the fact that the love of his life could be drowning.
“That’s for my house,” Knox said. “That’s for sending a man after my woman.
” He sliced his knife again. “That’s for trying to distract me with bounty hunters.
And this one is for Ava. I saw that bruise on her face.
” He plunged the knife into the man’s eye, and then he pulled back, letting him fall to the ground.
He was already dead. It didn’t fucking matter who he was.
Going to the latch in the floor, he felt the whole building creak.
“Ava! Marshal!”
He was just about to jump in the water when Marshal and Ava cleared the water.
Knox had never been so damn happy to see both of them. Reaching down, he grabbed Ava, pulled her up into the shed, then he reached for Marshal.
“I swear I felt a fucking shark,” Marshal said.
Knox didn’t know if sharks came this close, but it was an old-looking dock that didn’t have a lot of money flowing through it.
Once Marshal was clear, he turned to Ava and didn’t even have to wait. He pulled Ava into his arms, and she cupped his face, kissing him.
“Thank you. Thank you. Thank you! I knew you were going to come for me. I knew you weren’t going to let me die.” She kissed him.
He cupped her cheeks and forced her to look at him. “I love you,” he said. He was not going to let another moment slide where she didn’t know the truth. The smile on her lips was going to stay with him forever.
“I love you too,” she said. “Let’s not allow that to happen again, yeah?”
She was shaking just a little, and he knew that was from shock.
“Look, guys, I find this touching, but we’re still in a damn fish shed, with two dead guys, and I don’t think I’ll ever look at fishing the same way again, or movies. We could have been shark food, and I think we should leave and actually get that pizza, what do you say?”
He heard the quiver in Marshal’s voice.
Getting to his feet, he banded an arm around his woman and turned to Marshal. “You did good tonight,” Knox said, holding his hand out for him to shake.
Marshal looked down at his hand, and then he turned to look at Ava. “You heard that, right? I did good?”
“I heard it.”
“Good, good. I will treasure this moment forever, but can we get the fuck out of here?” Marshal asked.
Knox was more than ready to do that. He gave Marshal his woman as he grabbed what he needed from the car.
He was always prepared for everything. Dousing the fishing shed in gasoline, he pulled out a match and set it on fire.
Stepping back, he took Ava into his arms and watched the shed as it burned.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Yeah, I’m okay. Don’t get me wrong, I thought I was going to die when I fell into that water, but Marshal untied me.”
Knox looked over to Marshal with a frown. “You untied her?”
“Years of being bored, I learned how to tie knots and untie them. For a long time, I wanted to be a pirate, own my own boat. Then I watched shark movies, and decided I like land. Guess what, I still like land, and I swear there was a shark in there. Do you think he was keeping it as a pet?”
“No,” Knox said.
“Who was that man?” Marshal asked.
“Someone who was paid by your ex-wife, and promised riches,” Ava said. “He was pissed with Knox for taking his meal ticket away, so he wanted to kill Knox.” She shrugged. “It was kind of lame, to be honest, but he sure can punch.”
Knox tightened his hold around his woman and knew he was not going to let her go.
“What now?” Marshal asked.
“Now, I marry this woman and fill her with lots of babies,” he said.
“I feel this is a private moment,” Marshal said. “I will give you some privacy.”
“You want to marry me?” she asked.
“Yeah, I want to marry you and have lots of babies,” Knox said. “This will never happen again.”
Ava cupped his face. “Don’t talk about it. I knew when I agreed to work for you, there was a risk. It’s why I agreed to the GPS, that way, we cut out all the panic and crap. I knew you were coming for me, and I just had to stay alive until then.”
“So, what do you say?”
“Yes, I’ll marry you, and yes, I’ll have your children.”
“You do know I don’t think we’re ever getting rid of Marshal.”
This time, she laughed. “That’s okay, I’m sure our kids with love Uncle Marshal.”