He’s way too up Eve’s ass to let something like that go unchecked, yethe knew she was safe.He was calm after that first day when Paul was bailed out of jail, and, from what Vaughn tells me, calm is not his default setting since meeting Eve. Conveniently, he had me on Eve duty while he was suspiciously missing until much later that night. It is my firm belief that Adam made sure Paul wouldn’t get a single night’s sleep outside of jail after he assaulted Eve, and for that, I have no choice but to give him my blessing.He’ll keep our Evie safe.Well, to be fair, with what we know about Eve now, she doesn’t need anyone to keep her safe, but Adam would lay down his life for her, and that’s what matters. I don’t have to like him, but I do respect a man with no limits, and I can see now that there are no lines this man won’t cross to protect and keep Eve.
That’s why, just now, when Vaughn was about to employ the many skills she possesses to assault Adam and free Eve from his grasp, I grab her hips and pull her into me. Whispering in her ear, I tell her “Roles reversed, that’s you on my shoulder. She’s his Vaughn.”
The tension slowly leaves her body as she soaks in my words, soberly taking in the scene before us. Finally, she moves to the door and opens it for Adam so that he can start putting all the broken pieces of our little Evie back together again.
Vaughn’s head falls to the door as we hear Evie continue to verbally flay Adam, although more quietly now that they’re outside of the apartment.
Vaughns shoulders rise and fall with her heavy sigh.
“So...what? We trust him to take care of her now?”
Her forehead is still pressed to the door when I come up behind her, wrapping her up in my arms. The feel of this woman still makes my heart race and stirs my cock to attention.
“She’s still our family. She’ll always be our family. Now she just has more people looking out for her. You know...Adam wasn’t the only member of that group who was unaccounted for the day Paul Hastings went missing.”
Vaughn stills for a moment. “Ada?”
“No. Big and Bigger. The football bros. Pretty sure they helped him, which means they care enough about our girl to risk those fancy scholarships and life in prison.”
Another heavy sigh before she leans back into me. “I guess it was inevitable that the rest of the world would eventually see in her what we’ve known since we met her.”
“Yeah. She’s too special to keep hidden. Besides, this isn’t the end of anything. We’re just having to expand our circle a little more than we planned.”
“Ugh. Fucking, Ada. I knew that girl would worm her way into my life sooner or later. Wait until you see this girl. She looks like she’s been airbrushed.”
My laugh gets away from me before I can stop it.This woman.
“You think she’s prettier than YOU?”
“She is! Just wait. She’s infuriatingly perky and just...ugh, gorgeous.”
A full bellied laugh starts low and has the dimples at peak performance now.She has no idea. Well, she knows she’s sexy. She’s always known, and she wields her sex appeal like a hammer, but she clearly underestimates her beauty if she thinks there’s another female on this planet anywhere near as attractive as she is.
“No one can compare to you, Little Devil. You’re so far out of everyone else’s league that you’re not even playing the same sport.”
This earns me a kiss...several kisses, which earn her a private escort. Grasping her round, perky ass in both hands, I lift her up, and she wraps those thick, beautiful thighs around me.
“Do we need to worry about all of this? I mean, they have the bodies. From what that Cotton guy said, the dastardly dad really got what’s been coming to him via Eve Badass Mason.”
“Grizzly got in the Austin PD system. He looked around and, from what I can tell, Cotton is a pretty convincing guy. It seems that he also has some friends in the department who vouched for his story. He took the heat for the main psycho and put the other guy off on Adam. An accident in a scuffle. He protected her. He protected them all.”
“Ugh. Fine. Fine. We like them. I get it.”
Her dramatics bring out the best in me. It really is a shame that I didn’t get to see her unleash on Adam again, since I had to miss it the first time, but the boy was already limping when he came in. Then he was doing everything he could to keep firecracker Evie in place on his shoulder. No way he could’ve taken on another one, and I’m not about to get in Vaughn’s way once she’s already started swinging. This face is too pretty for that shit.
“We can like them and still make them earn it.”
“Yeah, well I’ve basically already started that with the Davenport siblings, I guess. He loves her...or he’s obsessed with her. Both, I guess, and Ada...well, she’s trying. She knows she messed up and she’s working pretty hard to fix it. Although, I guess with all that we now know about their first meeting, it makes much more sense that Ada treated Eve so badly. Really it’s a testament to Ada’s character that she still trusts her now that everything is out.”
“Let’s go for a ride.”
“Now?” Her face is scrunched in confusion. She thinks this just came out of nowhere when really, I’ve been dreaming of what we’re about to do for months. My first night home, Eve was attacked, then little Abel got sick, and the twins freaked the hell out, refusing to leave the house until he was better. In between all of that, we’ve been tracking down leads on Eve and planned the trip to Colorado. There’s just been too much going on to take the time I want to on this. Eve is where she belongs, Abel is better, and the rest can wait until I’ve done what I need to do.
“Yes. Now.”
She smiles at me, and it’s like someone turned on all the lights in the room. This is what they’re talking about. When they say, ‘she lit up a room’. This is what they mean. Vaughn does this. She lights up….not just the room. She lights up my life. Each smile is better than the one before it. Rainbow smiles that get prettier each time it rains.
“Okay. Are we taking both bikes? Or are you going to ride bitch?”
