"Fair enough." She hands me a card. "We'll need statements from everyone, including Ms. Langley. And there'll be an investigation into tonight's events, both here and at the warehouse. Cooperation would be appreciated."
"You'll get it. Within reason."
"That's all I'm asking." She nods to her team. "Alright, let's wrap this up. I want everyone cleared out within the hour."
As the feds work, I pull Ava aside, checking her over for injuries I might've missed. She's got a bruise forming on herwrist where she must've gripped the gun too hard, but otherwise she's unharmed.
"You scared the hell out of me," I tell her.
"Right back at you." She leans into me, exhausted. "Is it over? Really over?"
"The Reapers are done. The buyers are arrested. The trafficking network's exposed." I kiss the top of her head. "Yeah, sweetheart. It's over."
"Then what happens to us?"
It's the question I've been avoiding, the one that doesn't have an easy answer. What happens when the danger's gone and we're left with just ourselves? When she doesn't need my protection anymore and I don't have an excuse to keep her close?
"I don't know," I admit. "But I know I'm not ready to let you go."
She looks up at me, and there's something vulnerable in her expression. "Good, because I'm not ready to be let go."
"So we figure it out. Together."
"Together," she agrees.
And standing there in the wreckage of the clubhouse, surrounded by evidence of violence and survival, I realize that somewhere along the way this stopped being about protection or investigation or club business.
It became about something far more dangerous.
It became about love.
Chapter 6
Ava
The compound's a mess. Three days after the raid and the attack, we're still finding bullet casings in corners and patching holes in walls. The brothers work in shifts, repairing damage while maintaining security rotations because even though the Reapers are done, paranoia's become second nature around here.
I'm in the common room going through my notes for what feels like the hundredth time, organizing everything for the article I'm finally going to write. My new laptop, courtesy of the club's surprisingly generous equipment fund, sits open in front of me with files spread across multiple windows.
The door opens and Ice Pick walks in, sweat-soaked and shirtless after helping Rook repair the damaged gate. Dirt streaks his chest and abs, and I lose my train of thought completely watching water from the hose drip down his skin.
"See something you like?" he asks, catching me staring.
"Just admiring the view." I don't bother hiding it. "You planning on staying half-naked all day or are clothes eventually part of your agenda?"
"Depends. Does the half-naked thing bother you?"
"It's distracting, but I didn't say I wanted you to stop."
He grins, that dangerous smile that does things to my pulse, and crosses the room. His hands bracket me on either side of the couch, caging me in, and he leans down until his mouth's inches from mine.
"You've been working for six hours straight. Time for a break."
"I'm on a deadline. Robert wants my evidence organized for the prosecution."
"Robert can wait thirty minutes." His teeth graze my bottom lip. "You can't keep running yourself into the ground, Ava. You're going to burn out."
"I'll burn out after the article's done, after the prosecution's solid, after I know those girls are going to get justice." I push at his chest, but it's halfhearted. "Someone has to document all this properly."
