I have a weird mixture of nerves and excitement because I haven’t seen Elena and Trevor in what feels like forever. I chose not to go back over summer break, mainly because I have this obsession with being back to my normal self before I saw them again. I want them to see how much better I am and how far I’ve come but right now I feel like I’ve taken three steps forward and ten steps back.
I’ve changed so much over the last couple of months and I’m proud of what I’ve achieved, and all on my own too. So going back to Elena and Trevor’s, feeling like this, is something that I’ve worked towards.
I turn to face the crowd, my eyes finding Scott’s. I don’t like the look in his eyes, the way he looks from me to Jackson and back to me again makes me shiver.
Shaking my head, I look back at Jackson, silently asking what was going on between the two of them. He squeezes my shoulder lightly and tilts his head to the door, signaling for me to get inside. I take one last look at Scott and climb into the truck, clipping my belt around me and waiting for Jackson to go around to the driver’s side.
I guess I wasn’t getting anything out of him.
The drive home doesn’t take long, especially with the way Jackson drives. Several times during the ride, I actually feared for my life. The music blasts through his speakers nearly the whole way there, right up until we get the edge of the property.
The sight of the trees and the familiar surroundings fills me with a sense of peace.
This really is home.
I smile and breathe in the air as we turn up the makeshift road to the house, only frowning when Jackson stops all of a sudden. He was so eager to get on the road quickly when he picked me up and had barely given me anytime to pack an overnight bag before he was rushing me out of my apartment and back into his truck.
“What’s up?” I ask, turning in my seat.
“Well...” He clears his throat. “Thing is, Ma and Dad don’t know we’re coming home.”
“What?” My eyes spring open as I lean back in the seat. I can’t believe he’s done this, showing up unannounced is something that I never do and although I know they will probably be thrilled to see us, it still doesn’t stop me biting my lip out of nervousness.
What if they aren’t even in? What if they have company?
My mind starts to go into overdrive and for the first time since I got into Jackson’s truck, I feel anxious.
“Chill.” He laughs and presses down on the gas pedal. “They’ll love it. I mean, come on, we’re their favorite kids,” he says, waggling his brows up and down as he parks behind Trevor’s cabin.
“Why are you parking here?” I undo my belt and pull on the door handle.
“So that they don’t know we’re coming.” He smirks and jumps out. “I got it,” he says when I go to grab my bag.
Rolling my eyes, I step out of the car and let my head fall back, closing my eyes and breathing in the smell of the woods that surround the land. It smells like home and I didn’t realize how much I’d missed it until right now.
The sight of Trevor’s cabin has my lips lifting into a giant grin.
I’d spent hours in there with him, I only watched him work at first, that was until Trevor thought I was capable enough to learn how to use his power tools. I wasn’t the best at handling the powerful machines but he always told me that I did a good job.
When I hadn’t been in there, I’d been inside learning how to cook or bake. Several times Elena tried to get me involved in the numerous animals that she had brought home from the vets. But I just wasn’t an animal person, not unless it was a dog and that was the one thing that she never bought home with her.
“I love it here too,” Jackson says as he throws his arm over my shoulders. I look up at him, a small smile on my face and nod in agreement. “Come on, let’s go and surprise the folks.”
We both walk up to the main house and I marvel at it, it really is a work of art. Light yellow shutters sit beside each window and the white siding looks like it’s recently been painted. The flowers in the beds either side of the stairs are in bloom, and my eyes zone in on the swing that sits on the wraparound porch. I love that swing, many nights I used to sit out here and watch the trees.
With the dimming sky, we don’t see the cars parked out front until we get closer.
“Jackson, they have company,” I whisper, swallowing down the lump in my throat, disturbing them when they have company doesn’t sit well with me.
“It’s fine,” he says, urging me forward.
I shake my head and wave my hand, signaling him to go first.
He shrugs his shoulders and tip toes up the steps. This is the quietest I’ve ever heard Jackson, he’s always so loud and you know when he’s in a room because he makes it known. So seeing him like this is comical and I try my hardest to hold in the giggle that’s trying to escape.
When he’s at front of the door, he looks back at me and holds up three fingers, counting down until he has none and flings the door open.
“Honey! I’m home!” he shouts, spreading his arms wide and dropping the bags at the same time.
I wince as I hear something in my bag clank against the floor and I really hope it isn’t my laptop. It’s not that it’s anything special, it isn’t the latest kind and it’s certainly not fast by any means, but I bought it out of my own money and for that reason alone, it’s extra special to me.
I’d saved up for a year to buy the thing, refusing to let Elena and Trevor buy me one. I wanted to be able to earn my own things and relying on them to buy it for me was something that I didn’t want to do.
“Jackson? Is that you?” I hear Elena gasp as her footsteps get closer. I stand behind him, knowing that they won’t be able to see me behind his wide frame. “Oh, honey! I missed you!” she squeals as her arms come around him.
Jackson engulfs her in his arms and spins her around, her laughter bouncing off the walls as her feet lift off the ground. Her long hair spins as he picks up speed and the sight of it has me snorting.
“Wait, have you brought somebody to meet us?” she asks pulling back and slapping Jackson’s chest when he lets her down.
“Ava?” she gasps when she spins to face me, her eyes glassing over with unshed tears. She looks at me from head to toe, scanning my whole body, probably trying to work out if I really am here and in one piece.
“Surprise,” I squeak and lift my hands up in the air.
“Everybody! You never guess whose home!” she shouts. I wince at her but I don’t have time to get my bearings before her arms sling around me and squeeze me tight. “Sweet, Ava, I’ve missed you so, so much. How is everything, what have you been up to?”
I chuckle as she fires question after question at me. There’s no way I’m going to be able to answer any of them because as soon as she pulls back, I’m snatched inside another set of arms and lifted off the floor.
I breath in the smell that’s unmistakably Trevor. Musk mixed in with wood. There’s no way that I can ever forget that smell. “Avie!” he shouts down my ear, spinning me around in the same way that Jackson did with Elena. Only he doesn’t put me down, he carries me through to the living room, my feet dangling in the air.
“I see you’ve put on some much needed weight.” He winks.
Any other girl would be offended if someone said that to them but after what happened, I struggled to eat and lost so much weight; I looked ill, seriously ill.
I’ve been eating better and put on a much needed twenty pounds. The gym over the last few weeks has helped me tone up and I’m in the best shape that I’ve ever been.
He puts me down, my feet finally touching the floor and spins me to face everyone.
Charlie approaches me first, placing a kiss on my head and squeezing me in the same way that Trevor had. I’m then passed on to Ty, Elena and Trevor’s middle son and then to Kay, Ty’s fiancé.
But she’s so much more than that to me, she’d been through the whole ordeal in that hellhole with me, she was the perso
n who had lead me to this amazing family and I wasn’t one who believed in fate but if I was a believer, I would’ve said that these people right here were my destiny.
After giving their son Eli a quick hug, I look up not expecting anyone else to be here.
My breath catches in my throat as I meet his brown eyes, the swirls catching me in their web, not allowing me to look away.
I’ve envisioned seeing him so many times, I’ve dreamed about him, imagined his voice in my head when I need to be grounded. It’s been eighteen months but as I look at him now it feels like it’s only been a day.
Our eyes don’t move from each other’s and all I can think is, my savior.
The one person who knows just how many scars I carry, not just on the inside but on the outside too.
I’ve been back for three days now, the mission that we’ve spent eighteen months on is finally over. The whole team has gone home for a well-deserved break; we don’t know how long we have but we’re hoping for a long one before Daley calls us back in.
You never know with this job though and for all we know we could be back at work within the next week.
Knowing that Daley is my boss makes me on edge. I knew very little about him when I was in the special forces but what I did hear was never good. Getting to know him more over the last eighteen months, I’ve realized how much I misjudged him, he’s a good person and he’s always making sure that we’re safe and taken care of, and that we have everything we need.
He climbed the ranks quickly when he was in the forces and now he owns his own private contracting firm; and I’m not talking about the kind that works with bricks.
None of us know much about Daley, as far as we’re aware he has no family but most of us keep our personal lives private, so it doesn’t surprise me that we don’t know. He’s the epitome of going dark, there’s only a handful of people who know that he’s still alive. He has more enemies than I can count, he’s fierce and ruthless but only to the people who he’s contracted to kill or bring in.
I haven’t heard from him since I’ve been stateside and I know it’s only a matter of time before he gets in touch with me.
All I wanted to do was spend time with my family so as soon as I got to the compound, I spent every minute that I could with them. It was bittersweet being here with them all, I was having a great time but I couldn’t stop thinking about the last time I had been here... with Ava.
After hearing that I was back, Elena insisted on cooking a welcome home dinner so on Friday evening, we all piled into Ty’s truck and made the drive there.
We hadn’t been there half an hour before Jackson turned up with a girl on his arm. He’d tried to be quiet when he pulled onto the property but I knew someone was there, and from the looks on Charlie and Ty’s faces, they knew he was here to. I think he was forgetting who he was dealing with.
Had it just have been Elena and Trevor, I have no doubt they wouldn’t have heard him.
After the girl has been passed around to everyone, I stand up ready to introduce myself; I am a gentleman after all.
My heart thumps harder in my chest as I meet her eyes, the almost see through blue hits me straight in the gut. That’s the only thing that I recognize about her though.
She’s changed so much over the last eighteen months. My mind flashes with images of when I first saw her face and what she was being subjected to. My jaw clenches as I remember and I close my eyes briefly, trying to get my breathing under control so that I can stay calm.
Kay told me how well she’s doing at college but she didn’t tell me how much she had grown up.
I’ve just turned twenty-seven so that has to make her coming up to twenty, if I’ve done my calculations right.
When I open my eyes back up, it’s as if there’s only me and her. All of the air is sucked out of the room and my eyes zone in on her face, scanning her and moving back to her eyes that are pulling me back in.
“Hey.” She smiles the sweetest fuckin’ smile I’ve ever seen.
For a second, I can’t move and then my brain catches up with my body and I grin at her.
Stepping forward, I open my arms wide and wait for her to step inside them. It’s been too long since I held her in my arms. Back then, I’d held a broken girl but this time is different; I can see how much she’s changed, just in the way that she carries herself.
She takes two steps forward and I match her, meeting her in the middle and wrapping my arms around her waist. I breath her in, not being able to get enough of her and knowing this could quite possibly be the last time I see her in a long time.
Shaking those thoughts from my head, I lean down and whisper, “Hey, birdie.”
I hear her snort against my chest and I chuckle. That’s been my nickname for her from the moment I laid eyes on her, I haven’t got a clue where it came from, maybe it’s because she was always trying to escape herself.
She pulls back slightly and looks up at me, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I missed you,” she says, barely audible but I hear her loud and clear.
There hasn’t been one day that I haven’t thought about her. I always asked about her in a roundabout way when I video called Kay.
I lean down and whisper in her ear, “I missed you too.” Then I pull back, letting my arms drop from around her.
I’m all too aware of the audience that are watching us and I don’t want them to think something of nothing.
“Right!” Elena claps her hands together, causing Ava to jump. I can see the three brothers watching her out of the corner of my eye and I know they caught sight of it too.
Frowning, I shake my head, not dwelling on it. I’m going to enjoy spending time with my extended family and not worry about Ava.
At least, I’m going to try.
We all follow Elena into the dining room, watching as she sets an extra two places.
I can’t believe that Corey’s here, I have no idea how to feel about it. It’s been so long since I’ve seen him, I always envisioned us meeting under different circumstances; when I’m me again. I guess we can’t control everything, something which I’m slowly trying to get to grips with.
He hasn’t changed one bit, apart from the stubble that’s on his face. I lift my hand to my cheek, swearing I can still feel it’s scratchy texture there. My eyes flutter closed as I remember him whispering in my ear.
When I open them, they automatically find him. Looking away, I turn to the brothers who are stood on the other side of the room and make my way over to them. I haven’t seen Ty since I went to college.
“Hey,” I say when I come to the edge of the semi-circle they’ve formed.
“Ava.” Ty smiles and throws his arm over my shoulders. I feel so short standing next to all of these giants. “How’s college going?”
“Good.” I reply, skimming over the fact that things are getting better but still aren’t as good as they could be.
The apartment has been my sanctuary for so long but lately, I hated being there. Especially when Jess and Scott were there, they’ve started to come back more and more often now, and although Scott tried to act like nothing ever happened, I can feel the tension when we’re all there together.
Jess is different when he’s around, I don’t know if it’s always been there and I haven’t noticed, or whether it’s a recent thing, but she’s not her usual bubbly self.
Even when it’s just me and Jess things are awkward, there’s something unspoken between us and I know it’s not because of what went down at the bar, it’s something else. I can feel it, sense it.
“Dinner’s ready!” Elena calls from the kitchen.
Ty steers me towards my chair next to Trevor who’s sat at the head of the table, with Jackson to my right and Charlie and Ty opposite me. I keep my eyes up this end of the table, not trusting myself to look down at Corey.
“I’m so glad you’ve come home,” Trevor says quietly, placing his hand over mine when I’ve sat down.
“Me too.” I smil
e.
Elena and Kay start to bring in the huge amount of food they’ve cooked and we all eat. I don’t take part in any conversations, preferring to listen to them instead.
Everything is going well until Trevor asks how Jackson’s job is going.
Butterflies take flight in my stomach and I place my fork down gently on my plate. They know that we met at his work but Charlie said that he hasn’t told anyone what Scott did or that Jackson was arrested.
“Yeah, it’s going good.” He nods, shoveling another forkful of potato in his mouth.
“Think you’ll be able to keep this one?” Trevor chuckles.
I lean back in my chair, wishing the ground would swallow me up as everyone goes silent.
“Well, I’ve only had one warning so far, so...”
“You’ve had a warning already? What for this time?” Trevor asks, placing his fork down in the same way that I have, his face going hard at what Jackson has said.
All of his attention is on his son now and I can see the car crash waiting to happen. I don’t want them to know what happened that night, I don’t want them to worry and I don’t want to be center of attention either.
“Well... this douche-” Please don’t say it
“Language,” Ty growls, tilting his head to Eli.
“Right, sorry. This person...” He winks. “From Ava’s college tried to start a fight with me. All because me and Ava were going outside. Anyway-”
“Please don’t, Jackson,” I whisper, my voice breaking as I can feel everyone’s eyes on me, most importantly I can feel his eyes on me.
“Wait... so that’s how you met?” Elena asks from the other end of the table. I close my eyes, wishing I had some kind of super power; being able to turn invisible would come in really handy right about now.
“Yeah, and this dou- person grabbed Ava’s arm.” I take a deep breath and open my eyes, keeping them firmly on the fork that’s on my plate.
“Jackson...” Charlie warns.
He doesn’t listen to him and carries on, completely unaware of what’s going on around him. “So, I tell him to take his hand off her.” He rolls his eyes. “Long story short he punches me in the face-”
Flying Free Page 7
