Page 194 of This Woman Forever

Her forehead crinkles. “You do?”

“Of course I do, Ava.” I have to force myself not to laugh. Did she think Sarah acted out of hate? “I’m not fucking stupid.”

“You obviously are.” She snorts. “You’ll trample anyone who tries to take me away from you, yet right under your nose, she’s doing the best job, and you’re choosing to ignore it.”

Ignoring it? Jesus. Context is wasted, because she will never get it. Maybe because the context stands for shit. It’s the wrong context.

Ava disappears out of the room, and my heavy, pounding head drops back, my eyes on the ceiling. “Advice, anyone?” I ask seriously, waiting, listening. But no. I’m on my own. “Thanks a bunch, bro." I sigh. “I didn’t just let it go unsaid, Ava,” I say, following her to the kitchen. “I had it out with her and she admitted and regretted it all.”

Her eyes widen as she downs some water. “Of course she regrets it.” She swipes the back of her hand across her mouth, and a drop of water falls to her breast as a result. My eyes fall there. “She failed! She’s probably regretting not doing a better job!” I jump when a loud bang sounds. Her glass hitting the counter. How the fuck did that not smash? “And you may as well have let it go unsaid,” she rants on. “Did you offer burial or cremation?”

And now we’re talking about funerals? “What?”

Her hand flaps between our naked bodies. “The usual option you give people who hurt me. Did you offer it to Sarah?”

This is too much. What a fucking shitter of an end to our wonderful break in Paradise. “No,” I breathe, exhausted. “I offered her a job in return for her word that she’ll never interfere again.” How can I pull this back? Make Ava see I’m thinking of her too. It’s mainly her. She’s going to need me, and I can’t very well be there twenty-four seven if I have to run The Manor. Not that I could run The Manor if I had all the time in the fucking world. I’m hopeless. “I told her that if you say so, she’s out.”

“I say so,” she yells, going so red in the face, I’m sure she might pop. “I say she’s out!”

“But she hasn’t done anything.”

“She’s not done anything?” Disbelief. Yikes.

“I mean, she’s not done anything since I reinstated her,” I say calmly, trying to dial down the high energy before it ends in tears. “And you rewarded her with a tidy crack to the jaw for the stuff that came before.”

“Why are you doing this?” she asks, now calm too. “You know how I feel, Jesse.”

Fuck, yes, I do. And I understand. But this isn’t only about us. There’s more to be considered. Like a life. And I know Ava could never be so cruel to disregard a life, no matter whose life it is. “Because she’s desperate, Ava. She has no life past The Manor.”

“You feel sorry for her?”

This isn’t just a simple case of feeling sorry for her. God, there’s so much more to it. And yet... context. “Ava,” I beg, as she refills her glass. I’m not surprised, her throat must be really fucking dry and really fucking sore. “First of all, I want you to calm down because it’s not good for you or the babies.”

“I am calm!” she screams, now going blue in the face.

Oh, enough is enough. She’s going to burst a fucking blood vessel. I swipe the glass from her hand, ignoring her gasp of shock, and slam it down before lifting her onto the worktop. Taking her jaw in my grip, mine rolls, my glare as real as hers.

“Sarah has nothing,” I explain. “I kicked her out when she came clean and thought no more of it.” Fuck, I didn’t want to share this. I hoped Ava was comfortable enough with the reassurance that Sarah will stay away from her. “Until John spoke with her and she was saying all kinds of fucked-up shit,” I go on, loosening my hold of her jaw when she withdraws, her scowl turning into questioning. “The most worrying part mentioning death being better than living her life without me.”

“Attention seeker,” she fires, her scowl back.

Of course her mind would go there. But can I blame her? “I thought so too,” I admit. “But John wasn’t so sure. He found her. She’d slashed her wrists and taken a pile of painkillers.” She loses all animosity in a heartbeat and, I can’t lie, I’m really fucking relieved. “It was no cry for help, Ava. There was no attention seeking about it. John only just got her to the hospital in time. She wanted to die.”

She’s been shocked into silence, just staring at me in disbelief.

“I don’t want another death on my conscience, baby,” I whisper. “I live with Jake’s every single day. I can’t do it.”

“She came to see me,” Ava says quietly.

“She told me, but I’m surprised you never mentioned this before.”

“I didn’t think it was important.” Her shoulders lift on a little shrug, and my previous thoughts are ignited. Was it that meeting between them that had Ava rushing to The Manor and confessing about the pregnancy?

It’s possible, but I won’t push that. And since we’re putting some cards on the table... “It was Sarah who told Matt about my drinking.”

Oh, her scowl. “Is that how you knew I was collecting my clothes from Matt’s too?”

“She said she’d overheard you on the phone, telling someone you were intending on picking your stuff up. I was too mad to piece it together. I saw red, acted on impulse, and asked questions later.”

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