Page 68 of Brutal Collateral

“I liked the sunroom. And the yard seems nice.”

Griffin stops in his tracks and peers at me. “Try to climb the fence and you’ll be shot by my guards. They’re trained to act first and think second.”

I laugh, thinking he’s kidding. “And go where?”

My brother would bring me right back here.

“I’ll try to make life here bearable,” he whispers in my ear. “And I’m open to suggestions on how to pass the time.”

“In between all the shopping I need to do,” I mutter, unable to flirt right now.

We climb another set of stairs, and I get the reason for all the levels. The need for the height. Each bedroom is on its own floor. It’s Manhattan and nothing is sprawling.

“There are four guest bedrooms, each with an en suite bathroom,” Griffin says, climbing.

“And I can’t sleep in one of them?” I step into one with a fireplace. “This will do.”

“Sorry. I’ll make a lot of concessions. This isn’t one of them.”

Baby steps, Ava. You’ve been here before.

All those men in BUD/S training hated me and the other females like Cherise. Thought we should be serving them dinners at night and fucking them after a long day of hard work. But I dug and dug until I proved myself to them, even if I failed out. Most do. This is no different.

I glance up the next set of stairs. “Master bedroom?”

“Primary bedroom. It’s called primary now.” Griffin leads me that way.

It doesn’t hit me until we’re on this floor that it’s more of an apartment up here. There’s a sitting room with a large plush sofa, a fireplace, and a television. There’s a small kitchenette with a coffee maker, sink, and refrigerator. The bathroom takes up at least the space of one of the bedrooms below.

There’s a massive step-in enclosed shower with glittering glass tiles and a jacuzzi tub in the corner. A long marble vanity with two sinks stretches out across one wall, and there’s a separate room for the toilet.

“Does this work for you?” Griffin asks over my shoulder. “Want to see the closets?”

“Plural?” I spin around.

“There’s two, his and hers.” He walks past the bathroom and opens a door.

The suitcases brought over by the courier sit in there. I take in all the shelving. There’s one wall for shoes and two half-walls with drawers. In the center, a makeup counter looks bare, and I don’t think I can change that. The rest are bars for hanging clothes.

“I know what I’m doing tomorrow.” I run my finger across the designer luggage I can give two shits about. “Putting all this away.”

“Bridget will help you.”

“I can do it.”

“Look up.” Griffin pulls on my ponytail again.

“A skylight. Cool. Is it locked?”

“You can’t help yourself, can you?” He pulls harder, laughing.

I’m wondering if I have the strength to stand on the makeup counter and jump to break the glass. I busted plenty of glass as a RAVEN. Hence all the scars on my body.

He’s right, I can’t help myself. I spent weeks figuring out how to get out of that cage. With all the technology I can work around or use my brute strength to kick in doors, those steel bars brought me to my knees.

“You said something about making concessions,” I say to Griffin.

“Here we go.” He steers me out of the closet and into the main part of the bedroom itself where he sits me on a long wooden bench in front of a king-size bed.

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