Page 7 of Bratva, Baby
“And give her the choice of saying no?” I reply. “I will not take chances where Ava is concerned. I have to get back to that little ass cubicle. I had the one next to Ava moved so that I could keep a closer eye on her. You saw her at lunch. With another man.” My fury at Ava and Evan rises again and the desire to return to Ava barrels over me. “I’ll talk to you later,” I say, hanging up the phone and returning to my little bird’s side. It seems she can’t be kept unattended for too long.
At the end of the day, I am patiently waiting for Ava to finish packing up her office to head home. Today she is in a striped, black pantsuit with a long-sleeved white shirt underneath, and I can’t keep my eyes off her body. I don’t know what I am going to do when I finally have her beneath me, writhing in adelicious combination of pleasure and pain. Probably finish embarrassingly fast.
I am so consumed in my imaginings of her beneath me that she is nearly to the elevator by the time I catch up to her. “Little bird, where do you think you’re going so quickly?” I ask, expecting her attitude this time.
“What?” She asks, sounding confused instead.
“I asked where you’re running away to,” I repeat myself.
“No, not that. What did you call me?” She clarifies.
“Oh, Little Bird?” I repeat the nickname I have given her. “You don’t know the history behind your own name?” I joke with her.
“Don’t fuc-“ She stops talking and looks around, checking to see if anyone heard her outburst, but no one is around. “Don’t freaking patronize me.” She repeats, slightly more reserved.
“Doyou know the origin of your name?” I ask again.
“Obviously not if we are having this conversation.” She states like it’s obvious.
“Your name has Latin origins from the wordAvis,meaning bird. You’re small-”
“I am not small!” She interrupts me.
“As I was saying, you’re smaller than me,” I say, putting an emphasis on our size difference because some primal partof me needs her to know I can and will protect her, even if it’s with my own body. “Hence the ‘little bird’ nickname.” I continue.
“Um. Ok. I guess.” She replies. Like I would have stopped calling her by that name, just because she objected. I scoff at the idea internally; there are going to be a lot of things she is going to have to get over in the very near future.
“Now, where are you going?” I repeat my question. She’s not getting out of this.
“I’m going home. It’s the end of the day. Duh.” She says like she’s trying to force humor into her voice. What is my little bird up to?
“Yeah, I hope you don’t think you’re riding the bus. I told you yesterday, I will bring you home.” Her cheeks pinken and it piques my curiosity.
“Well, no, I’m not taking the bus today, but I’m not riding with you either. I got a ride home from one of our coworkers.” She says. I’m about to question her on who she’s riding with, but that question gets answered on its own when none other than fucking-Evan walks up.
“Hey Ava, are you ready to go?” He asks as if I’m not standing right here.
And just like that, he has made his choice, and he doesn’t even realize how dire the consequences are, but he’ll learn, just like she will have to.
I start planning her punishment. It will be pretty fun for me, but not so much for my little bird. It will have to wait until after the deal with the Irish.
Alek and the rest of my crew are waiting here at the warehouse; the Irish should be here in about ten minutes, and I am impatiently waiting for this deal to be over so that I can go to my little bird. I am livid that she let Evan bring her home, but fights me at every turn, so it’s time she receives her punishment for disobeying me.
Finally, the Irish arrive, and it’s time to put Ava in her little box in my mind so I can focus. Losing focus means making mistakes and that could mean the end of my life; after all, I’ve only just found my little bird.
“Let’s talk while the men count the weapons,” I say to Fionn, the Irish Don, wanting to get this over with. “You demanded that I personally be here. What is so important?” Looking at the old man reminds me of the time I accompanied my father to the meetings he had with the old fuck.
“With how well we work together, I wanted to warn you of a war coming to your doorstep. There is talk of the Italians wanting to set up shipments out of your port right under your nose. Supposedly, they have someone on the inside willing to help.” He speaks quietly, solemnly, with a heavy Irishaccent.
“Do you have any proof of this? Or am I supposed to just go offing my men on hearsay?” I demand, fury burning in my chest.Someone on the inside? Who the hell would have the balls to think they could get away with betraying me?Wrapped up in my musings, I almost miss what the Irishman is saying.
“I have no reason to lie about something like this.” He says, clearly, I’ve offended him.
“You also have no reason to tell me the truth about this.” I point out. “Unless the Italians already came to you and you didn’t like the deal they were trying to cut with you, so you decided to tell me in hopes of getting on my good side.” His face is splotchy now, and even if he denies it, he and I both know by his face alone what his truth is. He’s nothing but an opportunistic rat. I should end him now, but it would only start a war with the Irish andifwhat he says is true about having a traitor in our midst, I don’t need a war on two fronts.
“He did come to me, I’ll admit, but he wanted to set up an arranged marriage between my son and his daughter. When my son was being his usual…promiscuous…self, he had a maid who told him everything she knew.” He explains.
If the Italians are trying to marry off their daughter to the Irish in order to form an alliance, then something is up. “Well, are they going to be wedding bells in your family’s future?” I ask, trying to sound nonchalant, but picking up on the information.
