Dax

by Shannyn Leah

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  ~

  THE THIN SLIVER OF THE moon hung above them as Dax’s tense body drove his Camaro down dark side roads heading to his cottage. The gravel sent tremors through the car and she’d bet he didn’t regularly drive this particular car on such road conditions. But he was doing it for them.

  Looking over her shoulder again, she confirmed Olivia still rested peacefully in her car seat, asleep.

  Sitting back in her seat, Ava stole a glance at Dax as he sharply rounded another corner, his stiff body barely moving. She owed him an explanation. She knew that, and regretted dragging him into her past, but not right now, with Olivia possibly dozing in and out of sleep. Plus, she’d been preoccupied watching the side mirror for any signs of cars following them, beating herself up for allowing Ross to post the videos.

  This was on her. She’d escaped Kevin only to carelessly bring him back. “Escaped” was an odd word when, in reality, he’d let her go, sent her away. He left her with only a whisper as she lay in the hospital bed, groggy. He’d told her the fire that had killed her family hadn’t been accidental but had been payback for terminating their baby. What he hadn’t known was she’d only told him that lie to save Olivia from a life with him. But now….

  Now the bastard claimed he wanted Olivia’s portion of the shop. That could very well be his plan, but the bigger plan would be to eliminate Ava, and quite possibly Olivia, in order to claim it.

  Her eyes flew open, not realizing she’d drifted asleep. Dax’s ranch-style cottage came into view and he steered the car around the U-shaped driveway, stopping at the front door.

  “Here.” Dax dangled his keys in front of her. “Go unlock the door and I’ll carry Olivia in.” She nodded, numbly taking the keys. “Straight down the hall, last door on the left, there’s a room for her.”

  “Okay.” On her way up the rock path, she double-checked her surroundings. The moonlight barely gave a beam of light from the sky, casting shadows from the trees across the wood cottage until she stepped close enough to activate the automatic lights. She jumped, then felt a wave of relief, knowing the lights would alert her of any company. Of Kevin.

  Inside the cottage, she felt three light switches on the left of the door and turned them all on before making her way down the hall. If her visit weren’t under these frightening circumstances she would’ve be in awe at the beauty inside the small home. Pine wood lined the walls, and large wooden beams spanned across the ceiling. If only she weren’t so terrified, she’d have smiled and let the homey warm feeling of Dax’s cottage give her another reason to love him.

  Instead, she focused on her way to the last door at the end of the hall. A double-wide log bed sat in the middle of a rustic-themed bedroom. A large rust-colored woven rug lay beneath the bed. The warm tones matched the blanket draped over the bench at the end of the bed. She pulled back the block quilt and sheet, and then set the throw pillows on a twig chair beside the large window. She’d thought the days were gone when she had to check that the windows were locked and draw the curtains shut for privacy.

  She heard Dax’s footsteps behind her and turned as he walked into the room and gently laid her daughter on the bed. Standing on the opposite side, Ava lifted the sheet and tucked it under Olivia’s chin before leaning down and kissing her forehead. She laid her hand over her daughter’s arm and considered crawling under the sheet with her, holding her safe until daylight. But Dax covered his hand over hers and gave her a light tug. She owed him an explanation, so she followed him out of the room, leaving the door open in case her daughter awoke.

  Stopping at the end of the hallway, she took a moment to look around. The enclosed glass walls in the living room had an amazing view of the darkened lake, but sent chills down her spine at the possibility of who could be watching from the brush around the cottage. She was all too aware of how the lights in the cabin illuminated them.

  She peeled her eyes away from the bubbling fear in her chest, and turned to see Dax pull a beer out of the refrigerator. He held it up to her. “Thirsty?”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  He opened the bottle and tossed the cap on the counter before walking back to her. As her hand reached for the light switch, he caught it. “He’s not out there.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “No one followed us.”

  She turned to face him. “And if he did, Dax? Then he’s watching us.” She looked down where their hands touched, silently pleading with him to let her shut the light off.

  “I won’t hide in the dark from anyone and I certainly won’t allow anyone to chase you into the dark. Talk to me.”

  Her shoulders dropped in defeat, letting the comfort of his arms wrapping around her take away a part of her worry. She needed the security of his embrace more than she’d ever allowed before.

  Her fingers clung to the front of his shirt. She pressed the side of her head against his chest and closed her eyes. She felt the steady beat of his heart, reminding her of the life she’d created for Olivia and the future she’d hoped with Dax. A man who had dropped everything to drive to the middle of nowhere simply because she’d asked. All without an explanation, and all because of his love for her.

  Her breathing slowed and steadied, and her legs gained their strength back, but above all, she was ready to talk, even knowing the very words could sabotage their future.

  As if knowing her fears, Dax pulled her to the couch, but she pulled out of his grasp, needing distance of the couch cushion between them in order to pour out her past.

  “Before I lay my life out I want you to know that you and Rowdy are amazing. Your dad took me in when I had nowhere to go. And I mean nowhere. I don’t know where I’d be without him. And you’ve been there for me and Olivia since the moment I met you. I’d always thought it was a big brother act when really you were as attracted to me as I was to you. I’m sorry I’ve involved you in all this.”

  He reached his arms across the distance and his hands wrapped around hers. “You don’t have to apologize. I love you, Ava. You and Olivia.”

  Her heart sunk. He didn’t know her the way he thought. Her past was ugly, her decisions disgusting.

  She pulled out of his grasp, and rose to her feet. Walking around the coffee table, her fingers dug through her hair and a frustrated groan tore from her chest. “Please don’t make this harder than it is.” She hadn’t meant to shout at him. When she turned to face him, his features remained straight. “You won’t look at me the same after this.”

  His lips thinned and his expressionless, hard face left no room to read his thoughts. No surprise since he’d always been reserved about which emotions he allowed people to see. Deep down, she’d hoped he would tell her nothing would change the way he saw her, but he remained silent and her heart sunk a little bit more.

  “It’s alright if you need to walk away from me after this.” He said nothing, so she continued. “I’m not the person your dad put on a pedestal. I didn’t deserve it, but at the same time, I’d never felt so special.” Taking a deep breath, she turned her back to him and willed away the tears before looking back. “I was born on the, for lack of a better term, the ‘wrong side’ of the tracks. Like Ross. I think that’s why I tried so hard to give him a chance. I wanted him to see a different way than what his family offers him. What my family offered me.”

  She paced beside the fireplace, noticing framed pictures of Rowdy and Dax lining the top. She almost felt a push of hope run through her and couldn’t resist thinking it was Rowdy.

  “My family was close, but they made bad decisions. They didn’t work. Our house was basically run down before it burned down. They were the town drunks who did a lot of drugs, but they were my family. I loved them.”

  She watched his eyes soften and it took another part of her heart. “I was just like them. I partied hard, pretty much every day and all night. With them…with Kevin.” She glanced down the hall, listening and looking for any sign of Olivia before she looked back
at Dax. “Because I was just like them, I would do anything for my next high.” Tears pooled in her eyes and she tried to blink them away, wiping at the ones that slid down her cheek. She glanced down the hall again and swallowed her reluctance. “Anything.”

  Dax’s eyes followed her, widening at the realization she wasn’t the sweetness he’d been led to believe.

  “I slept with Kevin for drugs.”

  His haunted eyes slid to hers. “I understood the implication.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He stood. “Why are you sorry? Because you have a past or because you think I’m so shallow I would judge you for it? You’ve been around me for years. You’ve heard the stories, know about the women in my life, but, still, here you are, loving me. Why would I be any different? What kind of asshole do you think I am?”

  She said nothing, unable to come up with the words to make this right.

  “Maybe I was wrong.” He stopped at her side, his head lowered, his eyes boiling with anger or sadness. Disappointment possibly. “Maybe you never really got over my past.”

  ~

  DAX DOWNED HIS next beer and lined up the empty bottle on the table with the four others he’d downed. He scrubbed his hand across his face, feeling the frustration as sharp as the moment he’d realized Ava had no faith in him. What was a relationship without faith and trust? Love could conquer almost anything, but without faith they were treading on a fine line between success and failure.

  As much as he wanted to reach for the next beer, he had to stay sober enough to make sober decisions. Regardless of her lack of faith in him, there was still some real asshole out there, who had scared her enough to run. Kevin needed to be located and stopped.

  Many courses of action came to mind: beat him to a pulp, beat him beyond a pulp, and beat him again. However, Dax didn’t want to land his ass in jail, leaving Ava and Olivia alone. He could pay the prick off, but that could lead to more demands and payouts further down the road. That thought brought him back to simply beating Kevin up and leaving him on the side of the road.

  Dax needed sleep.

  The door behind him opened. He’d figured she wouldn’t step out here in fear of the coward possibly lurking in the bush. One minute alone with Dax, and Kevin would know he was the coward. He saw her out of his peripheral vision, cautiously moving up beside him. He kept his stare trained on the water, but eventually she moved into his view.

  She looked like an angel, the dim glow from the porch light casting across her delicate and slender body. She’d changed into shorts and a T-shirt that had slipped down one shoulder. Damn, she was gorgeous. But they weren’t on the same page.

  She turned her backside to him and leaned her arms on the railing to stare out at the water for a long moment. He couldn’t have torn his eyes away from her if he’d tried, and he sure as hell didn’t want to. They’d missed too many years together because he’d been stubborn and scared about letting love into his life. He’d been afraid of death, being alone, and trying to love only one person for eternity. But Ava had always had his heart.

  She turned, catching his eyes with hers before leaning her backside against the railing and wringing her hands together. Finally, she folded her arms in front of herself. “I’m no good at this.” She took a deep breath. “At letting people in, at relationships…at loving. I suck at all of it.”

  At least they were on the same page there.

  “When I found out I was pregnant, something in me changed. Immediately, like the flick of a switch. To be perfectly honest, I can’t even be sure I was sober when I found out, but I just knew that I had to do better. And I couldn’t do better there, with my family, with Kevin offering a hit in exchange for....” She shook her head and took another breath.

  Dax didn’t stop looking at her, but his fingers dug into the arm chair. Had he known this before that twerp had showed up at his shop, he would have pounded him into the cement.

  “I planned on leaving. Leaving my family, leaving him. I just needed to get away long enough to give her to someone who could give her everything I couldn’t, everything that without Rowdy I would’ve never been able to give her.” Her hands slipped out of the knot she’d created and wiped under her eyes.

  The more she talked, the more of a bastard he felt for getting angry with her. She let out a humourless laugh. “Ironic isn’t it? I lost my family in that fire, but I had the support to keep the most important person in my life with me. One of the two most important people. How does a person even sort that through in their head? There was a mixture of sadness for the loss in the fire, and heartache because someone I had loved, Kevin, had set the fire, but thankfulness for my daughter. I was a mess of emotions. Still am, I guess. I can’t even say I’m sorry for thinking you’d leave because, honestly, why would you stick around?”

  Those words had him on his feet and across the porch, pulling her into his arms. “Damn it, woman, I’m not going anywhere. You’re not going anywhere. We are in this together.”

  That son of a bitch was going to pay for putting the weight of the world on this woman’s shoulders.

  “He killed my family, Dax.” She cried against his shoulder, her tears dampening the material of his shirt. When her sobs slowed, she said, “I’m afraid he’ll hurt you, too.”

  “I don’t think you know what your friend Kevin looks like right now. He reminded me of a rotten branch ready to crumble at the slightest movement.”

  She pulled away, her tear-stained face still consumed with worry. “Not physically. He’s crazy, but not crazy enough to fight you head on. He’s a coward but he’ll come after you when you least expect it. Like a house fire, or setting your shop on fire, or paying his thug friends to take you out one night late after work.” She gripped his forearms. “You have to let me and Olivia go. For your safety.”

  Dax covered her mouth in a short kiss. “You have to let me protect you both. Have some faith in me.” More tears pooled in her eyes. “I’m a grown man with some good connections. Give me a few days. If you say he intentionally started the fire that killed your family, that’s arson, but worse, manslaughter. Let’s put him behind bars before he hurts anyone else.”

  “How?”

  He kissed her again, lighter this time. “Tomorrow we can discuss details. It’s late. You need sleep.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t sleep.”

  “Yes, you can.” He kissed the top of her head before leading her into the house. He walked her through the house, turning off the lights, and checking the locked windows and doors. The last room to check was Olivia’s. She stood beside her daughter’s bed as Dax double-checked where he already knew she had checked her daughter’s room. When he finished, he pulled the sheet back on Olivia’s bed and sat on the edge. He knew Ava wouldn’t leave her alone for the night.

  He patted the mattress. “Lie down and close your eyes.”

  Tiny hints of a smile lifted her lips, and then she crawled under the sheet and gathered Olivia in her arms. Dax stretched his body on the bed, slipping one arm under Ava’s head. She snuggled against him with a content sigh. “I love you, Dax.”

  He kissed her forehead. “Love you, too, sweetheart. Now close your eyes. I’m right here.” And here was where he would stay.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  ~

  THE SUN PEEKED THROUGH THE wood shutters, bathing warmth over Ava’s sleeping body. She felt a small hand draped over her head and Olivia’s body curled up beside her. Yawning, she stretched her free hand to feel the other side of the bed, only to find it empty. Slowly blinking awake, she gently moved her daughter’s arm and slipped out of bed so as not to wake her. She pulled the blankets over the sleeping child and then began walking down the hall, following the smell of brewing coffee into the kitchen. It wasn’t a surprise to find Dax up before her and she guessed he’d already gone for a run along the shoreline and bathed as well. Now he sat in the kitchen with a mug of coffee scrolling through emails on a laptop she’d spotted the eve
ning before.

  What she hadn’t been prepared for was finding Stone sitting at the table beside him. He nodded at her. “Hey, Ava.”

  She half smiled, wishing she’d changed from her shorts and thin material shirt to a presentable outfit. “Good morning.”

  Dax looked up, his eyes raking over her in a way that made her feel like she was naked as he silently appreciated every part of her. He finally made it to her face and she arched her eyebrows at him. He chuckled and asked, “How did you sleep last night?”

  “Good, and you?” She stole a glance at Stone, wondering if he knew they’d all crashed in Olivia’s bed for the night.

  “I like it better when you’re naked and tangled in my sheets.”

  She gasped, her head whipping back to look at Dax. Her cheeks warmed at his sudden change from concern to blunt teasing in front of his best friend.

  Stone only chuckled, shaking his head and looking back down at the laptop screen. “Don’t blame me for interrupting. You called me here, remember?”

  Dax grunted, and looked back down at his laptop.

  Ava crossed the room and robotically poured herself a cup of coffee. Her eyes searched the windows stretching above the counter for any signs of movement in the trees. Almost all the windows in this cottage were bare of any sort of curtain coverage. Normally, being secluded from the rest of the world, she wouldn’t have noticed. But now, things had changed. The worry of Kevin lurking in the brush around them tempted her to run to the corner store for extra blankets to cover every last exposed window.

  When the beautiful fall day only contradicted her worrisome insides, she turned and leaned against the counter. Sipping her coffee, she watched Dax over the brim of her mug. She grinned to herself at how annoyingly cocky he could be. If he’d let her take Olivia and leave town, everyone would be safe. But, instead, he’d put himself in danger and now had dragged Stone into her mess. Although no doubt lingered in her head that either of these men couldn’t defend themselves—they were all muscle—Kevin didn’t play fair. He hit when you weren’t looking and his lack of conscious made his strikes deadly. She couldn’t lose Dax to Kevin’s vengeance. She realized her feelings mirrored Dax’s and that’s why he hadn’t let her go.