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“Don’t,” he says softly. “Don’t go there. She is not your girl. She can never be your girl.”
“Why? Because she was once theirs?” I snap.
“Yes. That’s exactly why. She’s off limits to you, Ev.” He barks out a laugh. “Hell, Ev, she’s still fucking married to them. You want to be that guy, really?”
“If by that guy, you mean the one to see Avery for who she really is? The one who hears what she has to say? Who speaks to her with fucking respect? Then yeah, Greg, I want to be that fucking guy. You think I should stand back because she has a history with my brothers. But that’s all it is: history. It’s in the past. I could give her a future. I could keep her safe. Make her happy. She’d be—”
“Theirs,” he tells me gently. “No matter what you do, a part of her will always be theirs.”
I turn and look out the side window, ignoring the scorch of pain his words leave behind. He’s not telling me anything I don’t already know. Hell, what the fuck would Avery even want with someone like me anyway? I might not look like I did back in high school, but inside, I’m still the geeky computer nerd who plays video games and reads comics for fun.
Still, the more Greg pushed, the harder I felt the need to push back. I can’t say I’ve ever felt the need to fight for something quite vehemently before. I’m usually the chill one. The guys joke that I’m so laid-back, I’m almost horizontal. At least until I have a lead on something. Then I’m like a dog with a bone. I don’t stop—can’t stop—until I have all the information in front of me. Then it’s just a case of rearranging it like jigsaw pieces to all fit together.
That’s where I get my thrill, not like the others who are all adrenaline junkies.
I picture Hawk and Creed and know Avery has a type. And clearly, it’s not me. Still, I don’t open my mouth to retract my statement because part of me is not willing to admit defeat. Not yet, anyway.
Once we get to the hospital, I jump out, leaving Greg to park. I make my way up to Avery’s room and knock on the door before entering. There is an old guy asleep in her bed. I close the door and look at the number outside again and frown.
Heading for the nurses’ station, I spot a familiar one who offers me a wide grin. “Well, hey there, sugar. What can I do for you?”
“Can you tell me what room Avery was moved to?”
She shakes her head, her smile falling a little. “She was discharged this morning. She didn’t tell you?”
“No. She didn’t. Do you know where she went?”
“Uh, back to her motel room, I think she said. Yeah, that’s right. She told the doctor she had a family member flying in to help her out, but they weren’t coming in until tonight, so she had to take an Uber.”
“You know what motel?”
“No, and even if I did, I couldn’t tell you. You know that.”
“Right, thanks.”
I turn and jog toward the elevator as the door opens, and Greg steps out. When he sees me approaching, he holds the doors and steps back inside.
“What’s going on?”
“Avery checked out this morning. Took an Uber back to her motel,” I tell him as I pull out my phone and start doing what I do best—hack.
“Fucking hell. It’s going to be like finding a needle in a haystack because there is no way she’ll have used her real—”
“Found her. She’s staying at the Eastgate Motel out on the outskirts of town.”
“She used her real name?” he states in shock.
“Her married name. Avery Michaels-Creed. She did tell me that she had kept her marriage a secret at work, so she never changed her last name there. Avery is not that uncommon of a name. It’s ranked the twenty-sixth most popular girl’s name in the US, down from last year’s nineteenth. And seventh most gender—”
Greg looks at me with wide eyes.
“Right, sorry. My point is, by using her real name, she actually gave herself a little bit of anonymity. Since she isn’t using the surname her company has on file, she won’t ping in the system if they have parameters set to flag her movements.”
“So, hiding in plain sight.”
“Basically. And if her employers did find her, she could say she was here visiting friends since she called this place home for a while. She could even say she came to serve divorce papers, and since they didn’t know she was married, she didn’t feel the need to tell them she was getting divorced either.”
“Huh, smart.”
