One Good Reason (18 page)

She
felt Hayden kiss her head and lay back down.

Last
night had been…wow,
Ava
thought to herself. She now understood what Olivia talked about all the time.
She was convinced Olivia always stretched the truth about what sex was like, as
Ava had never experienced it the way Olivia talked about it. Sex had always
been sex. Sure it made her feel good, but it had never made her feel… feel like
she did with Hayden.

Ava
started laughing. Olivia would never let her live it down when Ava told her
that she was right. That sex was wow, amazing, and so many other crazy words.

“Why
are you laughing?” Hayden asked.

Ava
laughed even more. “It’s nothing. It’s just something Olivia said.”

“Well
don’t hold back on me. Tell me,” Hayden insisted.

Ava
shook her head. “It’s nothing really… She was just right.”

“Right
about?”

“Sex,”
Ava replied bluntly.

Hayden
pulled himself up into a sitting position. Ava sat up as well, looking at his
puzzled expression.

“You
said last night though… Just before we… that you had done it before… hadn’t
you?”

“Yeah,
I wasn’t lying. I’ve had sex before.”

Hayden
looked at her, still puzzled.

She
felt her cheeks turn red as she spoke, “It’s just never been that good. I’d
never…you know, before.”

Hayden’s
puzzled expression disappeared and he smiled. He then leant down and cupped
Ava’s face in his hands, kissing her gently.

“Just
so you know,” he said, as he pulled away from her lips, looking down at her
with his gorgeous eyes. “It’s never been like that for me either.”

Ava
smiled and kissed him quickly. She loved the way he looked at her. The way he
smiled at her. The way he kissed her. The now familiar feeling came over her.
She wanted him again. But Hayden must have sensed her kiss changing as he
pulled away from her.

“As
much as I want to,” he said with his hand stroking her hair, “I think we should
eat first.”

Ava
registered the thought of food and knew Hayden was right. She was starving.

Hayden
grabbed his pants from close by and pulled them on. “How about you stay here
and I’ll go fetch us something to eat, and maybe let Mason know we are alright,
since we have been missing all night.”

“Sounds
like a plan,” Ava said, kissing Hayden back when he leant down to kiss her. He
then stood up, grabbed his t-shirt, and pulled it over his head. He then
grabbed his gun and pushed it into the top of his pants.

Ava
already missed the sight of his naked body once it was covered up. Hayden
screamed sex appeal and the thought was not lost on Ava.

He
winked at her and set off down the sandy beach.

Ava
looked out at the ocean.
Another gorgeous day in paradise
, she thought
to herself, and then began to dress herself as well, while she waited for
Hayden’s return.

Hayden
walked into the house towards the kitchen, ignoring Mason’s smirk as he passed.

“I
made extra for you and Ava,” Mason said behind him at the dining table.

Hayden
looked on the kitchen bench to find a large plate full of bacon, scrambled
eggs, toast, and sausages.

“Thanks,
mate,” Hayden replied, picking the plate up from the bench and grabbing a
couple of knives and forks.

Hayden
walked towards the door, thinking Mason wasn’t going to say anything about last
night, but then stopped when he heard his voice.

“So,
I’m guessing you two made up?”

Hayden
turned and looked towards Mason who was casually sipping his cup of coffee with
a broad smile on his face.

“I’ll
be back soon,” Hayden said, rolling his eyes and walking out the door.

“I’ve
heard that one before!” Mason called out after him.

Hayden
walked down the beach ignoring Mason’s laughter behind him. He would need to
get back to Mason soon though; they needed to finalize their plan. But first,
he would have breakfast with Ava. He wasn’t ready to ruin a perfect morning by
talking about their plans again.

But
the moment he turned the corner on the beach and saw Ava, every rational
thought left his mind. There, on the edge of the water, was Ava with
Aun
and four of his men next to a boat, pulling her against
her will into it. Ava was thrashing her body about, but
Aun
had a tight grip on her. A piece of brown cloth wrapped around Ava’s mouth so
she couldn’t scream.

Hayden
lost it.

“Ava!”
Hayden screamed, dropping the plate to the ground and running at full speed
towards the men with his gun drawn.

His
mind blurred and all he could think about was Ava, as he ran towards the men.
After years of training in the field and fighting in a war, he’d forgotten the
proper tactical response to a hostage situation like this.

His
finger wrapped around the trigger and just as he was about to open fire on all
the men like a crazed killer,
Aun
pulled a gun to
Ava’s head, stilling Ava and Hayden.

Hayden
froze. His eyes connected with Ava’s, tears were streaming down her face. He
needed to gain control. He needed to stop and think.

With
all the strength he had, he calmed himself and spoke to
Aun
with sternness and authority. “What do you think you’re doing,
Aun
?”

The
four men had drawn their weapons as well and held them straight at Hayden.

“I
think the real question is what have you been doing Hayden?”
Aun
replied, pushing Ava out in front of him so Hayden
could get a clear view of the gun pressed into her temple. “It seems you’ve
been lying to me.”

“What
are you talking about?”

“You
know exactly what I’m talking about, Price. Don’t play dumb with me,”
Aun
replied.

Hayden
didn’t say anything, so
Aun
continued, “It doesn’t
matter now anyway. The girl is coming with me.”

“Like
hell she is,” Hayden replied, stepping closer to
Aun
.

“Careful
now, Price. As much as I want to take her with me right now, if you come any
closer, I’ll kill her,”
Aun
threatened.

Hayden
watched as Ava’s body trembled at the words. Her fearful eyes pierced daggers
into his heart. He didn’t know what to do. It was four against one, and
Aun
had a gun to Ava’s head. He needed Mason.

“Stevenson
will have your head if you take her. You know that,” Hayden warned.

“Oh,
I think you’ll find that he thinks very differently about the situation,
especially when I tell him what I saw last night.”

Hayden
clenched his teeth. “I can’t let you take her,
Aun
. I
won’t.”

Aun
stared at Hayden with curiosity.
Aun
knew what Hayden was capable of, but he didn’t know if
that would be enough to persuade him to let her go.

Aun
leant forward and whispered something into
Ava’s ear. Hayden watched as Ava squeezed her eyes tightly and nodded her head.

Aun
then used his other hand to untie the fabric
around Ava’s mouth and let it fall free.

Ava
licked her dry lips and looked at Hayden with pleading eyes. “Please don’t do
this, Hayden. They’ll kill you,” she begged him. “Put your gun down and walk
away.”

“I
can’t, Ava. I can’t let them take you.”

Tears
ran down Ava’s face. “I’ll be fine, Hayden. Please,” Ava’s voice croaked as she
pleaded with him. 

“You
won’t be fine, Ava. He’ll destroy you.”

“He’ll
kill you if I don’t go with him,” Ava said sobbing. “Walk away, Hayden. For
me.”

Hayden
felt himself break into a million pieces. He couldn’t let them take her, but he
knew the moment he fired off a shot he would be killed. There was no way he
could save Ava if he was dead.

Hayden
dropped his head in defeat. He lowered his gun down, but just as he was about to
throw it to the ground, he caught a glimpse of Mason in the corner of his eye
in the bush. He brought his free hand up to his head and rubbed his forehead so
he was able to look over at Mason and read his signal. Mason signed the signal
that made Hayden quickly realize that this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

Ava
looked at Hayden with tears burning down her face. She hoped she’d convinced
him to let her go with
Aun
. They would kill him if
she didn’t go. She would do anything before she let Hayden die.

She’d
escaped
Aun
before. She had to hold onto the hope
that she could do it again, it’s all the hope she had anyway.

She
watched Hayden lower his head and she knew he’d given in. He’d let her go.

Aun
wasted no more time as he grabbed her by the
arm and steered her towards the boat. Ava was about to step into the boat when
a large sounding blast hit the ground near her, sending her and
Aun
to the ground.

Her
ears rang and head spun as she tried to sit up from the sand. The sound of
screaming voices and gunshots echoed in her ears. She tried to focus. Tried to
gain control, but she couldn’t. Her eyes rolled back into her head as she hit
the ground again, her vision fading into darkness…

Hayden…

“Stay
with me, Ava,” Hayden said, gripping her against his chest.

Her
eyes opened and tried to focus on his face. Her mind tried to focus on his
voice, but it was too hard. Her head was heavy, her mind was fogging. Her eyes
closed again and she was lost in her unconsciousness.

.

Ava
could hear the loud whipping sounds around her. She looked up to see Hayden
calling out to the man next to him, who was dressed head to toe in army
clothing and holding a huge gun as the wind blew around them.  The sound
of turning propellers pushed through her mind like a snowstorm, sending her
back into the darkness. 

The
more her mind tried to focus on what was happening, the blurrier it all got.
All she knew was that Hayden was safe.

They’d survived.

17 TEARDROP

“Any last words, Harris?” Stevenson said as he looked down at the
pathetic body laid out on the cement floor.

His
plan had gone exactly the way he’d planned. Paul Harris had given himself up at
the warehouse with the original copy of all the files from his story now in
Stevenson’s possession.

Paul
had been so gullible to believe Stevenson, that if he gave the story up he’d
let his daughter go. Just because Paul had given up the story, didn’t mean he
still didn’t have knowledge of what Stevenson had been doing. Paul was a
liability. One that needed to be put down, permanently.

Paul
had begged Stevenson to spare his daughter’s life once he’d realised Stevenson
wasn’t going to let him live the day out. Unfortunately for Paul, his daughter
was currently in the middle of getting disposed of herself. There could be no
loose ends with this operation, and he needed to make sure everyone tied to
Paul Harris went to the grave with him.

Paul,
with his hands and feet tied, pulled his head up towards Stevenson. Blood trickled
down his face. His cheek and eye bruised and swollen.  “Fuck you,” he
said, spitting blood onto Stevenson’s polished black shoes.

Stevenson
slammed his foot into Paul’s face in disgust.

Paul
coughed blood onto the cement floor. His face was a mess, but it wasn’t
Stevenson’s problem anymore. He’d won. Just like he always did.

Stevenson
pulled out the gun from his pants and held it out in front of him, aiming it at
Paul’s body. Paul didn’t move as Stevenson smiled down at him.

“Sir!”
Riley yelled out from behind him.

Stevenson
pulled his finger from the trigger and turned.

 “This better be bloody good, Riley.”

Riley
held the phone down in front of him. “That was Price. He’s on his way here
right now.”

Stevenson
looked at Riley in disbelief.

“He
has Ava with him.”

Stevenson
tightened his grip around his gun and looked back at Paul on the ground who was
looking at Riley in shock.

“It
seems the plan has changed. You don’t get to die, well, just not yet anyway. I
think it might just be the perfect time for a family reunion,” Stevenson said
cruelly. “One that will enable you to tell her how you truly feel. Then I might
just kill her and make you suffer before I end your life.”

***

“You
don’t have to do this, Ava,” Hayden said, tightening his grip on her hand.

“Yes,
I do, Hayden. I have to,” she replied, squeezing his hand back in reassurance.

She
looked out the car window, watching the buildings pass them by as they moved in
and out of the traffic with ease.

They’d
made it back to Australia safely. Mason and Hayden had taken care of
everything. When Ava had woken from her sleep, she’d found herself in a private
plane that was descending on an airfield in Australia. She’d been amazed at
first, how easily Mason and Hayden had been able to pull off her arrival back
into Australia, especially without her being conscious, and without a passport.
But it seemed that Mason and Hayden had very good connections and the whole
thing seemed to run very smoothly.

It
wasn’t until she got back to Australia and was safely in a hotel with Hayden,
did she learn that her father had turned himself in to Stevenson. She’d hoped
they would have been able to make it back to Australia before the situation had
gotten any worse, but they were too late. Mason had been keeping tabs on Paul
since the discovery of their story, only he had no idea Stevenson had given him
a deadline to give himself and the story up. He only received word of this an
hour ago by an inside agent, that Paul was being held in a warehouse building
on the outskirts of the city by Stevenson, and by the sounds of it, Paul wasn’t
going to be alive for much longer.

Ava
and Hayden had to act quickly, and the only way to buy them the time they
needed was to offer Ava up at the warehouse, which was where they were headed
now.

They
didn’t know how much Stevenson knew about Ava and Hayden, and what had happened
in Thailand. But they had to go off the hope that Ava still meant something to
Stevenson and that he would let them come to the warehouse in time to stop
Stevenson from killing Paul.

Hayden
would never have agreed to the plan, especially one that involved putting Ava
directly in harm’s way, but with the help of Mason and his men, he had come to
believe it was the only way. With time against them, they didn’t have the
option to wait and plan anything else. They had to act now.

“We’re
nearly there,” Mason said as he drove the car, looking back in his rear view
mirror, only to see if Hayden and Ava had heard him.

Ava’s
palms began to sweat as they approached the deserted warehouse. This would be
their one and only shot at ending it. They needed to play this the best they
could if they were going to have any chance of ending Stevenson.

Mason
pulled the car up slowly. Ava took a few deep breaths, and then looked at
Hayden.

“Ready?”
Hayden asked.

Ava
nodded.

“Follow
my lead. Don’t say anything. I’ll do all the talking,” he instructed as they
got out of the car and stood next to Mason.  

Mason
and Hayden both looked at each other and nodded.

Ava
knew the risk both of them were taking for her, and she didn’t know how she
would ever be able to repay them.

Hayden
grabbed Ava’s arm. He had to make it out as though Ava was still his captive.
They needed Stevenson to assume he was in control and that Hayden and Mason
were still acting on his orders, and knew nothing about Paul or the story. Ava
was nothing more to Hayden than a girl who knew information about
Thornakorn
.

Mason
led the way as Hayden pulled Ava towards the building. His grip wasn’t hard, so
he wasn’t hurting her, but Ava put her game face on and acted as though it did,
prompting Hayden to whisper in her ear and ask if she was okay. She’d quickly
reassured him and they waited as they approached the steel framed door. Mason
knocked and waited. Seconds later, the door opened and a suited man appeared
with a handgun. He looked over Mason, Hayden, and Ava, and decided to open the
door wider to let them through.

Nothing
was said between them as the man waited for them to come inside, and then
closed the door behind them and walked forwards, motioning for them to follow.

Ava
followed Hayden, as they were led through a small room then out into a large
open room. The warehouse looked as though it used to be some kind of place for
storage. There were large shelving units stacked in a row that went metres
high. Ava had seen a similar kind of setup years ago when she’d purchased
furniture from the city with her mum, and they had to go to the warehouse to
collect it.

Although
this warehouse was abandoned, there was still evidence that it had once been
used, with stacks of papers scattered around, parts of machines, and empty
cardboard boxes.

Ava’s
body tensed when she heard the sound of voices become closer as they weaved
down one of the aisles and towards the back of the warehouse.

As
they came to the end of the aisle, the room opened up into a bare space. They
followed the man towards the middle of the room. There were five men in suits
gathered around a body on the ground. All standing with their hands behind
their backs, looking at a sixth man who was different from the others. He
didn’t have the slim build like the others, and his hair was longer and swept
back from his face. Standing next to him was a smaller man, who looked to be in
his early twenties. His body actions seemed uneasy and tense.

As
they came closer and closer to the men, Ava looked down at the body in
curiosity. It hadn’t even occurred to her that it might have been her father,
even though she knew going into this that her father was going to be here. But
she didn’t think or believe the bloody, bruised man laying helplessly on the
floor could be Paul, until he looked up at her and said her name. “Ava.”

“Dad?”
Ava cried out and tried to run to his aide, but Hayden held her close.

It
was the first time in over ten years that Ava had called her father, Dad. After
he had left her and her mum years ago, she’d stopped calling him Dad, and only
addressed him by his name, Paul. But the moment she saw him
laying
on the ground, weak and frail, her heart had broken in two.

“Let
me go,” Ava said, pulling on Hayden’s hand to let her go, as tears fell down
her face.

“Ava,”
Hayden warned, holding her firmly in place.

“I’m
glad you came,” the suited man said, looking at Hayden. “Although I am
surprised to see you, this works out perfectly.”

“Things
didn’t exactly go to plan, Stevenson,” Hayden replied.

Ava’s
eyes closed in on the man she now knew as Stevenson. The man who had made her
life a living hell in Thailand. The man who was betraying his own country. Her
body tensed in anger. She wanted nothing more than to launch her body onto his
and hit him where it hurts, but Hayden held her tightly at his side.

Focus,
Ava,
she told
herself.
You can’t lose your cool now. 
But she wanted to. Oh God,
did she want to.

Stevenson
turned to the man who had led them through the warehouse. “Did you check them
for wires?”

The
man nodded in reply.

Ava
knew the man hadn’t checked them, but dared not to say anything.

“Why
did he have to check us anyway?” Hayden said seriously. “Are we not to be
trusted? After all these years.”

“I
don’t know, Hayden. Are you?” Stevenson said stepping towards Hayden.

Hayden
was bigger and stronger than Stevenson was, but that didn’t stop Stevenson
pushing his chest out, declaring his authority for all to see.

Hayden
didn’t answer his question, instead, he pointed at Ava’s dad lying on the
ground. “Why is he here?”

Stevenson
didn’t bother to look at who Hayden was pointing at, instead, he looked at Ava
with his malicious eyes.

“Tell
me, Miss Ava,” Stevenson said, stepping so close to Ava she could smell cigar
on his breath. “What was it like? Being held a captive like that? I bet you
enjoyed it, didn’t you? You look like the type of girl who likes a good
beating.”

Ava
flung her free hand from her side and slapped Stevenson hard across his cheek.

Stevenson
held the side of his face, a bright red mark left Ava feeling empowered,
knowing she’d managed to hurt him, even if it was only just a little.

He
looked at Ava like she was a small insect, waiting to be killed without
hesitation and it made her feel uneasy.

He
then leant forward next to her ear. Ava tried to step back, but Stevenson
grabbed her with both hands. “I think it’s about time you learnt some manners,”
he whispered into her ear, and then pulled back, grabbing her arm hard and
pulling her towards her Dad on the ground.

But
Ava wasn’t going to get to the chance to be Stevenson’s punching bag, as Hayden
had stepped forward the moment Stevenson had grabbed her arm forcefully, and
put his on Stevenson’s upper arm.

“Let
her go. Now,” Hayden said sternly.

Stevenson
looked at Hayden and smiled. “Or what?”

Ava
looked at Hayden’s grip on his gun, his knuckles turning white.

“I
don’t have time for your childish games,” Hayden replied, ignoring the fact
that the other suited men had their guns pointed at Hayden’s head.

Ava
nervously looked between Hayden and the men. This was not what they had
planned.

“Hayden,”
Ava said softly to him, trying to get him to focus back on the plan and not let
his emotions get in the way.

Stevenson
let go of Ava and took a step back towards his men, looking at Hayden with the
same arrogant smile he had before.

“So
it’s true, then?” Stevenson said to Hayden, who had also let him go and lowered
his weapon, causing the suited men to lower theirs.

“What’s
true?” Hayden replied. He quickly looked at Ava who took a few steps closer to
him for protection. By the look on Hayden’s face, the situation wasn’t getting any
better and they were running out of time.

“I
thought of all people, Price, you would be the one able to keep his dick in his
pants.”

“Excuse
me?” Ava replied angrily.

“Oh
please, you little slut. You didn’t think I’d find out about the two of you?”

Ava’s
mouth fell open in shock of Stevenson’s words. Hayden quickly grabbed her by
the arm and pulled her next to his side.