Exposed: Book 2 MAC Security Series (34 page)

“You can go now,” she said to him when they were in the bathroom.

I waited for Corey to come back out and walked down the stairs with him. “She’ll be okay,” I said when we were both in the kitchen and sat at the table.

“I know,” he huffed. “She won’t last in the system though, sis.”

Nodding, I agreed. She needed to be around people who understood her, not with people who didn’t care.

“Anyway, what do you say that me and you go out and get something to eat? I’ll ask Elena to watch Ava,” I asked, hopeful.

He grinned for what felt like the first time in forever, his hand slid across the table, grasping mine and squeezing slightly. “Yeah,” he replied. “Let’s catch up. Just the two of us.”

I didn’t want to go out anywhere so we went to a drive through, got some burgers and then drove up to the spot that Corey always used to take me. Moaning at the first taste of my burger, I couldn’t help but close my eyes at the taste.

I’d never missed food so much in my entire life and I savored every bite. I moved my eyes to Corey, grinning wide with a mouth full of food at his chuckle.

“Some things never change.” He bit into his own burger, moaning at the taste just like I had.

“See,” I said once I had swallowed my bite, and raised my brows at him. The burgers at that place were the best and it was all I could do to stop myself from eating one after another.

We sat and ate in silence, both of us just gazing out of the window. It was nice, to just be sat with someone and know that you didn’t have to say anything.

“So…” he said, breaking the silence after ten minutes. “You and Ty, huh?”

I cleared my throat, knowing that this was going to come up at some stage. It was inevitable, Corey had always been protective and now he knew the truth about Max, I had a feeling he would be even worse.

“Yeah,” I said, flicking my eyes over to him. “I know he’s your friend-”

“Does he treat you right?” he interrupted.

“Yeah.” I sighed wistfully. “He really does.”

“Then as long as you’re happy…” He shrugged. “I’m okay with it.”

I raised a brow at him because even if he wasn’t happy with it, I had a feeling that Ty wouldn’t care. To be honest, it wouldn’t have made the slightest bit of difference to me either.

After the elephant in the room had been spoken about, we talked about everything. It was good to get my brother back, have him physically in front of me instead of on a computer screen.

I didn’t want to think about how long he would be here before he’d have to go away again. I pushed all of those thoughts to the back of my mind, not worrying about them until the time came.

We spoke about Eli and all the stuff they’d got up to while I was ‘away’. Then talk turned to how I was doing on the jobs and whether I’d learned to shoot a gun yet.

Telling me about when he first met Eli, I giggled and said, “I would have loved to have seen your face.”

“I was shitting myself, honestly, sis. I freaked the fuck out.” He shook his head, his face turning bright read.

I grabbed my side as a pain shot through me from giggling so much. Damn, that hurt.

“Careful, sis,” he warned, pulling up to the compound gates.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I huffed. If he wasn’t so funny then I wouldn’t be laughing in the first place, ergo, I wouldn’t be in pain. So it was his fault. That logic worked, right?

But seriously, I could just imagine his face. Eli didn’t seem fazed by it so why had he freaked out? I was sad that I’d missed it but I told myself that it wouldn’t do me any good to wallow about it, I wanted to move on from everything that had happened. The only way I’d be able to do it was if I forgot about the past and focused on the present and the future.

Parking outside of the warehouse, I was about to push my door open, but before I could, Evan’s face came into view.

“Kay.” Looking over at Corey he nodded and then moved his eyes back to me. “I need your help.”

My heart rate sped up at the serious look on his face. Holding my hand out so he could help me down, I stepped out and followed him to his cabin.

Once we were inside, he started to pace the small space, his hands waving all about. Frowning at how agitated he was, I asked, “Evan? What’s the matter?”

He turned to face me, his face pale as he worried his lip. “I...”

Stepping forward, I held my hand in the air. “It’s okay, just calm down, take a deep breath.” Once I could see that he had calmed a little, I asked again. “Now, what’s the matter?”

He ran his hands through his hair, looking at everything in the room but me.

“Take a deep breath.” I breathed in and out to show him. As if he didn’t know how to breathe. “Sit down.” I pointed to one of his chairs and waited for him to sit before I stood in front of him.

“Now,” I said calmly. “What’s going on?”

“Well, see…there’s this…girl.” He flicked his eyes to mine and looked away again.

“Erm…Okay?”

“And…I…I…don’t know how to ask her if she’d like to…court me?” he said, uncertain.

I held the giggle in that desperately wanted to come out. Ty had briefly told me about Evan’s crush on Geena and how he had freaked when Ty had found out.

“Geena?” I asked, trying to keep a straight face. It wasn’t funny that he liked someone, it was how nervous and worried about it that was.

“Yeah,” he nodded, looking everywhere but at me.

“You have her number right?”

“I have her email.” He nodded, becoming more sure of himself.

“Okay, this is what you’re going to do.” I sat down next to him, patting him on the arm. “Send her an email and ask her if she’d like to go out on a date.”

“But-”

“Nope,” I said, shaking my head and standing back up. “No ifs, ands or buts. Just do it, you won’t know until you ask.”

With that said, I stepped out of his cabin and walked back to the house, wondering how Elena had got on with Ava. Time to go and see.

I leaned back in my chair as someone knocked on the office door and shouted for them to come inside. I waited for whoever it was to come in and blew out a big breath. I couldn’t wait for this weekend, we were all taking it off and were going to spend time together as a family.

After all of the stress over the last week, we deserved it. I refused to take on any more jobs, wanting to spend some much needed time with Kay and Eli. I’d even debated on taking them on a vacation but I didn’t know whether it would be too soon.

I had a feeling who would be coming through the door because Kay and Corey had taken Eli to preschool and then they were off to visit Miss Maggie so I knew they wouldn’t be back until later. Kitty and Luke were finishing off a last minute job and Evan never knocked, he just walked in with his arms wide so it couldn’t be them.

“Hey,” Charlie said as he opened up the door and shut it behind him.

“Hey.” I nodded.

I watched as he sat down in the chair opposite me, running his hands down his face. He looked stressed and I wasn’t surprised with the amount of work load he had since bringing down Serena.

She’d been asking to see me but there was no way that I would. Although, I had been tempted when she said she’d sign the divorce papers but she’d caused enough suffering to the one person I cared about the most in the world. Not to mention, all of those girls that had been found in that building.

A total of twenty-seven girls had been found locked up, dehydrated and beaten. I couldn’t stomach looking at the pictures so I could see why Charlie looked so worn out.

I still hadn’t talked to Kay about everything. Something that I needed to do, and soon.

“Have you spoke to Ma?” Charlie asked.

“About?” I’d spoken to her about a lot of things these last few days so he needed to be more specific.

“Ava,” he huffed.

“What about her?”

“She wants to take her in.”

My eyes widened. She hadn’t spoke to me about this, but even if she had, I wouldn’t have said it was a bad idea because Ava needed someone like Ma. “Yeah? So?”

“Why would she want to do that? I mean, haven’t we all been through enough? Why does she want to bring something else into our lives, on top of all of that we’ve already been through?”

Leaning forward in my seat, I rested my arms on the desk, trying to keep my cool. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this come out of his mouth.

“Really, Charlie?” I raised my brows. “If Ma hadn’t taken Emmy in, you’d have never met her.”

“That’s-”

I held my hand up, cutting him off. This wasn’t the time to get into everything with Emmy.

“Ava needs to be somewhere safe, she needs to be with someone who understands her. She’s seventeen Charlie, it’s not like she’s a kid and will be our new sister, she just needs guidance.”

I shook my head, utterly disgusted with him. How could he sit and watch a girl like her, who had been through so much already, go into the system when she had someone offering her sanctuary?

From what Kay had told me, she’d been through so much already and deserved so much better than the shitty hand she’d been dealt already. She’d get lost in the system and he knew that. At least with Ma, she’d be able to try and get back to who she was before she was sold to Serena. Maybe she could even go to college. Get her life back on track.

“I know but I don’t want Ma to get hurt.”

“How would she get hurt? She’s a grown ass woman. You have zero say anyway, Charlie.” I chuckled. “You know Ma don’t listen to anyone.”

“Yeah,” he huffed. “I suppose she would be better with ma. I still need her statement though.”

“Well then, you need to talk to Ma about that then.” I said with a smirk.

He blew out a big breath, yeah, we both knew how that would go. Trying to tell Ma what needed to happen was like talking to a brick wall. If she didn’t want to do something, you could bet your bottom dollar that she wouldn’t. At least, not until she was good and ready.

“How’s the case going?”

“Busy,” he said, pushing up out of the chair and pulling his cell out of his pocket. “I better go and pay Ma a visit.”

“She’s at the house with Ava,” I called to his back. He waved in acknowledgment and I waited for the warehouse door to shut behind him before leaning back in my seat.

I almost wished I didn’t have to finish this paperwork so I could go and see him get told off like a three-year-old boy. Looking down at all the paperwork I still had to do, I blew out a deep breath and pushed up out of my chair.