* * * * *

Wake up call number two:

My phone in my purse all the way across the room started ringing.

I pulled myself out of bed, ran across the room, nabbed my purse and yanked the phone out, flipping it open and putting it to my ear.

“Yo,” I said.

“Hi there, sweetie. Your sisters and I are going to breakfast. Do you want us to come get you?”

It was Mom.

I was definitely digging the New Mom. However, I’d rather have a tooth extracted without Novocain than go to breakfast with my sisters.

Still, they were family.

“Okay,” I said. “But I need a change of clothes, can you bring some?”

“Sure thing. I’ll have Sofia go up and –”

“No!” I interrupted sharply. God only knew what horrors Sofia would drag out of my closet as payback for yesterday. “You pick,” I told her. “Jeans, t-shirt, belt, flip-flops and bring some of my silver jewelry.”

“Which pieces of jewelry?”

“Any of them.”

“Can do. We’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”

I told her my room number and we disconnected. Then I scrolled down to Luke and pressed the green button.

“Yeah?”

“It’s me,” I said.

“Babe, your name comes up on the display,” he informed me, a smile in his voice.

“Then why do you answer ‘yeah’ if you know it’s me?”

“That’s how I answer the phone.”

“Well, you could say something else like ‘hello’ or ‘Ava’ or even ‘babe’.”

“You want me callin’ you ‘babe’ now?”

“It’s better than ‘yeah’.”

“Let’s see if I got this right, now we’re arguing about how I answer the phone?”

Okay, he had a point.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“Dexter was wrong, you don’t taste like cherry pie, you taste a f**kuva lot sweeter. If you didn’t, babe, you’d be a pain in the ass.”

“Did you just call me a pain in the ass?” I asked.

He sighed.

Time to move on.

“Where are we staying tonight?” I changed the subject.

“Your family gonna be in town?”

“I don’t know.”

“The hotel if they are, your place if they’re not.”

I looked at the bed. It had a padded headboard, no slats for cuffs.

“If we stay here or at my place, we can’t play our, um… game.”

“We’ll play another night.”

He didn’t sound too broken up about it.

“Lotsa games to play, babe,” he went on softly. “I’ll get creative.”

I felt my knees wobble. If he hadn’t already been creative, I was looking forward to creative.

“Okay. Did Vance and Hector get Noah?”

“No.”

My stomach clenched. What did he mean “no”?

“No?” I asked.

“They didn’t go to Durango. Got a tip. He’s in town, they’re trackin’ him and they’re close. I’m just about to go out to assist. I want you to stay at the hotel. This shouldn’t take long.”

“But I’m going to breakfast with my family.”

Silence for a beat then he told me, “I’ll get a man on you. Don’t leave the room until he knocks on the door. You’ve met everyone now, it’ll be one of ours.”

“Okay.”

“Don’t do anything stupid.”

“Luke!” I snapped.

“Promise me.”

“Why do you keep saying that?”

“Last time you called me, beautiful, Smithie was up a tree.”

Shit!

I hated it when he was right. And he was right all the f**king time (except for with Kurt Reid, but that wasn’t his fault).

I gave in. “All right, I won’t do anything stupid.”

“Christ, you’re cute.” The smile was back in his voice.

“Am I cute or a pain in the ass?” I asked, the bitch in my voice.

“Both and you can be a bitch too and for some f**kin’ insane reason, I like it all.”

What did you say to that?

I didn’t have a chance to say anything, he disconnected.

I took a shower and when I got out, my phone was ringing again. I padded to it, wrapped in one of the hotel’s robes. It said “unknown number’ but I flipped it open anyway.

“Yo.”

“We goin’ to the mall or what?”

It was Olivia. How she got my number I didn’t know but it was a moot point now.

“We’re going to the mall. I have to have breakfast with my Mom and sisters first.”

“I could do breakfast,” she invited herself which I was realizing was kind of her way.

Olivia would definitely make breakfast with my sisters a better experience. Hell, Genghis Khan would make breakfast with my sisters a better experience.

“Meet us at Hotel Monaco as soon as you can get here,” I told her.

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” she replied.

“Gotcha.”

She disconnected but I had another call coming in before I got the phone flipped shut so I took it.

“Yo.”

“Where are you?”

It was Riley and I remembered I was supposed to meet him at the gym that morning. “Shit, Riley. I’m sorry. I forgot. My life’s a total –”

He cut me off. “That guy still in the picture?”

I sighed.

Then I said quietly, “That guy’s name is Luke and yeah, he’s still in the picture. He’s probably gonna be in the picture for a while.”

Silence then, “Ava, I’m guessing that you guessed where I’m at with this. Can’t say I’m thrilled that this Luke character shows up and your life becomes a disaster.”

“Luke didn’t do it, he’s fixing it.”

“Fixing, not fixed, means he’s taking his f**king time.”

“Riley, that isn’t fair. You don’t know what’s going on. It’s not good and he’s barely getting any sleep, he’s working so hard to fix it.”

More silence then, “You sure about this guy, Ava?”

I went back to speaking quietly. “Yeah, Riley. I’m sure.” Then for some bizarre reason I shared, “I’m in love with him.”

It was his turn to sigh. “You comin’ into the gym today?”