“Are you alright?”
Ava shifted in the aeroplane seat to look at Adrian.
“I don’t know. Are you?”
Adrian took her hand and dropped a kiss on the back of her hand.
“You are fine. Of course, I am.”
“Your lines keep getting smoother every day.” Ava smiled.
Adrian winked. “Maybe that’s because I have a woman who I practice with. She can be a bit mean but that’s how I like her.”
“And what would this woman think if she saw you trying out those lines on me?” Ava lifted an eyebrow.
Adrian leaned in and whispered, his lips centimetres away from her ear, his hot breath doing crazy things to her as it brushed the side of her neck.
“It’ll be our secret.”
Ava turned to face him, their faces inches apart.
Then a toddler began to cry on the plane.
Ava’s lips twitched and Adrian’e followed. Soon both of them were laughing so hard that they could barely rein themselves in.
With that, the tension of the day diffused. Ava knew Adrian was thinking about it almost as hard as she was, if not harder.
The first thing he had done immediately after checking if she was fine was call the pack to check if there had been any attacks but everything was pretty quiet at home.
The fact that they had been so close to death unknowingly. If not for the fact that Ivy had gotten on Adrian’s nerves so much so that he had turned down the volume of the stereo that had been playing throughout the journey all so he could yell at her.
That action had enabled Calvin to hear the ticking of the bomb and when they descended from the car, he had been looking for it to see the timer.
It remained minute, hence, the panicked and uninformed race.
So in a very roundabout way, Ivy’s bad habits might just have saved their lives even though technically the only time the bomb could have been planted was at one of the stops they had taken on her behalf.
While Ava laughed with her mate, her mind drifted. The council meeting, the Silverwolf pack, the bomb, the rogue attacks. It felt like she was missing something.
She suddenly remembered what Rachel had told her in that restroom what now felt like centuries ago at that meeting where she met Rita, Janine, and the other Lunas. When she hadn’t accepted Adrian as her mate yet.
The danger we should be afraid of isn’t the rogues. It’s people like us that will never accept what we are given when we can take whatever we want.
Come to think of it, was it possible that Rachel had known about this all along? If she had, was it possible that this scheme was even bigger than she had thought?
“Ava?”
Ava looked at Adrian. He had probably detected the worry down the bond, sometimes it felt like he knew her deepest thoughts despite the fact that she knew he couldn’t actually hear them. He could only feel her emotions.
She opened her mouth to speak but found that she had no words. It felt stupid to ask about something she wasn’t even sure of. That conversation had happened so long ago that it was possible she was even remembering it wrong.
“It’s nothing,” Ava forced a smile. “Just a little bothered about the meeting and the explosion.”
Adrian’s green eyes warmed with sympathy and he dropped a kiss on her forehead.
“We are already investigating the issue. We will get right to the bottom of the matter, besides no matter what I’ll be right here, next to you. I won’t let anything happen to you or our people.”
Ava wanted nothing more than to climb onto his lap and kiss him until she forgot all about the explosion and Rachel but they were on a public flight so she contented herself with taking his hand and settling as close to him as she could.
“I know,” She whispered, looking at him. “That’s all that keeps me going sometimes, I just want this to be over with already.”
His hand tightened around hers. “And it will. I promise.”
Even though she knew Adrian had no place to say that seeing as he wasn’t on the council but somehow she believed him.
Sometime later, she fell asleep, the stress of the day finally catching up with her.
When they touched down later, her mind was steadier. It didn’t matter if Rachel had known or if it had been all in her head. The Werewolf council would ferret out the truth and this entire issue would be resolved.
Her healed bruise from the explosion itched as though taunting her.
****
“You said what?!”
Cynthia screeched into the cell phone wishing she could reach through the phone and land a slap on the wolf’s face.
“You had just one freaking job!”
Cynthia ended the call to his apologies, her fist clenched in anger. Ava and Adrian had escaped unscathed. Meaning that they would be even more cautious now and a surprise attack would be close to impossible.
As if to taunt her, her phone beeped with a message from Calvin.
We arrived safely, I miss you.
Cynthia held on to the armchair, her legs suddenly felt weak beneath her as she looked at Calvin’s text.
Was this a joke?
Couldn’t at least one plan of hers work?
How did Ava and Adrian get so lucky ALL the time? She reread the entire text again then flung her phone away feeling more than a little angry.
She had planned everything out. Planned everything so meticulously that there was no room for mistakes and yet somehow they had managed to get out safely without so much as a scratch.
Cynthia didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. That was how angry she was. They would go through with the trials and return successfully.
Cynthia tried to comfort herself with the fact that the trials would go the way they had planned at least. There would be other chances she tried to convince herself.
******
The place was massive and surprisingly modern. However to call it a place would be a grave injustice.
It was a marvel of elaborate architecture, glass work and intricately designed gardens that made the place smell like a dream.
After arriving, Ava and Adrian had been settled into a large room and while Adrian had opted to rest after the long day they’d had, Ava had been unable to rest so she chose to explore the place. And so far, she had been impressed.
“Look who decided to show her face.”
Ava turned to see Rita rounding the corner with three other older female wolves. Rita wore leather clothing, unlike the edgy dresses she had worn at their previous meetings. She looked more like a Luna than she had before and she looked more than a little livid.
Somehow Ava had not expected to have a one-on-one meeting with her even though she had known in theory to expect her as her pack was on trial.
“Rita. It’s been a while.”
“Has it really? I didn’t notice between you framing me and defaming my pack.”
There was no polite way out of this situation. Rita was baying for blood and if she backed down then she submitted to her dominance.
“The claims will be appraised by the council and the truth will be revealed. If your pack is innocent then it will be proven.”
Rita laughed.
“Look at her sounding all prim and proper as though she didn’t bring us to this. What could I expect from a whore who stole her sister’s mate anyway?”
Ava saw red and nearly tore into her.
She barely restrained herself as she remembered where she was. If she picked a fight as Rita wanted then it was possible it would affect the ruling.
Rita smirked.
Goddess, she was really spoiling for a fight and if Ava didn’t control herself, she might just give it to her.
“Rita,”
Ava moved forward erasing the space between her and Rita. The female wolves with Rita fell back as though reading the air and deciding they wanted nothing to do with the matter.
“You should watch what you say or else,” Ava reached for her ponytail and yanked hard pulling Rita’s head back. “I will pull out that tongue of yours.”
Ava ignored Rita’s attempts to free herself and stared her in the eye while she struggled. Eventually, her struggles ceased when she couldn’t break her hold and she gave Ava a look so venomous that if looks could kill, Ava would be six feet under.
Ava released her so that she fell to the ground and then turned to leave when Rita’s voice stopped her.
“You think you are so clever, right? To gain recognition for yourself and your pack you framed mine. You miscalculated because I will win this trial. I am not your feeble sister whose mating you could sabotage.”
Ava’s anger crested and she partially shifted before she was even fully aware of it. Her right hand now shifted into claws lifted to tear open Rita’s jugular when someone caught her hand midway.
It was Javier.