Page 2

Three years later

Ava

A mechanical beep sounds at the gated driveway entrance. One solitary seagull swoops below the terracotta tile eves of the white stucco mansion, touches upon a palm frond, and soars away with one shrill cry. I press the black button again, listen, and wait.

A tall, imposing man in dark green cargo pants and a black V-neck t-shirt appears out of nowhere. He’s got a short buzz cut hairstyle, reflective sunglasses, a healthy tan, and holy mother, he’s wearing a gun holster.

I should not be here.

The armed man stands to the side of my car and motions. I don’t comprehend the gesture, and then it clicks. I roll down my car window.

“Hi.” No response. “I’m here to see, ah…” My mind draws a complete blank.

I’ve interacted with a lot of different people in my life and walked on the side of life most would refer to as wild, but guns and I don’t mix.

I search the cupholder for the scrap of paper with the names.

This is what I deserve for doing this off-the-wall favor.

I should never have agreed to a house call.

“Ma’am. This is a private residence.”

“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just… Oh, here it is.” I hold up an envelope from an old credit card bill with scribbled names on the back. “Sophia. Sullivan. And her dad’s name is Jack. Mark Sullivan asked that I come by.” The man’s face remains blank. His lips are frozen. “They’re expecting me.”

“And your name is?”

“Oh. Ah. Ava Amara. I’m…” I don’t know who this man is or if I can share why I’m here.

“They’re expecting me, but I’m early. I added in more time to the Google estimate, expecting more traffic, but…

” I trail off. His fingers cover one ear, and those lips finally move, but I can’t make out what he’s saying.

The iron gate slides open noiselessly. Before me, clear, crisp water spills over a marble sculpture into a fountain base that could double as a swimming pool.

The driveway circles the magnificent feature, and the armed man directs me to drive around the fountain and to park to the side.

My car's wheels rasp over the smooth pavers as I inch around the circular bend.

The lawn sports thick green grass. Bougainvillea vines loaded with fiery pink blooms sprout out of enormous deep blue pots. Palm trees sway, and tropical greenery fills perfectly manicured beds. A roughhewn marble pathway leads to a massive glass and iron front door.

The expanse of glass reveals a breathtaking view through an imposing marble foyer to a glass back wall and the vast blue ocean beyond.

“Ma’am? Are you ready?”

Wow . I reach over the front seat, grab my cell phone, and slam the car door shut.

“Do you work for the Sullivans?” I ask the armed man as we step through the white stucco arch into the picturesque courtyard.

“I’m part of the security team.”

Security .

Mark Sullivan has been my number one donor for years, but I’ve never been to his home in Texas.

Does he have security, too? Is that what billionaires do?

But, if he did, surely Patrick would have mentioned it.

I mean, I guess I knew the Sullivans were wealthy.

There’d been news coverage when his daughter went missing.

But this level of wealth is incomprehensible.

Patrick is my compadre, my equal. He didn’t prep me at all. After this is over, I’m so calling him and giving him a piece of my mind for not warning me.

“Would you mind waiting here? I’ll let Mr. Sullivan know you’ve arrived.”

The man’s shoes rasp against the polished marble floor in harsh succession.

High above, an opulent crystal chandelier hangs from a domed ceiling some thirty feet above my head.

An enormous white potted orchid sits atop an ornate round table centered below the chandelier.

There’s a simple, straight staircase off to my left, and a showstopping curved one toward the front.

The entire back wall is glass, but the center glass is thick, and up close it registers that the thick glass is an elevator. Holy mother.

I halfway expect a table with a check-in sign and uniformed employees asking for my credit card.

The style is both austere and pompous. The excessive use of gold and veined marble belongs on the cover of Traditional Home or Architectural Digest or possibly Hotel Lobby Design , if such a publication exists.

A whooshing sound fills the otherwise silent cavity. Two dark haired men accompany the armed man. The automatic floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors close behind them.

One man is enormous and stands nearly a head taller than the others. All three of them are over six feet tall, so the one man intimidates with his height alone. The other man stares at me with a laser focus.

I attempt to return his stare, and my nostrils flare as I force air in and out of my lungs.

The skin along my cheeks and throat heats in direct contrast to the harsh air conditioning.

The crisp lines of the collar on his golf shirt and his gleaming silver Rolex watch match his intense perusal.

There is absolutely no doubt. He’s judging me.

Scrutinizing me. What did Mark tell him?

Is he familiar with my sordid past? Is he disappointed I’m wearing a turtleneck with long sleeves so he can’t scan for fresh track marks?

I’m here as a favor to a friend. And the jerk is judging me. He’s a rich, clueless prick.

There’s not a single strand of hair out of place on his immaculate head. It’s Saturday, and the jerk’s shirt is tucked into ironed shorts. Instead of bare feet in leather loafers, I’d half expect black dress socks pulled straight up to his calves.

Even in shorts, he exudes a powerful and dominating persona.

He’s not as tall as the enormous man who is off to the side, speaking to the armed man in a hushed private conversation.

But the intense man is taller than I am and has no issue looking down on me.

Those sternly set lips brook no room for kindness.

The dark brown hair, thick eyebrows, and dark eyes combine to create a menacing persona.

I could envision him with a whip in hand, a woman in a collar kneeling at his feet. He’s that kind of dominant.

The armed man exits through the front door. The click as it closes resonates through the formal space.

“Hi.” My voice sounds small. I glance between the two remaining men, and my nerves slip into overdrive, something that is not at all helped by the intense man with the scowl.

“Hi,” the towering man says as he slides his sunglasses up onto his head, exposing crystal blue irises. “I’m Ryan Wolfgang. A friend of Jack’s in town for the weekend.”

The other man, presumably Jack Sullivan, stares at me with a borderline inappropriate intensity. Jerk .

But there’s something about that name. Wolfgang. It’s unusual, and I’ve heard it before. Recently.

“Do you have a sister, by chance?” I ask the only man evidently capable of speech.

“I do.” His answer calms my nerves with the impact of a quaalude. We have a commonality.

“Indie?” I ask. He and his sister don’t look alike, but there’s an intangible quality about him that reminds me of Indie.

“Indigo Wolfgang. Her friends call her Indie.”

“She may come to stay with us.”

“Us?”

Ah, shit. Indie hasn’t told him. “Well, I met with her two days ago.” Mr. Wolfgang doesn’t look pleased. “She mentioned she needed to speak to her family.”

That’s a total lie. The whole point of our program is to provide a path to independence, but soothing his ego might make him go easier on Indie if he confronts her. I shouldn’t have said anything.

“We have a small community of condos and apartments. Mark Sullivan, ah, your uncle,” I look over to the wordless glaring man, “has been incredible. We wouldn’t have been able to build our center without his help.”

“Nueva Vida.” Jack Sullivan grumbles the name of the center I helped to found. So, the judgmental jerk can speak and he’s familiar with my center. What else did Mark tell him?

“What’s Nueva Vida?” Mr. Wolfgang asks.

He’s asking for his sister, but I hesitate out of consideration for Indie. But he can look us up online. I can give him the answer he will find online.

“A secure place for recovering addicts to adjust to real life. We help with job training skills and placement and strive to provide a clean, safe environment because transitioning back to life is hard enough without worrying about your next meal or living in a dangerous place.” Jack Sullivan’s heated stare and expressionless face crack my stream of consciousness, and I shove hair behind an ear and refocus my gaze on the polished marble floor before my thirty-second elevator pitch comes to mind.

“We subsidize rent payments until each person can afford the full rent. We let them live with us until they’re ready, financially and emotionally, to fully re-enter the world.

Rushing to return to normal can be a trigger for relapse. ”

“How do you know my uncle?”

“Patrick.”

Jack Sullivan crosses his arms and looks like he wants to eject me from his castle. “And Patrick is?”

Holy shit. Fucking Mark. Mark warned me that he was closeted, but the idea that his family doesn’t even know Patrick is insane.

The two men have been in a committed relationship for fifteen years.

I cross my arms, mirroring Jack Sullivan’s posture.

As much as I would like to, I won’t out Mark to his nephew.

“A mutual friend.”

Mark told me his niece has been rejecting therapy. Returning to normal life after her abduction has been a struggle. He asked me to come by and meet with her, so I sat in slow traffic for nearly two hours to get my ass here on a weekend and do my biggest donor and longtime friend a favor.