Ava's POV
The gun sat on the shelf like a sleeping snake. Ava couldn't look away from it. Every other thought in her head, the pain, the fear of Mark, the strangeness of this empty room, was swallowed by the cold, metal reality of that weapon. It explained so much. The unshakable calm. The way Mark, a giant of angry muscle, had backed down. This wasn't just a tough guy. This was a different kind of man entirely.
Before her panic could fully take root, the apartment door opened again. Leo entered first, followed by an older man with a neat gray beard and a worn leather bag. The man looked like a friendly grandfather, not a doctor who made house calls for criminals in the middle of the night.
"Ava, this is Dr. Evans," Leo said, his voice still that same, level tone. "He's going to examine you."
Dr. Evans gave her a kind, professional smile that didn't quite reach his tired eyes. "Hello, my dear. Leo says you took a bad fall. Let's have a look, shall we?"
A fall. The cover story was already in place. She just nodded, her eyes flicking from the doctor back to Leo, who was watching them both.
"I'll be in the study," Leo said, and walked through a doorway on the far side of the living room, closing the door behind him.
Dr. Evans set his bag on the coffee table. "Alright. Can you tell me where it hurts most?"
"My right side. Here," Ava said, pointing. Just lifting her arm made her suck in a sharp breath.
"And your wrist?" he asked, noticing how she was cradling it.
She nodded. He began his examination with gentle, efficient hands. He prodded her ribs, asking her to breathe. He moved her wrist in careful directions. He asked no other questions. He didn't ask how she really got hurt. He didn't ask who Leo was. His silence was as telling as Leo's gun.
"Well," Dr. Evans said finally, opening his bag. "You have a significant contusion and inflammation. One rib is most likely cracked, not fully broken. Your wrist is badly sprained. You need rest, ice, and anti-inflammatory medication. You must avoid any lifting or twisting." He pulled out a syringe and a small vial. "This will help with the pain and inflammation. It will also make you drowsy."
Ava flinched at the sight of the needle. Dr. Evans paused. "It will help you sleep. And sleep is what you need most right now."
From the corner of her eye, she saw the study door open a crack. Leo was there, watching, ensuring everything was proceeding. His silent supervision decided for her. She gave a small nod.
The injection was quick, a small pinch in her arm. Almost immediately, a warm, heavy feeling began to spread through her aching body, softening the sharp edges of the pain. Her muscles, which had been clenched tight for hours, began to unknot.
Dr. Evans packed up his bag. He handed her a small bottle of pills. "Take one every eight hours with food. Ice your side for twenty minutes at a time. Rest." He gave her one last, inscrutable look. "Listen to Leo. He'll keep you safe."
He left without another word. Leo came out of the study, saw the doctor out, and locked the door again with three distinct, solid clicks. When he turned back to her, Ava was struggling to keep her eyes open. The drug was pulling her down into a soft, dark well.
"You need to lie down," Leo said. He walked over and, for the first time, hesitated. "Can you make it to the bedroom, or do you need help?"
"I… I can try," she mumbled, pushing herself up from the couch. The room swayed. Her knees buckled.
He was there in an instant. He didn't catch her dramatically. He simply moved beside her, letting her lean her weight against him, his arm a firm bar of support around her back, carefully avoiding her injured side. "Easy," he said, his voice close to her ear.
He helped her shuffle across the room to a short hallway and into a bedroom as bare as the rest of the apartment: a bed, a nightstand, a lamp. He helped her sit on the edge of the bed, then knelt down. He was going to take off her socks. She jerked her foot back, a spark of old panic flashing.
He stopped, his hands in the air. "I'm just checking your feet for cuts from the glass," he said, his voice patient. "You were barefoot in that apartment."
Slowly, she let him examine her feet. His touch was clinical, careful. He found a small sliver of glass embedded in her heel and removed it with a precise pinch from a pair of tweezers he pulled from his pocket. Of course, he had tweezers in his pocket. He probably had a whole first-aid kit and a lock-picking set in there, too.
He pulled the covers back on the bed. "Get in. Sleep."
"What happens tomorrow?" she asked, the words slurring. The fear was still there, but it was muffled now, wrapped in the warm cotton of the drug.
"Tomorrow, we make a plan," he said. He turned to leave.
"Leo," she whispered.
He paused in the doorway.
"Thank you. For the doctor. For… checking my feet."
He gave a single, slight nod. "Get some sleep, Ava."
He turned off the light and closed the door, leaving her in total darkness. The safe, quiet, painless dark. For the first time in years, she was alone in a room where no one was going to yell at her, hit her, or tell her she was worthless. The thought was so foreign, so beautiful, that a single, quiet sob escaped her. Then the drug pulled her under.
She didn't know how long she slept. It was a black, dreamless sleep. She woke because a sound pierced through it. Not a loud sound. A soft, persistent buzzing.
It was Leo's phone, vibrating on the kitchen counter.
The gray light of dawn was seeping around the edges of the window blinds. She could see the outline of the door. The buzzing stopped, then started again almost immediately. Someone was calling him over and over.
She heard his study door open, his quiet footsteps cross the living room. He answered on the fourth buzz.
"What?" His voice was a low growl, different from the way he'd spoken to her or the doctor. This was his business voice. The Ghost's voice.
She couldn't hear the other side of the conversation, only the long pauses between his short sentences.
"When?" A pause. "How certain?" Another, longer pause. His silhouette in the dim light was perfectly still. "Understood. Tell the men on the west side dock to pull back. Do not engage. Let them have the warehouse."
Ava held her breath, listening.
"No," Leo said, his voice dropping even lower, becoming dangerous. "He's a civilian. A problem, but not our kind of problem. He's looking for a woman, not a war. Containing him is a surveillance job, not a cleanup job. Do you understand me?"
He's talking about Mark. He had people watching Mark already. The realization should have been comforting, but it chilled her. How many people did he have? How fast did they work?
"Good," Leo said. "Keep me updated on his movements. And the other matter? … I see. Double the perimeter checks. I'll be here another twenty-four hours at least. She's not mobile."
He was talking about her. She was "she." A "matter." A reason to double perimeter checks.
"I have to go," he said, and ended the call.
The apartment was silent again. Ava lay perfectly still, her heart pounding. She heard him walk to the window. He shifted the blind aside just a fraction, looking down at the street below. He stood there for a full minute, a statue watching the dawn.
Then, he turned. He walked silently back toward his study. But he stopped right outside her bedroom door. He didn't open it. He just stopped.
Ava squeezed her eyes shut, pretending to be asleep. She could feel him there, just on the other side of the thin wood, a silent, powerful, terrifying guardian.
After a moment, she heard him whisper, so quietly she almost thought she imagined it. "He's hiring a private investigator."
Then his footsteps moved away, and the study door clicked shut.
Ava's eyes flew open in the dim room. Mark wasn't giving up. He was escalating. And Leo knew. He knew everything. The game had changed. It was no longer just an escape. It was a hunt. And she was the prize caught between two predators.