Chapter 69 THE CONFRONTATION
Dominic's POV
Calder's location took Adrian forty minutes to find and when he found it I wasn't surprised, a private warehouse on the south side of the Thames, the kind of place that looked like nothing from the outside and was everything on the inside, which was exactly how Calder operated, always hiding the real thing underneath something ordinary.
We drove there without talking and I sat in the passenger seat and thought about six years of trust and what it was worth now and came up with nothing useful so I stopped thinking about it and focused on what came next instead.
Adrian parked two streets away and we walked the rest and the night was cold and the river was dark beside us and I could feel Ava through the bond like a warm steady presence at the back of everything, the silver thread of it sitting solid in my chest, and that was the thing that kept me from going into that warehouse the wrong way, the knowledge that she was there and waiting and I had promised to come back.
"How many inside," Adrian said quietly as we approached.
"Four that I can sense," I said, "Calder and three others."
"Odds we like," Adrian said.
"Odds we've had worse," I said and he nodded and we went in through the side door that wasn't locked because Calder had always been arrogant about his security, always believed his reputation was protection enough, which was one of the things I'd admired about him once and now just made things easier.
Inside was lit with industrial lights and Calder was standing in the middle of the space like he'd been expecting us, which he probably had because Calder always knew things before he should and that was another thing I'd admired and now understood differently.
He looked exactly the same as the last time I'd seen him three months ago in this same city, tall and composed and wearing that expression of mild amusement that meant he thought he was the smartest person in any room he walked into, and most of the time he wasn't wrong about that, except tonight.
"Dominic," he said, like we were meeting for a drink.
"Six years," I said, stopping fifteen feet from him, "six years and I never suspected."
"That's because you trusted me," he said simply, no guilt in it, no apology, just fact, "and I was careful."
"Why," I said, which was the only question that actually mattered.
He looked at me steadily and said, "because what you're doing with that girl is going to break everything we built, bonded pairs destabilize the entire structure, they always have, you know the history as well as I do."
"The history was written by people who were afraid," I said.
"The history was written by people who survived," he said back, "which is more than can be said for the ones who bonded and thought love was enough protection."
"This stops tonight," I said.
"Does it," he said and tilted his head slightly and the three men behind him moved and Adrian moved at the same time and the warehouse became very loud and very fast for about ninety seconds.
I didn't use the gun, I didn't need to, I hadn't needed a gun in two hundred years and tonight was not the exception, and when it was over the three men were down and Adrian was standing with his hand pressed to his arm and bleeding again which was becoming a habit I was going to address when we got back, and Calder was against the wall with my hand at his throat and his feet six inches off the ground.
He looked down at me and his expression was different now, not afraid exactly but recalibrated, like a man updating his information in real time.
"The bond completed," he said, reading something in my face.
"Yes," I said.
"Then she's already changing," he said, "you know what that means for her, what she'll become, you're not protecting her Dominic, you're transforming her into something she never agreed to be."
"She chose it," I said, "which is more than your people ever gave anyone."
He was quiet for a moment and then he said, very carefully, "there are others, more than you know, this doesn't end with me."
"I know," I said, "but it ends with you tonight," and I said it simply, not cruelly, just as fact, the way I said things when they were already decided.
He looked at me and something in his face shifted and he said, "for what it's worth, I did respect you, genuinely, for a long time."
"I know," I said, and I meant that too.
I put him down and stepped back and Adrian was already on his phone and two minutes later Elias's people came through the door, six of them, and took Calder and the three men and I stood in the empty warehouse and listened to the Thames moving outside and felt the bond warm and steady and pulling me back toward Ava like a compass pointing home.
"Done," Adrian said, appearing beside me, his arm still bleeding.
"Done," I agreed and we went back to the car.
\---
I felt her before I opened the door of the flat, that warmth through the bond getting stronger with every step closer, and when I pushed the door open she was already standing in the hallway like she'd felt me coming up the stairs, which she probably had.
She looked at my face and then at Adrian behind me and then back at my face and said, "it's over?"
"Calder's in custody," I said, "Elias's people have him."
She let out a breath and crossed the hallway and I met her halfway and she put her arms around me and I held her and for a moment we just stood there in the narrow hallway of an East London flat and I pressed my face into her hair and felt the bond settle completely, warm and permanent and exactly right.
"Adrian's bleeding again," she said into my shoulder.
"I know," I said.
"Someone should look at that," she said.
"Someone should," I agreed, not moving.
She laughed quietly against my chest and I felt it more than heard it and held her tighter and behind us Adrian said, with great dignity, "I'm standing right here," which made her laugh properly and even I smiled into her hair.
Her mother appeared in the kitchen doorway and looked at us and then at Adrian and said practically, "sit down, I'll find something for that arm," and Adrian sat down because Elena Scott in full capability was apparently not someone anyone argued with, which made complete sense given her daughter.
I kept my arm around Ava and we went into the kitchen and sat at the table and outside the London dawn was starting, grey and quiet, and Elias was already making coffee and my father was at the window and Sera was on her phone and it was almost ordinary except for all the ways it wasn't.
Ava leaned into my side and I looked down at her and she looked up at me and I thought about the first night in that club, the pull I'd felt the moment I saw her, how I'd told myself one night would be enough and known immediately it was a lie.
"What now," she said quietly.
"Now we go home," I said, "New York, your mother, no more running."
She nodded and turned her face into my shoulder and I put my hand in her hair and felt the bond between us solid and settled and thought that whatever came after this, and something would always come after this, we would face it from the same side and that was enough.
It was more than enough.
It was everything.