As the man crumpled, Ava also kicked him hard in the right arm. He dropped his gun instantly which, as Ava thought about it, might mean nothing. The fact that he’d tried punching her rather than shooting her when he’d had the chance made her think that Spurlock had given them instructions to bring her in alive.
To make sure she would have ample time to get away, Ava delivered one last blow—a punch that took the scrawny man directly in the side of the head. He hit the pavement hard but it was the screams of the suited man that really brought the moment home. Ava finally turned to him and grimaced as she started to run away. His face had gone through the glass, slicing open his forehead and placing a deep gouge in his cheek. She also saw a piece of glass the size of a coin sticking out of his face, just below his right eye.
Ava took off running. She knew she only needed to make it a block before she’d be able to camouflage herself in the flow of pedestrians and busy streets. And while she felt she’d dished out enough damage to make her escape, she also sense that the last two minutes may have drastically changed her life.
Once these men went back to Spurlock—who was now apparently actively on the lookout for her—there was no telling how hard they’d come after her.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
It was 5:12 by the time Ava felt confident enough that she was out of any sort of realistic range of the two men she’d bested. She had a cab take her around the city for fifteen minutes, taking random lefts and rights until she finally asked the driver to take her to her apartment. But as she sat in the back of the cab, wired on adrenaline and the fear of what her actions may have just caused, Ava realized that there was no way she could take on the role of carefree mother for Jeffrey right now. She was too shaken, too off her game to be anything but a worried mess.
So at the very last moment, she leaned forward and gave the driver a different address—Frank’s address.
When the cab dropped her off, she stood in front of the building for a moment. Before she even went inside, she thought about the last time she was here, knocking and not getting a response. She knew there was a very good chance she’d get more of the same this time around. It was barely after five, which meant he was probably still at work. She felt slightly conceited to think such a thing, but she imagined Frank would be burying himself with any work he could come by in order to keep his mind off of their workplace situation. He was clearly upset about the way things had worked out and she couldn’t help but wonder if he viewed it as a hard strike against their relationship. In other words, speaking to her might be the very last thing he wanted right now.
But she was here now, so she figured she should at least try. She entered the building and, for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, climbed the stairs to Frank’s apartment. As she came to the hallway and approached his door, the weight of just how badly she wanted him to be there settled in on her. Ever since they’d been given the news of their professionalseparation, she’d started to fear that he may just give up on the relationship. As she raised her hand to knock, she feared this even more; she feared that if he wasn’t there again this time, it might very well be painting an accurate picture of what their relationship had become. Without a conversation, without argument, it could simply be over.
This was driven home when she knocked and there was no answer. She stood in front of the door, waiting, but somehow already knowing that he wasn’t home. The night before, she’d felt the exact opposite. She’d had the sense that he had indeed been inside, but had chosen not to answer. She wasn’t sure which feeling was worse, honestly. But God, she needed him to be there. The lingering nerves of having had a gun pointed at her less than an hour ago had her feeling out of sorts.
She knocked again, more out of obligation than hope. She stood there for two minutes, not sure where to go, what to do, how to react. Eventually, she slowly walked away, daring to hope that she might pass by him in the hallway or on the stairs as he came home from work. But she never spotted him. She toyed with the idea of heading down to the precinct and forcing him to speak with her but realized the sort of drama that would cause. There was no way anything productive would come out of that.
So in the end, she did what she’d intended to do from the start. She walked home. She rejected the idea of getting a cab, hoping the walk home would give her a chance to calm her nerves. It worked to some degree, though she couldn’t help but wonder if Spurlock somehow knew where she lived. Or had there maybe been a third man back at his little abandoned building that had tracked her every move after she’d left?
These worries followed her home. And though they did diminish somewhat when she was in her apartment, wrapping Jeffrey in her arms as he started to tell her about his day, they were still there, echoing in the back of her mind. Conversationover dinner was brief and scattered. Her father did his best to ask about work without bringing up any indication of Frank, which was difficult when he’d become such a part of their afternoons. She supposed her father knew that there wassomethinggoing on. He was a sharp man and had likely figured it out by now. She’d been reassigned yesterday and then Frank had not bothered to show up. That, plus her obviously frazzled mood, pretty much spelled it out for him.
After dinner, Jeffrey brought his deck of cards to the now-clean kitchen table. “Can we play some poker before bedtime?”
She smiled and tapped the kitchen table. “Shuffle and deal them out. You lose three times, and it’s early bedtime for you. Is that too high-stakes for you?”
He shook his head eagerly as he slid the cards out of the pack and started to shuffle them. He did so slowly and with great care, still learning how to handle all of the cards. As usual, her father sat by Jeffrey, trying to coach him through certain moves and strategies. It was all just fun and entertaining enough to keep her mind off of Spurlock, Perkins, and even Pawlowski for a few minutes.
Jeffrey was able to survive through nine games before he lost three times (thanks to Roosevelt’s assistance, of course) and was quite pleased with himself as Ava escorted him to bed. As they settled in and Ava lay down next to him, Ava realized just how tired she was. She supposed it might have a lot to do with the adrenaline that had rushed through her multiple times throughout the day: climbing up the Chrysler Building not once buttwice, getting into a small physical confrontation at the new precinct, and then being held at gunpoint and taking down two of Spurlock’s cronies. It was certainly a lot to endure in the course of a single day.
“Did you like your new workplace?” Jeffrey asked as he settled his head onto his pillow.
“Yeah, it was okay. It just takes a while to get used to a new place, you know?”
“Did you make any friends?”
She smiled at the naiveté of the comment and ran a hand through his hair. “Not yet, but we’ll see.”
“And you didn’t get to see Mr. Frank today?”
“No. Not today.”
She hugged him tight as the weariness overtook her. She sensed that she was about to fall asleep but was fine with it. Just a little nap. That would be fine. She’d drifted off from time to time right here in Jeffrey’s bed several nights over the last few months—all of which had occurred after Clarence’s murder.
She was faintly aware of the moment when Jeffrey fell asleep and then, just a short time later, allowed herself to doze off.
In the haze of her nap, she had a dream that had the strange, faint feel of a cloud. The images were there, the dreamlike narrative was there, but it was almost too detached for her sleeping mind to make sense of it.
In the dream, she was standing back at the top of the Chrysler Building. Only, when she looked across the exposed beams and to the open air beyond, it was not New York City that waited beneath her. Instead, there was a massive field of golden grass and weeds that stretched out as far as she could see. And standing directly on the edge of the floor, his back to her as he looked out at the breathtaking sight, was Frank.
“Pretty big out there, huh?” Frank asked.
“Frank…what are you doing?” Ava asked. “Step away from the edge. Turn around and talk to me. We’ll…we’ll be okay. Won’t we?”
Slowly, Frank did step away from the edge. He turned around and looked at her and though it was indeed Frank’s face, it bore the injuries she’d accidentally doled out to the suited man named Sam earlier in the day. Frank came walking forward,looking at her with a gashed forehead and cheek, a sliver of glass sticking out of his face just below his left eye.