Page 41 of Cruel King
Matthias
My eyes are barelyopen when I realize I fucked up. I don’t know why, but I fell asleep as I was filling in Ava’s picture. Throwing off the covers, I jump out of bed as my sketchbook sails through the air and lands on the floor. I don’t have the time to pick it up, though. My father and everyone else will be back this morning, and I want to see her before they all storm in and I can’t talk to her at all.
I run down the hall to the guest room and fling open the door, but there’s no one in the bed. It looks like Eleanor has already been here to fix the room.
Christ! Ava is going to think I went back to being a dick to her. I have to find her and explain.
I hear my father and brothers making their usual noise, and my heart sinks. I’m too late. Even if I do find her, we won’t be able to talk with all of them around.
Hurrying to the kitchen, I find Eleanor cleaning up after breakfast. When she sees me, she immediately launches into what I can choose to have to eat, but I wave off her suggestions. I don’t give a damn about eating right now. All I care about is finding out where Ava went to this morning.
“Eleanor, I’m fine. I’m not really hungry. Where’s Ava?”
She dries her hands on the dishcloth near the sink and smiles. “She woke up and left as soon as your father and your brothers came home. I think Theo saw her, though, because she came back up to talk to him. That was about a half hour ago.”
I need to go to her house to talk to her and explain I didn’t mean to fall asleep and forget about her. Grabbing my coat from near the front door, I start to get ready to head down to the carriage house when I hear Theo behind me.
“Where the hell are you going to?” he asks with a chuckle.
“Out. I need to take care of something.”
He walks up to me as I open the front door and asks, “In the snow? Everything’s shut down. It was a blizzard out there. Did you sleep through the entire thing? I don’t think anything’s open for fifty miles.”
I turn to look at him, wondering why he’s telling me about the goddamned snow. “It couldn’t have been too bad. You guys made it back.”
Rolling his eyes, he says, “That was Mr. Sutton. I swear he’s a maniac. We could have stayed in the city all day today, but once he heard Ava was up here because the heat was out in their house, he swore up and down to Dad that he could get us back safe and sound. I have to give it to him, though. He did just that. You should have seen all the cars stranded on the side of the road the whole way back here. It was a fucking mess, but he kept on driving like he was a man on a mission.”
None of this matters to me. All I care about is finding Ava.
“Good for him. Maybe Dad should give him a raise. Speaking of the Suttons, did you see Ava this morning? Eleanor said you and she were talking in the kitchen.”
My brother nods and gives me a shrug. “Yeah. She came up to tell me she’s leaving to go to her aunt’s in New Hampshire. No, maybe it was Vermont. I don’t know. I just know she said it’s out in the boonies and she didn’t think she’d have internet there. Sounds pretty fucking lame to me, to be honest.”
Leaving? What’s he talking about? Ava isn’t going anywhere. She lives here on the estate. Why the hell would she go to stay with some aunt who doesn’t even sound like she lives in civilization? She didn’t mention anything about that, and we talked about everything under the sun in the time we spent together.
I need to act casual, though, or Theo will know something’s up.
“Yeah, that sounds like it’s going to suck for her. When’s she leaving?” I ask, struggling to control my emotions as I attempt to look as calm as possible.
Turning on his heel, he starts walking toward the stairs. “She left already. Packed up her things and drove off with her father a little while ago.”
I want to ask if she gave him a message for me or maybe asked for my number when she came up to see him, but I can’t without making him wonder why I’d give a damn. I’ve pretended to dislike Ava Sutton for years, so suddenly being upset about her leaving would throw up red flags all over the place.
As I take off my coat and hang it back up, I pretend like it’s no big deal that the only person I wanted to see today has left and I have no idea when I’ll see her again. “I just remembered. I have something to do before I go out,” I mumble as I pass him on my way back to my room.
“You’re acting weird, dude. Did something happen here while we were gone?”
I look back at him and shrug as my foot hits the first stair. “Not that I know of. What could have happened? All it did was fucking snow like a foot or two.”
“Well, you’re acting strange.”
There’s no way I can tell him or anyone else in this house what happened between Ava and me, so I simply wave off his mention of my acting strange and dismiss it without saying another word. By the time I get back to my room, I can’t shake the feeling that she left without even saying goodbye. She didn’t even leave a note or anything.
Maybe she won’t be gone for long. I mean, how many days can you stay at your aunt’s out in the middle of nowhere?
* * *
Two weeks have gone by,and she’s never called or texted or even told Theo to give me a message. Nothing. I thought we had something special. It sounds stupid even thinking that since I’ve been with dozens of women I couldn’t give a damn if they ever contacted me after I slept with them, but Ava’s different.