The Ones Who Saved Us

Chapter 4

Avalee's POV

Standing behind my brothers was none other than Hunter. He had a bruise on his cheek that had swollen up and a busted lip.

I walked over to him and examined his face before turning to Alessandro. "Did you-"

"No, he was like that when I found him," Alessandro said.

I looked back to Hunter, who simply nodded his head. "The holding cell I was in had some other guys in there. They beat me up a little, but don't worry about it, kid. I'm fine."

"Thank God you called me when you did," Matteo said, hugging me from behind. "You might have ended up looking like him."

Shrugging Matteo's arms away from me, I asked, "Why are you here?"

"Well," Alessandro said as he slung his arm over my shoulder, "I like to know who my little sister is hanging out with. And I have a few questions for him."

Papa and Leo came out of the kitchen, confusion clear on their faces when they saw Hunter. "Who is that?" Leo asked.

"Hunter Wilson," Elijah answered. "The guy Ava got arrested with."

I took a step back when Elijah spoke, backing up into Emilio who wrapped his arm around me. Bending his head down, he whispered in my ear, "What happened, Aves?"

"Nothing," I whispered back. "He yelled at me earlier, and I think I'm still a bit shaken up."

Emilio directed a glare at Elijah who held his hands up in defense. "Why did you yell at her?" he sneered.

"Emilio, this is a conversation between Ava and me. It's not your concern," Elijah said.

"Whatever," Emilio muttered.

Emilio and Matteo walked me over to the dining table so that I was sitting in between them. Leo set the food on the table, and Papa, Hunter, and the rest of my brothers soon joined us. Alessandro took a bite out of the pasta, his eyes lighting up. "This is really good. Nice job, Ava and Leo."

My fork stopped before reaching my mouth, and I quickly put it back on my plate. Lowering my eyes, I said, "I didn't help with dinner."

"Ava, I asked you to do one thing-"

"Sandro, leave her alone," Leo said. "We can talk about this later once Hunter leaves, but this isn't her fault."

"Fine," Alessandro said. "But, Ava, don't think that you're off the hook for this or what happened earlier at Elijah's office. Once Hunter leaves, we're going to have a serious talk about everything."

I raised my head to meet Hunter's eyes and noticed something that I hadn't noticed before, probably due to the shock from seeing him in my house. His eyes were red, showing clear signs of being high. High Hunter was someone who never knew when to shut his mouth, and I was seriously worried how this would turn out.

Hunter was casually eating his food, showing no signs of stress, which was definitely a result of the weed. He had pretty bad anxiety, so he often had weed gummies to calm himself. Knowing Hunter, he probably had them when my brothers invited him for dinner as preventative measure.

"Hunter, how do you know my daughter?" Papa asked as he took a bite of the pasta.

Hunter laughed, reminiscing on our first meeting. I sent him a look in hopes that he would understand not to tell them anything, but either he didn't notice or the weed was really affecting him. "We met almost a year ago back in April of last year."

I'm dead.

Alessandro sent a glare to me, causing me to shrink in my chair. "Really? My sister gave us the impression that you met back in October at the library."