𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐒𝐎 𝐈 𝐑𝐀𝐍 ▸ Ana asked Christian how bad it could be, and so he showed her. Leaving Christian, Ana finds herself alone and running from the man who bruised her backside yet owns her heart. But Seattle is a big place, and Christian isn't...
I can't believe Leila had broken into Ana and Kate's apartment. According to Sawyer, she climbed the fire escape and forced a window in what turned out to be Ana's room. She'd obviously had a chance to have a good look around because while Kate's room was undisturbed, Ana's bedroom was completely trashed. Every item of clothing was slashed, as were the bed sheets, but the worst thing was the books. There were broken spines and torn pages decorating the room like confetti. Knowing how Ana treasured her tomes, this would devastate her.
"How the hell did this happen?" I shouted, my blood pressure shooting through the roof as I surveyed the damage. "This unit was meant to be checked!"
"It was checked," Taylor replied, looking far from happy. "I checked it myself this morning when Gail restocked the fridge."
"I want an alarm system installed here. Motion detectors in every room. Panic buttons. Everything!" I ordered, knowing it was a matter of shutting the gate after the horse had bolted. There was no way I'd allow Ana to move back in here after this, and once she saw the destruction Leila had wrought, I wondered whether she'd want to. "And get a team over here to clean up. Make a list of the books destroyed so I can replace them."
"Miss Steele will probably want to see herself what can be salvaged," Taylor warned. He was right. There was no way I could protect Ana from seeing this, no matter how much I wanted to.
"She's going to run," I predicted, running my hands through my hair.
"Not necessarily," Taylor replied, looking at me with sympathy.
"Everything she owns has been destroyed because of me. Of course she's going to run," I replied fatalistically.
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It turns out I disliked Ethan Kavanagh even more than I did his sister. Not only did he look at Ana in a way that wasn't entirely fraternal, but I also had to wonder what sort of guy takes some stranger's word about being a friend of the occupier when unexpectedly found inside their unit.
Ethan wasn't able to tell us much, other than that Leila knew Ana by name, and had said she'd been dropping off something of hers. Ana's bedroom door had been closed, and Ethan didn't go in, which was why he was unaware there'd been damage.
While Taylor and I doubted Leila would return, I couldn't in good conscience let Kavanagh stay there; at least until the locks were changed. So it was with a heavy sense of obligation that I invited him to stay at Escala. Ana and I had left him watching a movie in my theatre room while we returned to the unit to see if anything of Ana's could be salvaged.
I knew Ana was worried about how Kate would take the news, so we'd all intentionally played down the situation in front of Ethan. Taylor had made it sound more like Leila had rifled through Ana's stuff rather than destroying it.
"How bad is it?" Ana asked later, her beautiful blue eyes filling with tears.
"Pretty much everything," I dolefully replied. I was holding Ana's hand, but it was more for my sake than hers. We were in the back of the SUV heading back to her unit. "I'll replace everything," I offered, knowing there would be sentimental things I couldn't just buy.
