Heaven Hath No Rage - Book Two

Taking the Risk

Ava had gotten lost in the smoke, watching it hang in the air for a second before fleeing through the small crack in the window. It had distracted her, every pull of the cigarette was an unconscious movement meant only to provide more smoke for her visual pleasure. It had meant that she finished her havcera too quickly for her liking. Even though she felt her head in the clouds and the calming effects settle her body, she went for another. She lit it and no one was there to stop her. She was alone, as she had been since arriving home.

Her isolation was not self-imposed, just happenstance. Things were moving and people were busy but as a result of having to comply so rigorously with her father's requests and expectations, she needed people to talk to. But she had fewer and fewer people around to have those conversations with so drowning herself in havcera was a reasonable outlet for her. With no one else to funnel her thoughts to, she was forced to sit with it herself.

Not even Viv was around for a bit of entertainment. She was around, in Ava's life, but she didn't hang near her like before. There was nothing special in it for Viv anymore, Ava supposed it made sense. Viv never claimed to like her as anything more than a fling, and that was clearly shown in her actions of late. Simple companionship had been off the table. Ava was fine with that, Viv was not someone she wanted around in that capacity anyway. She had seen firsthand what Vivexa did to people she called friends.

Cameron had also been scarce in presence. His stress was mounting and made him slightly irritable. It was stress he had taken on voluntarily though, he had decided to become friendly with Wilma, who had recently moved into an abandoned room on the floor below her. Wilma, the mother of Killian's child, had come to them almost immediately after she had been introduced to Ava. It happened so fast and Ava had not yet adjusted to it even though it had been a cycle since her arrival.

Aside from his new friend, Cameron was being pulled in all directions. They needed to be seen together which meant a lot of time in public and around the estate. Her father had decided he would also have a greater role to play than originally planned for Cameron and he was involved in many of her father's social meetings. And on top of all of that, he had insisted on taking up art and painting, so he was attending lessons. He was rarely home and when he was, she wanted to be away from him.

All of it drove her mad.

She tried to pull herself back to the moment on the lightbringer after their union, where they promised each other to be kind and open and communicative. Yet, being around him made thoughts of that moment fly out the window. In his presence, she was not the nicest. So he knew to stay away unless he had to be around. None of her moods were his fault she just didn't understand how it all didn't swallow him alive. How Aubermasse seemed to not affect him. He was stressed but beyond that, perfectly content.

Things were stable and bearable, but just the act of being in the estate made her skin crawl. It felt like she was walking familiar halls when she would go down to meet with her father and it didn't sit well with her. The more it felt normal and like home the more she hated it. She would have loved to tell Cameron that is how she felt but Ava had no luck expressing her frustrations.

Most of the time they were together, he tried to speak to her about the baby. To not snap, she would disengage. It was always one-sided. She didn't care about the preparations, she had enough to deal with. They had her wearing a fucking bump. Small, now, but just enough to get the rumors swirling. She couldn't be seen doing much of anything. Pregnant noblewomen were to be treated with the utmost delicacy. That was enough preparation, she didn't feel she needed to do anything else.

She hadn't seen Wilma outside of formal introductions the night she was first taken into town to see her. Since she had moved in, Ava had made herself a ghost. Oceane had been in her ear, telling her her behavior was not acceptable. She could not simply ignore the things she didn't want to do, not when it affected other people. Oceane reminded her that Cameron would help. She would have nannies. She didn't need to do much except parade the child as her own. And even then, once they grew older she wouldn't need to be so involved.