All Chapters of Off-Limits Puck: Daddy's Best Friend is my Ruin: Chapter 171 - Chapter 180

GAVIN“I cannot believe this.” Director Flint’s voice filled the conference room, the veins in his neck sticking out as he leaned forward over the table. “The election is tomorrow, and you’re telling me we still have nothing solid enough on Dalton to link him with the Rossi family and put them all away?”He had called every agent connected to Operation Black Ice into the room to make his displeasure clear. The timing couldn't be worse. Once Dalton took that senatorial seat, his political immunity would make future federal indictments nearly impossible.Dalton had been extremely careful these past weeks as if he knew somehow that he was being watched closely. Even Cassandra had come up with nothing. The case on Evelyn was at a standstill as nobody had heard or seen her and no evidence even pointed to her being alive except Melanie’s words, a wedding ring, and a locket left on two separate porches.Everything felt stalled.Flint kept on telling everyone how disappointed he was and how

MELANIE I was in front of his house, parked and sitting in my car, still debating whether coming here was the right decision, when the sound of my ringtone filled the air.I glanced at the passenger seat, and Gavin’s name lit the screen.Gavin?My heart jumped. I almost reached for it too fast, then forced myself to take a slow breath, clear my throat, and answer like I hadn’t been sitting outside his door for the last ten minutes.“Hello?”“Melanie,” he breathed. “Thank you for picking up. I wasn’t sure you would.”I kept my tone flat. “What do you want, Gavin? Haven’t you done enough?”“Baby, I'm sorry.”A small, unwilling smile tugged at my mouth, but I refused to let it show in my voice. “What exactly are you sorry for?”“I'm sorry for making you feel like you are not important… Melanie, you are the most important person in my life, and I will not trade you for anyone.”“Including your wife?”There was a brief pause on the line. A frown marred my forehead.“Even Evelyn,” he final

MELANIE “Miss Wealth! Over here!”“You look beautiful, Miss Wealth!”“How does it feel to stand beside the next Senator?”I kept my chin lifted, my back straight, and a polite, practiced smile locked in place until my cheeks ached. The emerald-green gown my father had sent to my mother’s apartment earlier that day clung smoothly to my body and pooled at my ankles. The short note that came with it still sat folded in my purse: For tonight. You belong on that stage.Standing beside him now, knowing what Gavin had told me—that the man holding my hand wasn’t only an ambitious politician but the acting head of the entire Rossi syndicate—made my skin feel too tight.Dalton was in his element. He was dressed in a sharp, black tuxedo as he put a warm arm around my waist, pulling me close for the news crews. To anyone watching on television across the nation, we were the picture of a perfect family.​Nobody saw the quiver in my forced smile or the slight, nervous tremor in my fingers where I

MELANIEThe video filled every screen in the ballroom.My body became stiff; I couldn't move. It felt like my legs had been tied to the ground as heat flooded my face so fast it burned. My hands started shaking first, then my legs. I couldn’t stop the tremor that ran through my entire body. The gown I was wearing suddenly felt too tight, too thin, like it wasn’t covering anything at all.How could this have happened?Hundreds of people were staring. Not at the stage in general. They were staring at me.The footage was clear. It was of me and Gavin.I wanted the floor to open and swallow me.“Dad?” I took a step closer to him. “Make them turn it off!”My father stood frozen in front of the microphone. I could only see the side of his face, but the color had drained from it so completely that he looked pale under the stage lights. His smile was gone, his hands hanging uselessly at his sides.Somewhere in the crowd I found Eva. Her mouth was wide open. Then her eyes moved sharply to the

MELANIEMy breathing turned ragged as I lay on the hospital bed with my arm wrapped in bandages.I was indeed lucky, as the doctor said, because the bullet had only grazed me, scraped deep enough to bleed and leave a long, angry wound, but it hadn’t lodged inside or whatever.But I didn't feel lucky. I felt sick to the stomach as I lay there waiting for news about Eva.I could still remember how fast everything went down. I still don't know what made me jump in front of Gavin. I don't know why I did it, but I just knew I had to. Because if I didn't, Gavin would have been dead by now.I saw the shock in my father's face when he pressed the trigger and realised it would hit me instead of Gavin, but I guessed it hadn’t been enough to stop his finger.“Fuck” I groaned softly, trying to sit up, but the pain shot through my arm and I sucked in a sharp breath.Where the hell was everyone? Why wasn't anyone around to answer my questions?The expression on Eva's face when the bullet hit her. T