Stealing Her (Covet 1)

“Mom, you don’t understand.” I reached for her arm and held on, needing the comfort of her skin. “Mom, they’ll eat Julian alive at school! If I’m not there, they’ll beat him up. Dad will—” I didn’t want to say it, but couldn’t stop myself. “Dad will ruin him. You know Julian would do anything for his approval, hell, the only reason he hasn’t been ruined already was because I kept Dad in check!”

She squeezed her eyes as two tears fell onto my arm, the one holding on to her for comfort, for help, for support. “There’s nothing we can do. Email him every day, video chat, we’ll try as hard as we can, okay? I promise.”

But I knew, on that sad day in July.

It wouldn’t be enough.

I forced a smile and said, “Why don’t I grab the bags?”

And for the first time in my young life, I understood the meaning of your heart breaking in two.

Chapter One

ISOBEL

June 2019

I didn’t recognize my college sweetheart any more than I think he recognized himself when he looked in the mirror. Julian Tennyson, easygoing, full of life and laughter, that Julian Tennyson, was gone. It was strange watching someone you love slowly lose pieces of himself until there’s nothing left.

The last six months had been absolute hell, and yet I kept telling myself it would get better, he was just under a lot of stress.

After my parents died when I was in college, the Tennysons took me in because I had no other family. They’d provided for me and made me feel like family. I needed to be a part of something, and they gave that to me.

But the gifts weren’t free.

It didn’t matter at first. I had Julian, wonder-boy graduate, voted one of the sexiest men alive under thirty, and corporate heartthrob.

Year one, we moved in together and were ridiculously happy. I did charity work, and he hit the ground running at Tennyson Financial.

Year two, he started coming home later and later, and sometimes not at all.

Year three, the cheating started.

Six months ago, he broke my heart.

He drank the Tennyson poison, and now I was going to end it.

Except nothing was calming my racing heart, not the Xanax I’d popped before I scheduled this meeting, not the bottle of wine I knew was waiting for me at home, not even the relief I knew I’d feel once I said the words and walked out of his life.

Out of the cult that was the Tennyson family, with all of their dark secrets, greed, and textbook narcissism. I shuddered. I couldn’t do it anymore.

I couldn’t live in a constant state of walking on eggshells.

I would never be what my fiancé or his father wanted.

I was good.

Just not good enough.

That morning I was waiting to see Julian in the reception area outside his office.

There were two receptionists in their midtwenties with blonde hair and model-perfect makeup, neither of whom bothered to look up from their desk. Employees knew you never made eye contact with the Tennysons, and since I was engaged to the vice president and soon-to-be CEO, that meant I was looped into the crazy.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

I wasn’t supposed to have to schedule a meeting just to talk to my fiancé. That’s not what normal people did.

And yet that was the expectation. I was here waiting for my “appointment,” already delayed. Time, after all, was extremely valuable, and the Tennysons never seemed to have quite enough of it, especially when it came to personal matters. Julian always had time to party on yachts with celebrities and heiresses, but when it came to time alone at the penthouse with me? Never enough.

Pain stabbed me in the chest.

Pain over his careless treatment.

Pain over our drawn-out engagement.

Pain over the loss of our friendship.

“Isobel?” Kelsey, one of the perfect receptionists, stood. I’d fought with Julian when he hired her; she was too pretty, and he was easily distracted by shiny things. After all, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree. “Julian will see you now.”

“Perfect.” I stood and primed myself with a confident smile as I made my way through the sleek, modern double doors.

The first time I walked through those doors years ago it felt like I held the keys to a new kingdom.

I didn’t realize then that the kingdom was actually a dungeon and some things are covered in gold to distract from what’s underneath.

“Isobel.” Julian moved toward me, but his smile was for the receptionist who would report back to his father. “It’s the middle of a workday.”

He looked more tired than normal . . . and stressed. I was tempted to reach for him, to tell him to lean on me like he used to. But he looked almost angry when my hand started to do just that.

“It is.” I ground my teeth. How had it come to this? Memories of us in college resurfaced as they always did when I was trying to match the man I fell in love with to the stranger standing in front of me.