But the heart had a mind of its own. Wayward and unruly. Reaching for the dangerous, sure it would be worth the risk.
My spirit shook.
I guessed maybe it was. Maybe I would have given anything to experience those few stolen moments. But I hadn’t been prepared that it could hurt so much.
“A fallen star,” I whispered.
Richard tightened his hold. “I should have told you.”
My head shook. “It wouldn’t have mattered.”
Those confessions were on Royce.
The crimes on Cory.
“It’s Cory who’s to blame. Let’s not forget that,” I found myself saying.
Richard squeezed his eyes together, his expression morphing through a hundred different emotions as he came to a realization. “It was him? Cory was the one who hurt you? The one who had been causing you all that anxiety? Because of me?” The last was a guttural rasp.
My eyes squeezed shut, too, and instead of answering, I asked my own. “Who is she, Richard? Who is that woman in the picture? Please . . . tell me you aren’t involved in something so cruel.”
He pressed his lips to my temple, whispered, “Never. Never.” It was a plea. “And because of you, she is free. That’s the only thing that matters.”
I choked over the emotion that surged.
The detective who’d first entered the office approached me, his eyes moving over me like he was looking for injuries. Sympathy filled his expression when he met my gaze. “I’m sorry this happened to you on our watch. That wasn’t supposed to be how it went down.”
I could barely nod.
“I’m going to ask that you make a formal statement tomorrow. Testify if you’re willing.”
My soul throbbed.
More of the pieces sliding together. What Royce had wanted all along. I’d been a target. A calculated casualty.
“If it means Cory will go away for longer, then yes, I will agree to testify.”
He gave a somber dip of his head. “Go on, get checked out. I’ll be in contact with you tomorrow so we can get your statement.”
He stepped back, and Richard returned to my side as they started to wheel me away.
My spirit thrashed when I felt the presence consume.
That connection pulling at me in a way I couldn’t let it.
The paramedics paused, and Royce was suddenly there, towering over me to the side.
“Emily.” My name was grit.
Gravel.
Dirt.
Dust.
Floating away into nothing at the end.
My entire being winced at the familiarity.
This man I’d fallen so desperately for.
“I need you to answer something for me, and I want the truth,” I said, trying to steel myself, not sure I was ready for what I was asking.
He lifted his chin, flashing the tattoo imprinted on his throat.
“The first night at that bar in Savannah . . . is that why you sought me out? Because you knew Cory had gotten to me? Because you needed me to testify to put him away? Because you knew Carolina George was the way to steal your stepfather’s company?”
Regret blistered across his flesh, but his eyes . . . they no longer held any mystery.
No reason left to keep any secrets.
“Yes.”
The word speared me like an arrow.
Tears slipped free at the corners of my eyes and dripped into my hair.
Royce reached for me.
“Don’t touch me,” I whimpered, angling away.
I couldn’t handle it.
His remorse.
His hurt.
He’d hurt me enough.
My tongue darted out to wet my lips, and I forced out the one thing I needed to say. “I don’t know how you knew, and I don’t want to, but I want you to know, I would have done it for you. For your sister. For your wife. For those women. Freely. You just needed to ask.”
Grief slashed across his face. “Emily.”
I squeezed my eyes closed. “Please, don’t . . . the one thing I asked of you was not to lie to me, and I’m pretty sure that’s the only thing you’ve done.”
Blanching, he stepped back, out of the way of the paramedics.
As they wheeled me out, I felt as if I was leaving a piece of myself behind.
Shredded.
Slayed.
Nothing left but fragments and mist.
Following along at my side, Richard dipped down to press a kiss to my temple. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
He tightened his hold on my hand. “Yes, it is.”ThirtyRoyce“Are you sure this is what you want?” Sebastian Stone sat at the table opposite of me in his kitchen in Savannah, Georgia. He slowly shuffled through the piles of paperwork set out in front of him. It wasn’t that he didn’t know every detail. Both our attorneys had spent hours hashing them out.
Sunlight poured in through the window of the close to two-century-old house that was nothing but southern charm.
The kitchen as country as his wife, Shea.
As country as Emily.
Emily.
Slanting a hand through my hair, I paced, shoved down the errant thought.
I didn’t want to think about her.
Couldn’t.
Not without breaking apart.
“You know that it is,” I told him, grinding my teeth.