Stolen Hearts (Hearts 1)

Too much. Just like him.

Even if they were lies, they were the kindest lies someone had told me in so long.

“This was lovely, really,” I said. I started shoving leftovers and dirty plates in bags. Cleaning up so I didn’t have to look at him. “And I’m glad we can put all that other stuff behind us. And maybe be friends?” Though honestly, I couldn’t imagine that. It would be like being friends with a wild animal. Something vicious and unpredictable. I’d done that already. I’d married a monster whose moods made me bleed.

“Stuff?” he said. “Friends? Are you talking in code?”

I saw him stand up out of the corner of my eye and abandoned the cleaning up to step back. Away.

“Poppy? What did I say?”

I forced myself to look at him. A small bravery. “What do you really want?” I asked, suddenly seeing through this all so well. So clearly. This was just another game. Kindness and dinner instead of cruelty and sex.

He took a breath and gave me a heartbreaker’s smile. Devastating. “When I met Caroline,” he said. “I was wild. Absolutely wild. I’d run from the school and was doing awful things, awful things for a gang in Belfast. And I tried to rob her. Not like a snatch and grab but, I tried to.” He laughed, shaking his head. “It’s so embarrassing. But I tried to charm her. I sat next to her in a hotel bar, pretending to be some kind of nob. I bought her a martini, and I don’t think I was old enough to drink. But, I got her purse and legged it. Got halfway down the block before one of her men grabbed me, dragged me back to her. She told me I was clever.” His blue eyes pierced mine. “And I clearly wasn’t, but I so badly wanted to be. I wanted to be clever and to belong in that hotel bar. I wanted to be anything but what I was. And her words watered a seed in me, and I decided right then and there that I’d be clever. For her.”

“That’s a real sweet story, Ronan, but what’s your point?”

“I was clever. I had to be, to still be kicking, like. But I didn’t believe it until she told me.”

“You think I need you to tell me I’m smart so I’ll believe it?” I scoffed and he shrugged.

“I think your husband told you awful lies about yourself and with no one around to tell you different, to remind you that you’re smart and kind and all those other things you are, it was easy to believe him.”

“Oh, this is rich coming from you.” I didn’t believe him. Because I couldn’t. I couldn’t risk it. I couldn’t risk him or this dinner or his kindness. So, I struck out. “You’re a fucking liar—”

And there he was, his body against mine pressing me to the credenza. He’d moved so fast, dropped the act so fast that I laughed breathlessly.

Yeah. There you are.

“Oh my god, your mouth,” he whispered. “Your mouth makes me crazy. You’re like a cat who keeps biting the hand that feeds you. And you don’t seem to realize that you are soft and tiny and inconsequential.” His hand came up to my face. His thumb against my lip, and I bared my teeth and snapped at him.

He laughed and grabbed my face in that hand, his fingers out of reach of my teeth.

“I could crush you, Poppy. Absolutely crush you, and I don’t know if you don’t realize it or if you just don’t care.”

“Fuck you.”

I lifted my knee to hammer him in the crotch, but that too, he saw coming. And he kicked my feet out wide so I was unstable. He held me up by the grip on my face. The press of his hips against mine.

“Stop playing these fucking games and tell me what you want,” I snapped.

“What I want is irrelevant,” he said, almost kissing my lips. Again I tried to bite him, snarling this time. “Stop it and listen to me.” He shook me like a rag doll. “I cannot say this more plain. You need to leave here.”

“I’m trying, asshole. You’re the one—”

“New York. Bishop’s Landing, this goddamn foundation. You need to go far, far away.”

“This is my home.”

“Is it? Seems to me it’s the place you’ve been used and hurt and lied to. You’ve been tricked and—”

“Shut up!”

“You know it’s true, Poppy. You’re gullible but you aren’t stup—”

“Shut up!” I screamed. And my voice rang and echoed and pierced his expression. I was panting in his arms. Panting.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

And he kissed me. He kissed me like his world was ending. And I was so stunned and scared that I stood there and I let him. I let him kiss me. Ravage me. His hand left my face, curled up into my hair, pulling until it hurt. “I’m sorry,” he said again. Kissing and kissing and kissing me. “Poppy, don’t make the mistakes I’ve made. Don’t—”