Heartless Hero (Crowne Point 1)

I stopped just before his jaw, his sharp, smooth jaw. Nerves strangled my stomach. I could feel him hard and digging into my stomach. This was Theo. This wasn’t some random asshole. I cared desperately what Theo thought of me.

Heat blazed in his eyes.

I wanted to kiss him so badly.

So of course I distracted myself.

“I don’t remember,” I said. It was barely a whisper. Theo arched a brow at my non sequitur. “Giving you this bracelet,” I explained.

He blew out smoke. “You were small.”

His hand settled casually yet possessively on the back of my thigh, just beneath my ass. I swallowed air. I wanted him so badly I felt like I was going to combust. All the while Theo just watched me.

As if the memory came back to him, a small smile tugged his lips. “Little Abigail Crowne, in black jeans, a fur vest, and leather boots… an outfit that cost so much it could probably get me off the streets. You know what I remember most?”

His thumb grazed the underside of my ass. Slowly. Easily.

“What?” I couldn’t breathe.

“You had the same fucking look in your eyes. Lonely…” His eyes softened. “But so damn tenacious. I thought you were going to hand me money, but you gave me a fucking bracelet. I was hungry, so I was pretty pissed.”

As he told the story, it came back to me. We’d spent the day at Crowne Point Day Camp, a nonprofit camp set up by Mom and Dad. It was only for appearances, and the last time I ever went somewhere like that, but I got to make a friendship bracelet. I didn’t have a best friend to give the bracelet to, but I loved the thing. It was the first thing that was mine, not Abigail Crowne’s, but mine. Still, when I saw him, I wanted to give it to him. I don’t know why. Maybe my heart knew what my mind didn’t.

I guess I’d latched on to that feeling, even if I didn’t remember its inception. From that point on I made jewelry until I reached an age where I had to start hiding it from my mother.

A Crowne isn’t a petty craftsman.

I did it in secret, and it saved me. I was so young—so young I forgot Theo—all I remembered was that feeling. I forgot the boy who played an integral part of the dream that saved me from disappearing into Abigail Crowne.

I stared at him with newfound amazement.

His thumb traveled higher, into my linen floral shorts and sliding over my panties, and I could barely get out my next words. “You kept it.”

“I kept it.”

His thumb disappeared too soon, now using the arm to wrap around my waist, sliding me higher, pushing me against his dick.

Hard.

Rock hard. And he felt like heaven between my legs, hitting that aching spot, making me ache even more but in a delicious way.

I couldn’t stop the moan that dripped from my lips. At the sound, he pressed his head against my headboard and groaned. I think I could get addicted to that sound. Rough, a little strangled and pained. My eyes dropped to his lips, waiting to hear it again.

“Condom?” he asked, voice rough. His head was still against my quilted headboard, only dropping his gaze to meet mine.

“I don’t have any condoms,” I said. “I mean… I just… I never…”

I mean, I did, but I bought them when I was sixteen.

Theo lifted his head, brow furrowing. “You’re really a virgin?”

I looked away. “If we’re going by heteronormative norms, but I’ve done everything else so—”

His lips were on mine.

He tasted like wine and smoke and sex, like some heathen god. His kiss was soft but unyielding, and it was over too soon. He broke off, my eyes still closed.

“You just said heteronormative.” He ca