Suddenly, his arms wrapped around me like a vice. “I know I didn’t deserve Grace. I know I don’t deserve you. The difference is, I’m a grown fucking man now and every fucking thing in my life has wielded me into a weapon. I won’t let anyone take you from me, Bianca, that’s a fact I’ll die for.”
“I believe you,” I promised, because how could I not when he showed me the collection of fragments his heart had been reduced to as if they somehow made him less worthy. Instead, like a painting that had been eroded and stained with neglect and rough hands, I saw only the unmitigated beauty in the wreckage. Tears started track hot paths down my frozen cheeks as I stared up at the man I couldn’t believe I’d once thought to be a villain. “And please, don’t say you don’t deserve me. It’s so far from true. You’re a survivor, Tiernan, and you know what a survivor deserves most of all?”
He swallowed thickly, once, twice, as if trying to force down a lump in his throat. Finally, he gave up and shook his head, his forehead rolling against mine.
“A happy ending,” I whispered, the words a hot plume of white between our mouths.
Our kiss was soft, closed-mouth, but I could taste the brine of my tears in it. He took more slowly, as if realizing his hunger. When we finally parted, our twin breaths cast billows of white clouds in the air.
“You’re forgiving me,” he said slowly. “But are you asking me to give up my hatred for Bryant? Because Bianca, I’m beginning to realize there isn’t much I wouldn’t do for you. For Brando. But that… I’ve lived with it so long, I don’t know how to carve it out of me.”
“No,” I said immediately, letting the anger in my belly spark into flame. I clutched his face in both my hands and snarled over the words that poured from that fierce place inside me, the same place that ignited when someone tried to fuck with Brando. “Bryant has taken from you your entire life. He deserves to die for what he’s done.”
For one crystal clear moment, Tiernan didn’t blink or breathe as he looked into my probably manic expression, and then, shockingly, he threw his head back and howled with laughter. It rumbled through us both as he shouted his mirth to the cloud-covered heavens and he didn’t stop for long moments, not even when it started to snow.
Finally, he dropped his head to smile down at me, moving my hair out of my face with a gloved palm. “You are a contrary girl, Bianca Belcante.”
“I told you I wasn’t as sweet as you thought,” I countered with a cheeky smile, relieved to see the deadness faded from his eyes.
He squeezed me tightly and leaned back, taking my feet off the ground. I wrapped my hands around his neck and laughed into his mouth as he kissed me again.
When he put me back on my feet, he grasped my chin and studied my face. “So, little girl with the fierce claws, are you ready for a fight? Going up against Bryant will mean danger and bloodshed. I learned to be a monster from a man even more monstrous than me.”
“Your fight is my fight. Everyone underestimates me because of my age and maybe the blonde hair, but I’m clever and I don’t ever give up. Not when it comes to my family.”
I watched as the word family rocked through Tiernan like a physical blow. In the wake of the hit, his face softened, the brackets carved around his mouth and between his brows smoothing. He looked younger than I’d ever seen him.
“Oh, I know it,” he teased drolly. “I’m just glad to finally be on the same team. Your claws fucking hurt, little thing.”
I rolled my eyes at him, but he just laughed and hugged me tighter.
Of course, it was Tiernan and I, so the peace didn’t last for long.
In fact, it ended abruptly as soon as we arrived back in Bishop’s Landing.
“Absolutely fucking not,” he roared, slamming on the brakes at a stop sign. “No way in goddamn hell, Bianca.”
“What happened to letting me make decisions for myself?”
“Make all the smart decisions you want,” he countered. “This is not that. We kissed and fucking made up. You need to come home. Not just for me, but Brando.”
“Don’t you dare use Brando against me,” I snapped. “You don’t think I’m doing this for him too? Caroline needs me for something, Tiernan.”
“Don’t tell me you want to help that bitch,” he asked incredulously.
“No, of course not.” Between Tiernan and Elias’s stories, I had no doubt Caroline was a beautiful painting rendered by a despicable artist. The dreams I’d had for years of being accepted into her home were hollow enough to cave in when I was faced with the truth of who she was. “But I want to know what she knows.”