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“They’re never going to stop. They’re never going to leave me alone,” I say dully. I thought being trapped with Elio was bad enough. But knowing that even if I ever get away from him, I’ll never be safe, makes me feel like my entire life is getting snuffed out before my very eyes.
“No, they probably won’t. Not unless I drag your papà back here and dump him on Darragh’s doorstep.”
“No,” I say instantly.
Muscles go stone-hard in Elio’s jaw.
“Even after everything he put you through, you still want to protect him?”
“I just can’t have another person around me die!” I cry out. “I can’t! I can’t handle all this guilt. It’s like I’m being buried alive!”
“Darragh’s men keep coming for you because they consider you one of theirs,” Elio says. “You’re Irish. In their minds, you belong to them, not me.” He takes a sharp turn, and I flinch at the swerving motion of it. “There’s one way to put that thought out of their minds. One way to prove that you’re irrevocably mine. Mine in a way that they’d never dare to touch you.”
“What? What way?” I thought that was the whole point of me going to the gala on his arm. Clearly, that didn’t work.
“You take my ring. You take my name.”
“I… What?”
He doesn’t look at me as he takes another fast turn, making my insides lurch.
“You marry me.”
No. There’s no way. I’m sure I’ve heard him wrong. My blood sloshes in my head. I lean forward and grip my knees, trying to breathe slowly between clenched teeth.
But he says it again. And this time, there’s no mistaking the words. There’s no mistaking the threat of them. The way they bind me to him more than any debt ever could.
“You marry me, Songbird. Marry me, or I’ll tell Darragh exactly where your fucking father is.”
