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The truth was, I knew that. I knew he didn’t love me and maybe he’d never love me. Not in any conventional way. But we were long past conventional. But I also knew what he was doing, trying to make me safe. He tore the bag out of my hand, ripping the thin plastic. Jewelry spilled out onto the couch. A waterfall of gold and diamonds. Turquoise and sapphires. I didn’t care about the jewelry; I’d throw it out the window if I had to.
“I know what you’re trying to do to me,” I said. “You’ve been trying to do this practically since the minute we met.”
“What’s that?”
“Keep me safe by pushing me away. But the safest place for me in the world is with you.”
“You believe that? After everything that just happened? What the hell is wrong with you, Poppy?”
“Nothing,” I snapped. “So stop treating me like a fool.”
“I can’t keep you safe if you’re here. You talk about revenge. You talk about war. This is what war looks like, Poppy. Pack your things,” he said. “Leave and you’re free.”
“What about you?”
“I’m never free, Poppy,” he yelled. “I’m a killer. That’s all I am. That’s all I’ll ever be. I’m a fucking Morelli and the Constantine monster. Don’t you understand, this is my world.”
It wasn’t just his father who made him believe he was a weapon. Or where he was raised. Or the priests and losing his friend Tommy. It was Caroline, too. No boy grew into a man believing his only worth was killing people unless that was reinforced every step.
“You killed the senator because he hurt me.”
“Why do you want to make that noble?” he cried. “What is wrong with you that you want to make that noble?”
“Because the rules are different with you,” I cried. “With this world.”
“And that’s why you need to leave. You need the regular world, Poppy. Where good guys are good guys not because they didn’t put a bullet in a man’s head. Where fairy godmothers don’t save you just so they can fuck up your life. Where—”
I stood. “You’ve ruined me for the regular world, Ronan,” I told him. “The only world I want is what you and I build together. If you’re staying, then I’m staying too. You want me to leave, you have to come with me.”
“Why do you want this?” He honestly didn’t know. Didn’t see. And I would take the rest of my life convincing him if that was what he needed.
“I love you.”
“Poppy—”
“I do. I love you.” I would say it until he believed it. “I love you. I love—”
He dropped the bags and grabbed me, lifted me off my feet and stomped me across the room to the wall between two windows. I expected him to shake me and tell me to grow up. That he would never love me. But instead he asked in a low, heated voice, “How do you know?”
I blinked, stunned by the question, by the torment in his face. He arched his hips against me and I felt the hard length of his cock against my belly and moaned in my throat. “Because that’s not love,” he snarled in my face, trying to defile everything between us. “Anyone can fuck.”
“No one makes me feel like you do.”
“You liked Eden well enough on that plane.”
“Only because you were watching.”
He tried to stay so furious, he did. He clung to it with all his strength. And I almost felt bad for him. I reached up and pushed his dark hair off his face. His beautiful, broken face. His hands left my shoulders to grab on to the windowsill and I was boxed in between the window and his body.
And I didn’t want to be anywhere else. I kissed his forehead. His cheek. He dropped his face against mine.
“I love you,” I whispered against his face. He flinched and I said it again. And then again. Binding him to me with my hope and my heart. With everything I was sure we could be if he would believe in me. Believe in what I saw when I looked at him. He wasn’t just a killer. He had a code that was pure iron. He was a victim, still grieving. Still hurting. He was my fierce protector and he would break the laws of man if I was hurt.
If I was a queen, he was my king. And we’d find our own fucking kingdom.
“I love you,” I said again, determined to say it until he believed me.
“How do you know?” he asked.
I cupped his face and lifted it so our eyes met. “How do I know I love you?” I read the question in his eyes. And I realized this wasn’t his searching for a compliment. He honestly didn’t know how this was supposed to feel and, granted, I hadn’t had a lot of experience, but I’d loved people in my life. But he’d had no one. Everyone who should have loved him left him. Or used him. Twisted him into this man who thought the only way for him to live was alone. A version of himself he never should have been.
