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Had they stayed in contact over the past three years? If they had, no one had said a word to me. I’d done everything I could to find Killian after he’d disappeared. I’d called and texted until he finally blocked my number. I’d emailed until he’d done the same. I did everything I could to find my husband until he built an unclimbable wall between us.
Three years and my Killian was gone. Gone and replaced by… God, I didn’t even recognize him. Cocky and confident. Rough and rugged. Violent and aggressive.
What happened to the man who wrote me songs as we sat on our porch in the rain? The man who got up early to make me breakfast in bed? The man who rushed home after work just so we could catch a run in the woods at sunset before making dinner together.
Lazy kitchen dances, long showers, and pumpkin picking. Where was that man?
Had I done this to him?
A tiny sob caught in my chest at that thought, and I swallowed hard. I would not break down. I would not let him break me all over again.
I could do this.
I would do this.
This would not break me.
I could do this.
I would do this.
This would not break me.
I kept my mantra on repeat. I had to because the wobbly foundation I’d rebuilt myself on was unstable. I put on a happy face. I told people I was okay. But I wasn’t.
Not really.
Not for a very long time.
But that was my cross to bear.
A sharp knock on the door made me jump. Probably Nolan. I glanced around the room to make sure I hadn’t forgotten any of his stuff. I hadn’t.
“I don’t want to talk, Nolan,” I said loud enough for him to hear and hoped he’d go away. Another knock, and I sighed. “Damn it.”
I wrenched the door open with the full intention of yelling, but all the words were ripped right out of my throat. It wasn’t Nolan.
It was Killian.
Simple shorts had been traded out for fitted jeans and a black t-shirt. The ink, the dark clothes, and the busted lip were so strange to me. Up close, just how tailored and tapered his body was became real. Those dark eyes settled on me, brimming with something I couldn’t quite place as his gaze swept down the length of my body at an agonizing pace. I shivered and gripped the door for support. The sweatshirt and leggings I wore did nothing for the naked feeling that look inspired.
“Hello, Genevieve,” he said quietly when his eyes finally met mine.
“Killian,” I whispered. “What are you… what do you want?”
“I think you and I need to talk,” he replied. Now we needed to talk? That one sentence sparked something inside me. Something deep down and full of hurt and anger. I stepped fast into the hall, forcing him back.
“Now we need to talk?” I demanded incredulously, slamming the door behind me. “What could we possibly have to talk about?”
“Genevieve,” he began with an edge of warning in his tone. I caught the way he glanced down the hall. Yeah, we weren’t alone. There were dozens of rooms lining the hall in both directions. And rooms downstairs. And across the whole house.
“We’re in a house full of wolves,” I snapped. “If they want to hear us, nothing we do will stop that. So, tell me. What does the great Killian Byrne want to talk about?”
He said nothing, which didn’t bode well for the anxious way my heart pounded in my chest. The man in front of me may have been a stranger, but there were still little things I knew like how his brows came together when he was carefully picking his words.
Which pissed me off.
He didn’t have a right to be picking his words carefully. Not after everything. Not after showing up at my door to tell me we needed to talk.
