Page 38 of Broken Butterfly
As I look down to see what it is, he gets up from the sofa. “Password is kitten,” he says and leaves the room.
I stare at the phone he just laid in my hand and my breath hitches. “Fallon, what?” I look up but he’s already gone. He gave me his phone. What does this mean?
I turn it on and type in ‘kitten’ to unlock the screen. Holy shit. Am I ready for this? Deep breath in, exhale out. I dial Ryder’s number. My heart is beating so fast, I feel it might beat a hole right through my chest. Ryder’s phone rings once, then twice. On the third ring, I hear his baritone voice answer and I about pass out from how much it affects me.
“Ryder?”
I hear shuffling noises and something like the low hum of a car engine in the background. “Elizabeth?”
I swallow a few times not knowing what to say next.
“Elizabeth, are you still there?”
I answer with a breathy, “Yeah.”
Just like the last time, Ryder goes silent and my stomach clenches with nausea. Every self-doubt I’ve been carrying with me comes flooding back like a tsunami, breaking my resolve and decimating my hopes that everything will be okay.
“Open the door, baby.”
“What?” My ears pick up a faint noise coming from the front of the house.
“Open the door, Elizabeth.”
I hear the noise again. I jump off the sofa and run as fast as I can to the front door. I fling it open like the house is on fire. And standing before me, looking handsome as sin, is Ryder Cutton. The man I love more than anything. The man I want to spend the rest of my life with.
My body starts shaking uncontrollably and I drop Fallon’s phone. He can afford another one.
“How?” I can’t seem to speak anything other than monosyllabic words.
Ryder gives me that heart-stopping grin, his amber eyes liquid with unshed tears. “There’s my girl.”
I burst into tears.
Chapter 11
Day 17: He Found Me
Barcelona
Before my legs have a chance to buckle, Ryder swoops me up in his arms and I swear to God, I have never felt anything more wonderful in my entire life.
“I love you so much. I’m so sorry,” I weep uncontrollably, the floodgates to my heartbreak opening, dumping everything out.
“Sweetheart, everything is going to be alright.” Ryder kisses the side of my hair, my face, and my lips several times then buries his face deep into my shoulder, inhaling deeply. I clutch him to me tightly, afraid that if I let go, he’ll disappear, and I’ll be lost again.
“How did you find me?”
“I called him,” Fallon says from behind me. My head swivels to where he’s standing at the bottom of the stairs, hands shoved in his pockets, wearing an inscrutable expression.
“Fallon?” I say his name in question.
“Private jets, kitten,” he says with that infamous Fallon smirk. I think it takes about nine hours to fly from North Carolina to Spain. Ryder must have left immediately after Fallon’s mysterious phone call this morning to be here now.
Ryder puts me down and I rush over to Fallon and hurl my arms around his neck, hugging him fiercely. “Thank you. How did you know I chose Ryder?”
“Kitten, there isn’t much I don’t know when it comes to you.”
“You are a wonderful man, Fallon Parker Montgomery,” I whisper against his cheek.
