Page 64 of Daddy's Ring
After she leaves, I lock the door and carry Maeve upstairs. The apartment still smells faintly of garlic from last night's dinner, and there's a coffee mug on the counter from this morning—evidence of Declan being here, of me letting him in.
I wash the mug, wipe down the counters, trying to erase any trace of him.
But I can't erase the way Maeve keeps looking toward the door like she's waiting for him to come back. Can't erase the hollow ache in my chest or the memory of his voice sayingit's not real, none of it is real except what I feel for you.
I want to believe him. Despite everything, I still want to believe him.
And that's the most terrifying thing of all.
17
DECLAN
Ican't go home.
The thought loops through my head as I walk away from the bookstore, as I climb into my car, as I sit gripping the steering wheel hard enough to hurt. If I go back to that house right now—if I see Bianca's smug face—I might actually kill her.
Not hypothetically. Not as a figure of speech. I might genuinely wrap my hands around her throat and squeeze until she stops breathing.
The rage is different from anything I've felt before. It's not the cold calculation I use at work, not the detached efficiency of handling problems. This is hot and visceral and consuming, and beneath it is something worse: the look on Zola's face when she told me to get out.
I can't lose her again. I can't.
But Bianca went to her. Somehow found out about the bookstore, about Zola, and decided the best course of action was to stake her claim like Zola's some kind of territory she needs to defend.
My phone buzzes. I ignore it.
It buzzes again. And again.
Finally, I look. Three texts from Bianca.
Bianca:Where are you?
Bianca:We need to talk
Bianca:Don't ignore me, Declan
I turn the phone off.
The drive to Stellan's takes twenty minutes, and I spend every second of it trying to calm down enough that I won't do something stupid. By the time I'm standing at his door, I can almost breathe normally.
He takes one look at my face and steps aside. "What happened?"
"Bianca." The name comes out like a curse. "She found Zola."
Stellan closes the door behind me, his expression going carefully blank in that way that means he's already thinking five moves ahead. "Found her how?"
"Went to the bookstore. Told her to stay away from her husband." I move into the living room, needing to pace, needing to do something with the energy crawling under my skin. "Mentioned the baby."
"Fuck." Stellan rubs a hand over his jaw. "Did Zola?—"
"She kicked me out." My voice sounds hollow even to my own ears. "Told me to leave. And she was right to do it because I should have told her about Bianca the first day I walked into that bookstore. I should have explained everything instead of?—"
"You were trying to fix it first." Stellan moves to the bar cart, pours two glasses of whiskey without asking if I want one. "You didn't want to tell her about your sham marriage until you could also tell her you were ending it."
"Lot of good that did." I take the glass he offers, down half of it in one swallow. The burn helps, focuses the rage into something sharper. "Now she thinks I'm some cheating bastard who's been lying to her for weeks."
"Have you tried calling her?"
