Page 35 of Savage Hearts

It’s time to do something stupid and dangerous again.

ELEVEN

RILEY

Smashing flowerpots isn’t nearly as cathartic as I’d hoped it would be.

I go back inside the bedroom, closing and locking the patio doors and drawing the curtains over them again. I’m starving, having only had a dinner roll and some candy for supper, but I’ll be damned if I’ll call down on the stupid house phone for food.

I don’t want to speak to another Irishman for the rest of my life. The whole lot of them are arrogant bastards!

Okay, fine, they’re all really nice. The truth is that I’m too embarrassed.

It seems more reasonable to starve to death than to have to face the disappointed, condescending looks of Declan’s staff when they bring food up to Sloane’s lying little sister.

I have no doubt whatsoever that they’ve all been gossiping about me since I left the room earlier in such disgrace.

The judgmental sons of bitches.

I decide to take a hot bath to try to scrub my humiliation away. It doesn’t work, but at least I’m clean and a shade less weepy.I polish off another box of candy, spend a millisecond worrying about tooth decay, then brush and floss my teeth, turn out the lights, and climb into bed.

I must fall asleep, because I find myself sometime later staring up into the darkness with my heart pounding wildly from the terrifying sense that someone else is in the room with me.

There’s no sound. No movement. Not a single breath disturbs the air.

But there’s the distinct scent of the woods and a big fuckingpresence.

I sit bolt upright in terror, clutching the sheets to my chest and hoping one of Declan’s guards will hear my scream before my body is hacked into a million pieces.

Shaking all over, I suck in a deep breath—

“Don’t scream,malyutka. I won’t hurt you. I give you my word.”

The voice is deep, rich, and hypnotic, and one I instantly recognize.

Oh my fucking god, it’s him! It’s him, it’s him, it’s him! He’s in my bedroom, and it’s him!

I start to hyperventilate so badly, I’m in immediate danger of passing out.

“Thank you.”

He’s thanking me for not screaming. What he doesn’t know is that I’m trying to, but my throat muscles are unwilling to cooperate. They’re frozen stiff with terror, like the rest of me.

Hearing a small rustle to my right, I jerk my head in that direction. Unfortunately, I’m not wearing my glasses. So even if the room were lit, I’d still see nothing but the watery blur I’m seeing now.

I knew I should’ve gotten LASIK when my optometrist suggested it.

“Why didn’t you leave when I gave you the money?”

“I was too busy being brain-fucked.”

That’s what I wanted to say, but what I actually produce is something along the lines of the sound an elephant might make giving birth. It includes a lot of awkward grunts and trumpeting.

“Breathe,malyutka. You’re in no danger from me.”

Except for the danger of my ovaries exploding at the same time my head does, you mean.

I don’t understand how the husky timbre of his voice can be both arousing and frightening, but I suppose I’ve always been good at multitasking.