Page 76 of Stolen Hearts

He was risking everything.

Chapter Sixteen

The first thing Rhae noticed was the smell.

Before her eyes blinked open, it surrounded her—musty books, aged wood polish, dust and the faint smoky scent of her father’s bourbon. Beneath it all was a location so familiar it rooted her in place with dread.

Her parents’ home in New Jersey.

She’d know that mixture of bourbon, books and time-worn leather anywhere. The stale air of the house that had been long closed up filtered into her lungs as she drew a shallow breath.

Her stomach turned, and she gulped down the nausea and panic rising inside her.

When she forced her eyes open, the dim light trickling through the familiar heavy draperies on the tall windows sent a piercing pain to the back of her skull. She let her eyes move slowly side to side, taking in the washed-out, gray glow of the space.

She was right. Her father’s study.

The world tilted.

She was lying on the old, tufted leather couch, the one guests always joked looked like it belonged in a 1950s psychiatrist’s office. Her legs were stiff. Her hands tingled. Her throat was dry.

She sat up slowly, every muscle screaming that she wasn’t ready. Her heart hammered behind her ribs as her gaze darted around the room.

Oh, god. Everything wasexactlythe same.

The framed diplomas on the walls. The Tiffany-style lamp that had flickered her entire childhood. Her father’s worn leather recliner, still angled toward the fireplace.

Her mother’s cardigan lay draped over the arm of the chair, slouched like she had just shrugged out of it. The sleeves sagged, worn and stretched. Her father’s reading glasses were still perched on the table next to it, right where he’d always left them when he got up to pour a bourbon.

But they were dead. Both of them. Gone for years.

No one had been here since the estate was settled, only months after Robert Ravencroft assured Rhae that he would handle everything on her behalf and in the memory of his late business partner and dear friend.

The house had been locked up, preserved like a shrine.

She shivered.

Her fingers reached up to touch the back of her neck, tender and sore from some physical abuse she’d sustained getting here.

Her pulse quickened, fragments of memory filtering in through the fog in her mind. The file cabinet. Her office. Justin.

She jerked upright, stumbling to her feet. Her legs trembled under her weight, but she made it to the center of the room before freezing.

Tiny black circles were dotted near the ceiling—cameras.

New.

Her parents would never have put surveillance in the house. Her father was old-school in his beliefs. He preferred to retain the integrity of the original Victorian-era structure.

And the doorknob glinted too—metal, modern. No lock was visible on this side of the door. It could be bolted shut from outside.

Panic slammed into her chest.

She wasn’t just in a place filled with sad memories of that fateful day when she lost both her parents. She wastrappedin it.

“Good. You’re awake.”

Rhae jumped, her heart leaping up her throat.

---