Page 63 of Stolen Mafia Vows
“That’s a bullshit quote from a fucking movie, Emily.” The panic in my own voice is scaring me. “It doesn’t work in real life.”
“Standing here yelling at me isn’t going to prove anything.”
She backs further away. A couple more steps and she’ll be in the car, and it’s hitting me like a punch to my gut that this is goodbye.
“What can I do? Tell me what I can do to prove how much I love you.”
“Let me go.” Another step.
“No can do.” I follow her like we’re attached by elastic. “I’ll fight for you, Emily.”
“With bullets?” Her voice slices through the rain.
“No, with everything I fucking possess. This doesn’t end here. This doesn’t end now. You’re wearing my Gran’s ring.”
“I don’t care about the ring, Eoghan, don’t you understand?” She slides it off her finger and holds it up between her index finger and thumb. “I trusted you, and you lied to me.”
“I never lied about loving you.”
Her eyes are fixed on the ring as if hypnotized.
“Put the ring back on, Emily. You’re mine now, puisin. I meant it when I said?—”
“Stop!” She covers her ears with her hands, and she looks so vulnerable, so lost, that I try to hug her.
But it’s the move that tips her over the edge of the precipice. She tosses the ring at me and clambers behind the wheel, locking the car doors before she starts the engine.
The ring bounces off my shoulder and lands in the wet grass on the side of the road.
I barely see it land before my brain kickstarts. I close the distance between me and the car and reach for the handle as she hits the gas pedal and the car speeds away, skidding across the road, tires squealing, before they finally find purchase.
“Emily!” I chase the car down the road, yelling her name until I’m hoarse, but she doesn’t stop.
As the car blends into the gloomy drizzle and disappears around a bend, I sprint back to the 4x4 and open the door. Icould chase her, but her words come back to me, painted across the windshield in my dripping blood:
If you truly love me, you’ll let me go.
“That’s not how love works, mo chroi. I’m coming for you, and God help anyone who tries to stand in my way.”
13
EMILY
I driveuntil I have no idea where I am. I’m no longer sure if the road is blurred by the rain hitting the windshield or by my tears, but I slam on the brakes when a deer runs straight across my path, and cling to the steering wheel, my heart trying to hammer its way free.
“The deer is gone,” I murmur through my tears. “I didn’t hit it. It’s still alive.”
The ache burning a hole through my chest isn’t for the deer though. It’s for what I left behind on the roadside back there. It’s for the love that I thought was real because I was blindsided by Eoghan Byrne from the moment I set eyes on him.
“Stupid fucking idiot.” I rest my forehead on the steering wheel and sob until there’s another burn between my shoulder blades from the uncomfortable position.
Everyone I love, everyone I’m close to, has lied to me, and I’m so fucking naïve I didn’t even have a clue. How did my family manage to keep such a colossal secret without dropping atleast a few hints? Or was I so cushioned by my privileged life that I didn’t think to question it. I never once thought to myself,jeez, my brothers must be some kind of genius entrepreneurs to get so rich so young.
And Eoghan… I really wanted to believe that he loved me, but he was harboring a gigantic missile of a secret too.
I peer in the rearview mirror. Disappointment flares inside my chest when there’s no sign of him. There’s no sign of anyone else on the road, and thankfully no dead deer. I know that I told him not to follow me, and I don’t even know how I would react if he suddenly banged on the driver’s door window, but it hurts all the same.
I’ll fight for you, Emily.
