Page 129 of Frozen Hearts
He storms out of the room, and I hear the front door slam a minute later. Sighing, I sink onto the bar stool, dropping my head in my hand.Fuck. I didn’t mean for that to get so heated. I wanted to get him to acknowledge what he’s feeling, not push him all the way over the fucking edge.
Feeling bad, I decide I’ll apologize to him when he gets home. In the meantime, I should check on Riley to see how she’s doing after our talk earlier.
Bringing the bag with me, I leave it in the bathroom before going to her door and pushing it open. I stop in the doorway when I find her curled up asleep on the sofa. She looks so small and fragile, and the black rings around her eyes are fucking with my head.
Before I’ve properly thought it through, I’m across the room, an arm hitched under her legs and another around her shoulders as I reel her into my chest.
“What are you doing?” she mumbles groggily.
“Shh, go back to sleep,” I whisper, satisfied when she buries her face in my T-shirt and her breaths even out once more. Holding her closer, I carry her out of the room and across the hall to my bedroom, where I gently set her down on the bed. Her auburn hair fans out against my navy sheets, and I can’t help thinking how right it feels to have her there.
“I don’t know what you’re doing to me,” I murmur as I pull the covers up around her. “But I’m not entirely sure I hate it.”
33
RILEY
Burying my face in the softest pillow known to man, I try to go back to sleep. I’m nearly there, too, when I realize something is off. It’s the soft sheets against the bare skin of my thighs. The crisp, winter scent in my nostrils. The lack of a hard floor beneath my shoulder or pinch of cuffs against my wrists.
But what really confirms it for me is the low, masculine chuckle that comes from my left. My body goes tense. Not out of fear, but because I can’t remember how the hell I ended up in Logan Astor’s bed.
Turning my head to face him, I pry open an eyelid, finding him on his side, leaning on his elbow with his head resting in his hand as he watches me with a knowing smirk. His chestnut eyes gleam in the morning light, and I groan as I bury my face back in his pillow.
Eventually, I roll to face him, my nose scrunching when I have to look at his face again. “Ugh. Your face.”
He barks out a surprised laugh, lifting this hand to rub at his morning stubble.
“You’re delightful in the morning.”
I wave my hand at his face. “No one has the right to look that good first thing in the morning. Have you even brushed your teeth yet?”
“Nope. I just wake up looking this amazing.” He flips his non-existent long hair.
I snort, cuddling deeper into my pillow as I stare up at him. “You brought me to your bed.”
What I don’t say aloud is,“You believe me.”I know he said he did, but the fact he went against Grayson and brought me to his room says more than his words ever could.
I have to physically swallow back the tsunami of emotions threatening to spill over.
He believes me.
He believes me when my own mother doesn’t.
When the entire police department wrote me off as attention-seeking becauseBertram Van Doren, upstanding citizen and millionaire,couldn’t possibly do something so heinous.The only one who took pity on me was the sheriff.
Still, this is different because I care what Logan thinks of me. What all of them think of me. And knowing they thought I was an attention-seeking bitch who would happily let an innocent man sit in prison for a crime he didn’t commit made me feel like utter shit.
“I did,” Logan says, seeming to see into my soul as he gazes into my eyes.
“Will you get in trouble with Grayson?”
He shrugs a shoulder. “He’ll get over it.”
My lips flatten. Grayson is not one to simplyget overanything, but I’m choosing to stay out of it for now.
“So, what is the plan for today?” I ask instead, rolling onto my back.
“First, breakfast. I’m starving.” Logan throws back the covers, and for the first time since we woke up, I realize he’s only wearing a pair of boxer shorts.
