Page 39 of Hart Breaker

“You don’t get to act affronted by me. I?—”

“You marry that asshole, Ry …” He shakes his head. “You marry him, you become one. He strikes”—he hits the ink on his arm—“you’re doing it, too.”

“Is that a fucking snake on your body?” I ask with disgust.

“You bet your ass it is.” He turns and flexes, making the damn thing move.

“I’d ask why you’d do that, but it’s not the reason I’m here.” My eyes stall on his fuck-hot nipples.

“Peel your eyes off the pecks, Brooksie, and step back into the ring.”

“I didn’t come to fight with you.”

“No?” His eyes and nostrils flare in sync, and my insides clench.

Without being offered a seat, I sit. “Can I get a spoon?”

He lets out a harsh, growly breath as he opens a drawer and pulls one out. “Yeah.”

I position myself on my knees, lean over, and take a scoop. “Brett’s always been a bit dick-ish, and I’m not gonna lie and say I don’t like that about him.” I shove the dough in my mouth, hold my hand over my face, and continue, “I’ve known him since we were kids, as a pubescent boy, as a shit hot high school athlete who I was in adolescent love with. He was my first everything, including my first heartbreak.”

He bends down, resting his elbows on the counter, picks his spoon out of the bowl, and shovels a scoopful into his mouth as I force myself to keep on task, even when he licks the spoon and then his lips.

“We broke up before college and promised each other if we were single at twenty-five, it would mean we were meant to be together.”

I stop when he grabs his phone off the counter and starts tapping his screen.

“Am I interrupting something? A late-night hook-up with a wanna-be WAG?”

He smirks. “Not my style, Brooksie. I’m just making notes.”

“Notes?” I huff.

“Yeah.” He sets the phone down on the counter, eyes locking on mine. “Questions I wanna ask when you’re done she-splaining why a girl like you is settling for a fuckwit like him.” He grabs the spoon and takes another scoop. “I’m all yours, Ry.”

I’m all yours?

I tamp down the total freak-out that statement could cause and push on. “I went out with friends one night, fake ID in hand, and got pretty shitty. I saw something on IG while I was in the bathroom that messed with my head.” I decide to leave out that it was a picture of Gina and Brett with the caption, “together again.” “I needed to get the hell out of there, so I left without telling my new sorority sisters, alone.”

He picks up his phone and taps on the screen.

“Just freaking ask me.”

“I will.” He pushes it away.

“Fine, whatever, long story short; I was followed by a bunch of guys who …” I lift a shoulder. “They didn’t get far; a man who I later learned owned the bar stopped them. He and one of his employees beat the shit out of five guys.” I exhale as I close my eyes and say his name, “Devon was older, broody, and wanted nothing to do with me, but I was relentless in pursuing a job at his bar, and even more relentless in pursuing him.” I open my eyes and smile softly. “I loved him.” I pause when my voice cracks. “Will always love him.”

He grabs his phone again.

“Just don’t, okay? Just let me talk, and listen.” I scowl at the counter. “I loved him, and I know he loved me. Our relationship was intense—the fighting, the fucking, the breaking up, and the making up. There was no simmer to us; it was always a roiling boil. The last time we broke up was because I suspected he was back to his old ways, and then …” The first tear falls, and I slap it away.

“Ry, you don’t?—”

“He and Mick’s wife died in a car accident.”

He asks as he reached over and takes my hand, “Mickey Mick?”

I nod.

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