Page 98 of Thrones We Steal

“Is love really that scary?” I finally say, matching the car’s hushed tones.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Oh, because I’m a naive child who doesn’t know what it is to love someone?”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

“Actually I have no idea what you mean anymore. You just told me that you hide who you really are to manipulate people.”

He reaches for my hand on the console between us. “Celia—”

I pull back. “How am I ever supposed to trust you again?”

“I’m still the same person.”

“I loved you!”

He smacks the steering wheel. “Damn it, C. You think I don’t know that?”

“You destroyed me!”

He slows the car and pulls to the side of the road. I have no idea what he’s planning to do, and my heart mashes the accelerator to the floor of my chest as he turns toward me.

“No, baby, I didn’t. You’re too strong for that.”

His calling me baby creates a hiccup in my veins. But it doesn’t erase the blinding anger I feel toward him right now. “You have no idea what it did to me. You weren’t there.”

He jabs his fingers into his hair, causing it to stand up at weird angles. “I won’t insult you by making excuses.”

“How comforting.”

“But I am sorry.”

“Why did you tell them to stop taking care of the Sunken Garden?”

He turns to me with a frown. “How do you know about that?”

“Just answer the question.”

It takes him a minute to formulate his response. “That was our spot. And after … everything, I couldn’t stand the idea of anyone touching it.”

It’s not what I’m expecting, and I’m not sure what the appropriate reaction is.

“I’m sorry, C. Truly.”

I lay my head against the cool pane of the window. “Take me home, Henry.” Nothing he says can take away the pain. Nothing can erase the past. Nothing can change the future.

We are damaged and broken and beyond redemption. But how do you unspool someone from your heart when they’re the very thread holding it together?

* * *

10 years ago

It’s one of those glorious days of summer, the kind you get only a handful of times in the whole year and you have to grab with both hands before it’s gone. He’s sprawled in the grass, his feet bare and kicked up behind him, reading aloud from Wuthering Heights, our latest book. I’m sitting a few feet away, obediently wearing the sunhat my mother treats like it’s made of gold. The sun is the enemy, Celia. It will not hesitate to ruin your skin.

The Sunken Garden becomes a realm of its own on days like this, everything a little more vibrant, a little more immortal. The whole thing is so saccharine it nearly hurts your teeth to think about. The fact that it mirrors the way I feel on the inside is just another coating of bliss on the package.

“Cathy and Heathcliff remind me of us,” I say, stripping the rose in my hands of its petals.

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