Page 111 of Shattered Hearts

“My landlords.” She touches my face. “Someone was outside my apartment. What if it’s Harper?”

I don’t know what I expected her to say, but definitely not that.

Does that mean Riley’s going to disappear?

Anxiety tightens my muscles. I’m not ready to lose her. We need more time.

“Let’s go see.” There’s an unfamiliar edge in her voice that puts me on high alert. “Together.”

I seal my lips over hers and kiss her savagely. When I pull away, that hazy, dizzy gleam is in her eyes, and I feel her heart racing beneath my chest.

“Okay.”

In record time, we dress, scarf down protein shakes, and climb into the car to cross the miles from the Gallagher estate to Riley’s apartment.

I was right about that edge in Riley’s voice. Whatever it is, it’s spread throughout her whole body. Sitting beside me in the passenger seat, she seems off-kilter.

Her bouncing knee distracts me.

I glance her way. “What did they say exactly?”

“They said someone was outside my apartment.”

“And?”

“The person was wearing a jacket with a hood, and they couldn’t tell who it was. I have a bad feeling.” Riley shakes her head, fingers squeezing that pendant she always wears. “If it’s Harper, why didn’t she call me?”

Riley’s uneasiness is contagious. I press down on the gas pedal, accelerating through the Manhattan streets toward Chinatown.

I turn left onto her street and dive into a metered parking space across from Blooms A to Z. Riley hops out before I get the gearshift in park, jogging across the street into the alleyway that leads to her staircase.

“Riley, wait! This could be a trap.”

She’s already gone.

Her urgency sets off alarm bells in the back of my mind. Something’s wrong, but she won’t tell me what exactly. I know she and Harper have a complicated relationship. In the months before the wedding, Harper herself mentioned that much.

Without knowing any details, I feel like I’m walking in blind when I get up to her apartment. I expect to hear Riley andHarper talking when I come through the door, but only silence greets me. I soon find Riley standing alone in her den.

If she looked nervous in the car, now she’s borderline panicked. I’m just relieved no one ambushed her.

“Riley.” I reach for her on instinct, rubbing my hands down her arms. “Talk to me.”

“Harper’s a little old-school sometimes. She leaves notes.” Riley’s worried eyes come to mine, a small bit of hope igniting in them. “I mean, when she visits someone who’s not home, she’ll put a little sticky note on the door, and?—”

“Did she leave one?”

“Not up here, but she might have left it with the Zhangs.” Riley glides out of my embrace and right back to her front door. “I’ll be right back.”

After I nod, she disappears over the threshold. I peer out her windows until she appears below, and then I turn back.

Glancing around her apartment triggers the memory of the first time I came here, the day after the wedding. How Riley patched me up, how badly I wanted her, even then?—

Boom.

A blast rocks the block.

Scorching heat. Shattering glass. A chorus of car alarms.

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