by Shen, L. J.
Copyright © 2020 by L.J. Shen
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial use permitted by copyright law.
Resemblance to actual persons and things living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.
Title Page
Copyright
About This Book
Playlist
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
Stay connected
Also by L.J. Shen
Excerpt from The Kiss Thief
Prologue
Chapter One
Cruel. Cold-blooded. Hades in a Brioni suit.
Cillian Fitzpatrick has been dubbed every wicked thing on planet Earth.
To the media, he is The Villain.
To me, he is the man who (reluctantly) saved my life.
Now I need him to do me another small solid.
Bail me out of the mess my husband got me into.
What’s a hundred grand to one of the wealthiest men in America, anyway?
Only Cillian doesn’t hand out favors for free.
The price for the money, it turns out, is my freedom.
Now I’m the eldest Fitzpatrick brother’s little toy.
To play, to mold, to break.
Too bad Cillian forgot one tiny detail.
Persephone wasn’t only the goddess of spring, she was also the queen of death.
He thinks I’ll buckle under the weight of his mind games.
He is about to find out the most lethal poison is also the sweetest.
Sub Urban: “Cradles”
Bishop Briggs: “River”
White Stripes: “Hardest Button to Button”
Gogol Bordello: “Sally”
Milk and Bone: “Peaches”
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds: “Red Right Hand”
To Cori and Lana.
Lost in Hell, Persephone,
Take her head upon your knee;
Say to her, “My dear, my dear,
It is not so dreadful here.”
—Edna St. Vincent Millay, Collected Poems
The bleeding heart is a pink and white flower that bears a striking resemblance to the conventional heart shape. It is also referred to as the heart flower or as lady-in-bath.
The flower is known to be poisonous to the touch and deadly to consume.
And, like the mythological goddess Persephone, it only blossoms in spring.
My love story started with a death.
With the sound of my soul shattering on the hospice floor like delicate china.
And Auntie Tilda, wilting inside her hospital bed, her breath rattling in her empty lungs like a penny.
I soaked her hospital gown with tears, clutching the fabric in my little fists, ignoring Momma’s soft pleas to get off her ill sister.
“Please don’t leave, Auntie. Please,” I croaked.
The cancer had spread to her lungs, liver, and kidneys, making it excruciating for my aunt to breathe. For the past few weeks, she’s slept sitting upright, falling in and out of consciousness.
At twelve, death was an abstract concept to me. Real, but also foreign and faraway. Something that happened in other families, to other people.
I understood what it meant now.
Auntie Tilda was never going to scoop me in her arms, pretending to strum her fingers on me like I was an air guitar again.
She’d never pick Belle and me up from school with Ziploc bags full of apple slices and strawberries whenever our parents worked long hours.
She’d never braid my hair again, whispering magical tales about Greek gods and three-headed monsters.
My aunt tucked wisps of blond curls behind my ear. Her eyes shimmered with sickness so tangible I could taste it on my tongue.
“Leave?” She belched. “Oh, my, that’s a big word. I’d never do that, Persy. Dead, alive, and in-between, I will always be there for you.”
“But how?” I tugged at her gown, clinging to her promise. “How will I know you’re really here after your body is gone?”
“Just turn your face up, you silly goose. The sky will always be ours. That’s where we’ll meet, between the sunrays and the clouds.”
On hot, sticky summers, Auntie Tilda and I would lie on the grass by Charles River, cloud-spotting. The clouds came and went like passengers at a train station. First, we’d count them. Then we’d choose the funny-shaped, extra fluffy ones. Then we’d give them names.
Mr. and Mrs. Claudia and Claud Clowdton.
Misty and Smoky Frost.
Auntie Tilda believed in magic, in miracles, and I? Well, I believed in her.
While my older sister, Emmabelle, chased after squirrels, played soccer with the boys, and climbed trees, Auntie Tilda and I admired the sky.
“Will you give me a sign?” I pressed. “That you’re there in the sky? A lightning? Rain? Oh, I know! Maybe a pigeon can poop on me.”
Momma put her hand on my shoulder. In the words of my sister Belle—I needed to take a chill pill, and fast.
“Let’s make a deal,” my aunt suggested, laughing breathlessly. “As you know, clouds are more reliable than shooting stars. Common, but still magical. When the time comes and you grow up, ask for something you want—something you really want—when you see a lone cloud in the sky, and I will grant it to you. That’s how you’ll know I’m there watching. You only get one miracle, Persephone, so be careful what you wish for. But I promise, whatever your wish may be—I will grant it to you.”
I’d kept my Cloud Wish for eleven years, harboring it like a precious heirloom.
I didn’t use it when my grades slipped.
When Elliott Frasier came up with the nickname Pussyfanny Peen-rise sophomore year, and it stuck until graduation.
Not even when Dad got laid off and McDonald’s and hot water became rare luxuries.
In the end, I wasted the Cloud Wish in one, reckless moment.
On a doomed desire, a stupid crush, an unrequited lover.
On the man every media outlet in America referred to as The Villain.
On Cillian Fitzpatrick.
Three Years Ago.
I was drunk before noon the day my best friend, Sailor, got married.
Typically, I was fun-drunk. Responsible drunk. The kind of drunk who talked a little louder, snort-laughed, and danced like no one was watching, but also called an Uber, saved her friends from bad hookups, and never let anyone in my vicinity get a tattoo they were going to regret the next morning.
Not this time.
This time, I was crank-up-the-Enola-Gay plastered. The kind of hammered to end up in the hospital with an IV drip, an oopsie baby, and a criminal record.
>
There were a variety of reasons I was so drunk, and I would point all of them out if I were able to hold a steady finger in the air.
The problem was, now was the worst possible time to be indisposed. I was on bridesmaid duty. The twenty-three-year-old—drumroll, please—flower girl!
Was it weird to be a full-grown flower girl? Why, not at all. It was an honor.
Okay, fine. It was a little embarrassing.
And by a little embarrassing, I mean soul-crushingly humiliating.
Yet saying no was out of the question.
I was Persephone.
The easygoing, even-tempered, roll-with-the-punches designated friend.
The one who kept the peace and dropped everything when someone needed help.
Aisling, who was about to become Sailor’s sister-in-law, was in charge of holding the eight-foot train, à la Pippa Middleton, and my sister, Emmabelle, was responsible for the rings.
Thorncrown Chapel was a luxurious wedding venue on the Massachusetts coastline. The medieval castle looming over a cliff boasted fifty acres of old-world architecture, French-imported limestone, private gardens, and a view of the ocean. The bridal suite was an oatmeal-hued apartment that offered a claw-foot tub, a front porch, and four fully equipped vanities.
All expenses for the lavish wedding were paid by the groom, Hunter Fitzpatrick’s family. Sailor was marrying up, climbing high up the social ladder.
The Fitzpatricks stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the Rockefellers, the Kennedys, and the Murdochs.
Rich, powerful, influential, and—at least, according to the rumors—with enough skeletons in their closet to open a cemetery.
It was crazy to think the girl I’d played hopscotch with as a kid and who let me cut her bangs was going to become an American princess in less than an hour.
It was even crazier that she was the one who introduced me to the man who now occupied ninety percent of my brain’s capacity and virtually all my dreams.
The villain who broke my heart without even noticing my immortal existence.
Trying to sober up, I paced back and forth in the room, stopping at the window. I leaned over the sill, tilting my face up to the summer sky. A lone cloud glided lazily behind the sun, holding a promise for a gorgeous day.
“Auntie Tilda, fancy seeing you here! How’ve you been?”
It wasn’t the first time I’d spoken to a cloud like it was my dead aunt, so I couldn’t blame my level of intoxication on this particular quirk. “Weather’s looking fine. Sailor is going to appreciate it. How do I look?”
I twirled in my pine-green gown in front of the window, giving my hair a playful toss. “Think he’ll finally notice me?”
The cloud didn’t need to respond for me to know the answer—no.
He wasn’t going to notice me.
He never did.
I highly doubted he even knew I existed.
Five years I’d known him, and he had yet to speak a word to me.
Heaving a sigh, I grabbed the flowers I’d picked earlier outside the suite and pressed them to my nose with a greedy breath. They smelled warm and fresh, spring-like.
The flowers were pink and shaped like a Valentine’s heart. I wove some of them in my hair, which was partly coiffed at the top.
One of their thorns pricked my finger, and I lifted it, sucking on the drop of blood it produced. The stickiness of the sap filled my mouth, and I groaned.
“I know, I know, I should just get over him. Move on.”
I quickly licked all my fingers to get rid of the nectar. “There’s a fine line between being a romantic and a moron. I think I’ve straddled it about four years too long.”
I’d been harboring my obsession to the eldest Fitzpatrick brother for the past five years. Half a freaking decade. I’d compared every guy I dated to the unattainable tycoon, sent him starry-eyed looks, and compulsively read every piece of information about him in the media. Simply deciding to forget about him wasn’t going to cut it. I’d tried that before.
I needed to go big or go home.
In this case, I needed to use Auntie Tilda’s wish and ask to move on.
I opened my mouth to make the wish, but just as I began to utter the words, my throat clogged up.
I dropped the flowers in my hand, stumbling to the mirror. A rash fanned across my neck like a possessive male palm. The rubicund stain spread south, dipping into the valley between my breasts. Every inch of my flesh was turning scarlet.
How in the hell did I have an allergic reaction? I was too anxious to eat anything all morning.
Maybe it was jealousy.
A green, pointy-toothed monster clawing its way out of my heart. Reminding me that being a bride was my dream, not Sailor’s, darn it.
Sure, it wasn’t feminist, or inspiring, or progressive, but it didn’t make it any less the truth. My truth.
I wanted marriage, a white picket fence, giggly babies in diapers roaming around freely in my backyard, and smelly Labradors chasing them.
Whenever I allowed myself to think about it (which wasn’t very often), the unfairness of it rubbed me off my breath. Sailor was the most asexual thing in the world after a surgical face mask before she’d met Hunter.
Yet she was the one who ended up marrying before all of us.
A knock on the door snapped me out of my trance.
“Pers?” my older sister, Emmabelle—Belle for short—crooned from the other side. “The ceremony starts in twenty minutes. What’s taking you so long?”
Well, Belle, I look shockingly similar to a Cheetos, both in color and complexion.
“You better get your ass in gear. Our girl has already puked in the limo’s trash can twice, cursed the groom like a pirate for not eloping in Vegas, and one of her acrylic nails is playing Amelia Earhart.”
“How do you mean?” I shouted back through the suite’s door.
“It’s disappeared. Hopefully not in her hairdo.” I heard the grin in my sister’s voice. “Oh, by the way. Can you bring Hunter’s ring if his brother doesn’t show up to take it? Technically, it’s Cillian’s job, but he’s probably in the gardens, skinning a female employee and making fashionable coats out of her flesh.”
Cillian.
My stomach clenched at the mention of his name.
“Roger that. I’ll be there in five minutes.”
I heard my sister’s heels clicking as she left, heading back to the waiting limo.
I glanced around the room.
How can I make this stupid rash go away?
Mentally snapping my fingers, I looked around for Aisling “Ash” Fitzpatrick’s purse, finding it on the bed. I rummaged through it, flicking away Band-Aids, a Swiss knife, and a thumb-size makeup kit. She must have Benadryl and antihistamines. She was a Girl Scout, ready for any occasion, be it a rash, a broken nail, a World War, or a sudden pandemic.
“Bingo.” I tugged a skin-soothing ointment tube from the diamond-studded Hermès. I scrubbed the lotion on my skin, pleased with my drunken self, when the door behind me flung open.
“Five minutes, Belle.” My eyes were still glued to my blemished arms. “And yeah, I remember, Hunter’s ring…”
I looked up. My jaw slacked as the rest of my words shriveled back into my throat. The ointment slipped between my fingers.
Cillian “Kill” Fitzpatrick stood at the door.
Hunter Fitzpatrick’s older brother.
The most eligible bachelor in America.
A stonehearted heir with a face sculpted from marble.
Attainable as the moon, and just as cold and wavering.
Most important of all: the man I’d loved in secret since the first day I’d laid eyes on him.
His auburn hair was slicked back, his eyes a pair of smoky ambers. Honey-rimmed yet lacking any warmth. He wore an Edwardian tux, a chunky Rolex, and the slight frown of a man who regarded anyone he couldn’t screw or make money out of as an inconvenience.
He was always calm, quiet, and rese
rved, never drawing attention to himself yet owning every room he entered.
Unlike his siblings, Cillian wasn’t beautiful.
Not in the conventional sense, anyway. His face was too sharp, his features too bold, his sneer too mocking. His strong jaw and hooded eyes didn’t harmonize together in a symphony of flawless strokes. But there was something decadent about him that I found more alluring than the straightforwardness in Hunter’s Apollo-like perfection or the Aisling’s Snow White beauty.
Cillian was a dirty lullaby, inviting me to sink into his claws and nestle in his darkness.
And I, aptly named after the goddess of spring, longed for the ground to crack open and suck me in. To fall into his underworld and never emerge.
Whoa. That last mimosa really killed whatever was left of my brain cells.
“Cillian,” I choked out. “Hello. Hey. Hi.”
So eloquent, Pers.
I peppered my greeting by scratching my neck. It was just my luck to be alone with him in a room for the first time ever while looking and feeling like a ball of lava.
Cillian ambled toward the safe with the indolent elegance of a big cat, oozing raw danger that made my toes curl. His indifference often made me wonder if I was even in the room with him.
“Three minutes until the limo leaves, Penrose.”
So I did exist.
“Thank you.”
My breathing became labored, slow, and I was starting to realize I might need to call an ambulance.
“Are you excited?” I managed.
No response.
The metal door of the safe clicked mechanically, unlocking. He took out the black velvet box of Hunter’s ring, pausing to look at me, his eyes sliding from my red face and arms to the pink and white flowers crowning my head. Something passed across his features—a moment of hesitation—before he shook his head, then made his way back to the door.
“Wait!” I cried.
He stopped but didn’t turn to face me.
“I need…I need…” A better vocabulary, obviously. “I need you to call an ambulance. I think I’m having an allergic reaction.”
He swiveled on his heel, assessing me. Every second under his scrutiny dropped my temperature by ten degrees. Sharing a space with Cillian Fitzpatrick was an experience. Like sitting in an obscure, vacant cathedral.