by Donn, KL
Contents
A Cinderella Romance
Blurb
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Epilogue
Epilogue 2
Coming Soon
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by KL Donn
Safe, In His Arms
The In His Arms Series Book 1
KL Donn
Copyright © 2018 by KL Donn
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Edited by - KA Matthews
Cover Design & Formatting by - Sensual Graphic Designs
Created with Vellum
A Cinderella Romance
Spotify Playlist: https://goo.gl/dkzRx4
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Watch the YouTube video here:
https://youtu.be/pxeXvwr86is
Blurb
Alpha. Fierce. Protective.
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Onyx Inwood lives a strict life of order and strategy.
He knows every move he makes before he takes action.
As a detective in the NYPD he knows the city streets like the back of his hand.
So why, when he stumbles upon a wandering girl, does his world turn upside down?
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Shy. Klutzy. Afraid.
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Grace Hawthorne often forgets why she doesn’t like to leave her tiny apartment.
The world outside is huge, unforgiving, full of strangers & danger.
Her step-mother often says she lacks basic human knowledge.
When she meets a big scary man in the park, she forgets why she’s afraid of the world and embraces being safe, in his arms.
Dedication
For me.
No, seriously.
I wrote this sucker all for me!
But also, Carol Jacobs.
You’ve heard the fairytales of princesses locked away in tall towers, loved by many, seen by few. You’ve watched as their princes rushed to the rescue and slayed all of their dragons. You’ve witnessed their transformation into becoming the person they were meant to be.
Those stories probably gave you the warm fuzzies like they did me…once upon a time.
Now, I’ve grown into a recluse, hiding from the outside world. Marking my existence into nothingness. When my father died eight years ago, his wife—my stepmother—took over custody of me. Robyn’s dislike had always simmered just below the surface, only visible to me. Love blinded my father, and I kept quiet.
That ended on the day he passed away. Her hatred grew so exponentially that I often feared for my safety. Locked away in her Manhattan apartment, home-schooled, I’d become scared of the outside world. The birds, the trees, nature, humanity. All of it is as foreign to me as the moon. I can’t remember the last time I felt the grass tickle between my toes or the wind ruffle my hair. Dating was never in the cards for me, but it doesn’t stop me from dreaming of having my very own husband one day.
With my eighteenth birthday fast approaching, I know I have to decide whether to stay or go. If I go, I’ll be living on the streets. I’ll have nothing. But I if I remain, I’ll be a prisoner. My stepmother could do with me as she pleases because technically, I’ll be a financial burden she no longer receives money for.
Gazing out the window of my bedroom, I watch children play in the park, parents smiling down on them with love.
Husbands holding their wives.
Love shining brightly.
All I’ve ever wanted.
“You’re kidding me, right, Marty?” This fucker, always with his sexual exploits. Never actually caring if the women he takes to bed become more than a fun night once they’re out the door the next morning.
“Come on, Onyx, tell me you aren’t jealous. You’d like to be me you big bastard.” At six feet six and over two hundred pounds, I tend to scare women off rather than attract them, even if I get told I’m attractive all the time. “It’s that fucking scowl, that one right there.” Marty points to my face. I’m sure I am scowling. He pisses me off.
“You gotta stop treating them like a piece of ass, man. How you ever gonna find something real if you don’t give them a chance?” My friend looks at me like I’ve grown two heads. Maybe it’s because, after five years as a beat cop with the NYPD and another five as a homicide detective, I know what I want in my life, while he’s still mid-twenties and thinks it’s all a game.
“Here you are, boys. On the house.” Tom, the guy who owns the best hot dog stand in the city, hands us two chili cheese dogs with everything. Never lets me pay, though. Not the first time, and not once since. I’m sure to tip twice as nice for it.
“Thanks, Tom. Have a good one.” He nods as I walk away.
Before I take my first bite, the sight of lavender flowing in the wind across the street catches my attention. Darting through traffic, I toss the dog in the trash can nearby and chase after the impression I’d seen heading into the park entrance.
I don’t know why I’m so quickly enamored, but I know I need to find out who it is. Who she is.
Flowing light blonde hair in the distance captures me, and when I see the matching lavender color again, I know it’s her. Running to catch up, I immediately recognize the tension in this young woman’s body. Tucking the edge of my t-shirt behind the badge on my hip, I want to make it clear I’m friendly.
“Ma’am?” I tap her shoulder lightly, but she still jumps and stumbles as she spins. Before she can crash to the ground, I grab her arm and pull her into my body. I’m consumed by the soft way her breath hitches and by the scent of fresh cherries in the spring. Lost in her gaze, I don’t recognize the fear overshadowing her clear blue eyes at first.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. Even though she’s terrified, she doesn’t try to pull away, doesn’t call for help, nothing. And that’s confusing as fuck.
“No, ma’am, my apologies. It wasn’t my intent to startle you.” Fuck, she can’t be a ma’am. She’s barely a teen. Christ. “You were looking a little skittish; I wanted to be sure you were alright.” I smile, hoping to ease some of her anxiety.
“Oh.” She looks around as if someone will jump out any moment to attack her. In the middle of Central Park on a sunny day like this, I doubt it. At night, I wouldn’t be so sure. “I think, maybe”—she chews on her lower lip—“maybe I’m lost?”
“You think?” My brows draw together, and I have this sudden urge to protect this little waif of a woman from everything wrong in the world. She holds an air of not just innocence but naïveté as well. She seems to have no idea what her surroundings are really like.
“Well…” She licks her lips, and I have to bite back the moan that’s about to break free. “I can’t seem to remember where I am. I took a wrong turn, and now I don’t recognize anything.”
“Are you from around here? Maybe I can help?” In all honesty, I want to know more than where she’s from. If I can find out where she lives, maybe I could convince her to go on a date. Or something more.
Nibbling her lower lip, I fight the urge to do the same. To taste her. “I moved recently. I thought this was the park, but I must be wrong.” Her gaze strays around us again.
“What’s your
address?” With how big the park is, I understand how she might have gotten turned around.
Fear and panic worm its way through her as she answers. “I just moved, I don’t…I don’t remember.” Her uncertainty has got me slightly worried.
“Onyx!” Marty calls from the park entrance. “We’ve gotta go! Suspicious death in Upper Manhattan.”
“Fuck.” I don’t want to leave her. Spying a bench near the entrance, I guide her to it with a plan in mind. “What’s your name?”
“Grace.” Of course, it is. Soft, sweet, just like her.
“Stay here for me, Grace, please.” The terror in her eyes softens as I say her name. “I’ll have an officer get you home, and I’ll come check on you tonight. Okay?”
“Okay,” she says softly. Her grip on my arm tightens briefly before she lets me go with a sad smile. “I’m coming back, Gracie.” She nods, but I don’t think she believes me.
“Onyx! Let’s go!” Marty calls again.
As I turn to leave, I know I have to taste her first. I need to know how she feels. Placing my lips over hers, her surprised gasp allows me entrance to her mouth.
Delicious.
Sweetness rolled into savory, and I know I’ll be back for more. Something about her calls to a very animalistic side of me.
“I’m coming for you, Gracie.”
I sat at my window, watching and waiting. Why, I’ll never know. I’ve never held the trust one normally does when it comes to strangers, but I believed Onyx. His words that sounded like a promise, his lips on mine, his arms around me. I felt safe. For the first time in more years than I can remember, I wasn’t afraid of the world I live in.
A fleeting moment gave me hope when I should have remained in the dark.
A fleeting moment made me feel when I should have ignored it.
I barely know this man’s name, and already, I have become dependent on him from one small feeling. An insignificant one.
Now, a full day later, and I haven’t heard from him. I used to believe in fairytales. Princes and white knights. The day my father died, I thought I’d buried those dreams with him only to have a single man bring forth the clarity of which I used to long for.
Being kicked out of my stepmother’s home a year ago, almost to the day, was a blessing in disguise. I spent three weeks on the streets before an attorney’s private investigator found me and announced an inheritance from my father that no one knew of. The sum of money I received proved to be more than he left dear, old Robyn. She harbored a great deal of resentment and hate towards me when she found out.
After renting a condo for months, I finally found and fell in love with a small one-bedroom apartment in the city that I only moved into a few weeks ago. I also donated a portion of the money to the shelter who helped me wade my way through the streets, and still, I have more left in the trust.
Unfortunately, I don’t know what I’m doing with my life. Having been home-schooled, I never thought about college. I didn’t have friends. My guidance had been limited to what Robyn told me, and none of it was good. She had always been catty and rude when she spoke to me. Talking down to me like I was nothing while I grew up. Leaving her house had been the best thing to ever happen to me.
I grew to hate her and often wondered if my life would have been better off if she had died alongside my father or even abandoned me altogether. Guilt would immediately swamp me at those thoughts, and I’d bow down to whatever she wanted from me.
I’ve been a doormat for far too long, and I’m eager to climb out of my shell and discover my true self. Even if that finds me dependent upon a man of which I don’t yet know his full name.
I spend the morning reading tales of old, remembering the love Cinderella had for Prince Charming and he for her. The way Belle loved Prince Adam as first a beast and then a man. The consuming emotions they’d experienced are the ones I find I’m longing for.
I don’t know how or why, but my mysterious man has me sucked into a spell he might not have meant to weave. But from the first moment his arms wrapped around me, I recognized down to my soul that he would protect me. Become one of the most important people in my life.
Pounding on the door interrupts my romantic musings. Easing towards the door on soft steps, I peep through the hole to see a large man standing there.
Never raised a fool, I inquire, “Who is it?”
“Detective Marty Locke with the New York City police, ma’am?”
Nerves settle in the pit of my stomach. Has she found a way to take my new-found life from me? Robyn has been threatening legalities for months. The threat of arrest is one that terrifies me most. I’ve spent my whole life locked away and dictated to, and I can’t do that again. Not after getting a taste of freedom.
Opening the door, I take a deep breath and prepare myself for my next battle of wills. I search for the fight I know resides deep down inside, buried beneath the girl who simply craves to be loved and taken care of. I have to find her in order to be her.
“Grace Hawthorne?” The handsome man with a crooked nose and masculine jaw asks, a solemn expression on his face like he knows he’s about to upend my world.
“Yes,” I whisper.
“May I come in?” I step back, allowing him entrance as he clips his badge back onto his belt. The butt of his gun shows as his coat slips back into place. “My partner, Detective Inwood, will be up in just a moment.”
I nod and wait for the officer to speak, holding my breath as he looks around my home. Eyeing my silly unicorn knick-knacks critically. His judgment over such a frivolous item is only slightly masked by his contempt for my enjoyment.
Feeling uncomfortable in my own home has me irritable as I ask, “What are you here for?” with a bite in my tone.
His blank stare meets mine as a smirk crosses his face. “Robyn Hawthorne is your mother?”
“Stepmother,” I correct. She doesn’t deserve the title of mother.
“Stepmother,” he amends. “A call came in yesterday at her residence.” I hold my breath. I can’t let her back in my life. Whatever it is she wants, I can’t be that person. His dramatic pause slithers dread down my spine. “She’s dead.”
Thunder rumbles in my ears as the blood drains from my head and down to my feet. I’m light-headed and begin to sway when strong arms catch me. Arms full of care and consideration. Arms I’ve felt before. Ones I’ve longed for.
“It’s you.” I smile up at my savior as he picks me up while the room spins around me.
“It’s me.” He returns my smile as the first tear slips free of my eye.
Discomfort courses through me for the woman my father chose to love and I’ve been holding resentment towards for years.
“I’m a horrible daughter,” I cry into his chest, wishing I’d tried harder.
Been better.
I glare at Marty as I carry Grace to her couch. The shock of learning she’s lost her only parent shouldn’t have been delivered in such a careless manner. I’ll be having a word with my partner on the way back to the precinct tonight.
“Grace?” I settle her into the soft cushions and hold her small hands in my own. “Did you hear Marty?”
Her glossy eyes, filled with so much emotion and tears, look up to me. “Yes. Robyn is gone.” Her swallow is audible in the quiet room. It only takes a moment before confusion enters her eyes. “How?”
Marty snorts his amusement as I explain. “It looks like she tripped down a flight of stairs. The momentum contorted her body, and the medical examiner suspects she broke her neck on the landing.” Her ridiculously high heels and drunk state likely didn’t help, but I won’t tell Gracie that.
“Stairs?” Her brows furrow as she closes her eyes, bringing a hand up to rub her temple. “She fell down a flight of stairs?” Her question is rhetorical.
“Unless you can think of a reason we should look at this as a suspicious death?” We have to consider every angle before making a ruling and wrapping up our investigation.
Her head shakes before she answers. “No, I don’t think so. I mean, she wasn’t the nicest woman, but I don’t think there’s anything suspicious going on? I haven’t been in her life since my eighteenth birthday unless it involved the court.”
“Court?” Marty asks from his stance near the window.
“What?” Grace’s head whips around to him, her blonde locks swishing past my face, and the scent of cherries invades my senses.
“You said you haven’t been in her life unless it involves the court. Why?” Suspicion fills his tone.
“My father died when I was young, and Robyn felt forced to care for me. She didn’t like it or me, and the feeling was mutual.” Her gaze slides between us, begging for understanding. “When I turned eighteen, she kicked me out. I lived on the streets until a private investigator found me and handed me a large check, explaining that my father had left me a trust to be given to me when I was of age. I never knew about it and judging from her outrage when she tried to contest the will, neither did Robyn.
“The trust was iron-clad, though. Daddy had a video and affidavits signed and ready for when the time came for me to receive the money. We went to court twice before she was told to leave me alone. The judge even offered me a restraining order against her because of her rage.”
“Sounds like a real peach.” Marty’s droll response earns a small smile from Grace. One I want. One I’m insanely jealous of.
“What about lovers? Would she have a scorned ex in hiding somewhere?” I ask her.