Willow
willow
R onan’s guest room was just like the rest of his house and office—bare. There was only a bed and a rickety nightstand, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to cry or laugh because of it. But I didn’t mind it because I felt safe knowing Ronan was just a room away.
I stared up at the ceiling as I tried to calm my heart. Today had been a whirlwind. It felt like a year had passed, but it had only been a few hours. The kiss helped me forget about the break-in for a short time, but now that I was lying in a bed, staring at the ceiling just like I had been earlier, it was the only thing I could focus on.
I wanted to think about the kiss. I wanted to relive every second of it, feel every hitch of breath and the possessive way Ronan held me against him. It had been a kiss out of a movie, out of a dream.
It was perfect.
We’d crossed a line tonight, and I wasn’t sure if we were still just pretending or if things were starting to feel real for him, too. I didn’t have the courage to ask him earlier, because if he said it was only a kiss, that it meant nothing, it would gut me, and I didn’t have the strength for that tonight.
There was a sound outside the door, and my eyes opened wide. My breathing turned ragged as I sat up, a feeling of déjà vu overtaking me. It’s nothing , I told myself. If there were someone out there, Ronan would’ve heard, and I trusted him to take care of it.
To take care of me.
But I couldn’t stop the tremor wracking my hands, or the way my breathing turned harsh. Fear wrapped around my throat and squeezed .
Another creak came from the other side of the door, and I gripped the blanket tighter. There had been noises all night, but that felt different. Felt heavier, like a person.
No. It’s nothing .
But then something pressed against the door causing the wood to groan, and I shot out of bed.
“Fuck this,” I breathed. There was some god playing a cruel joke on me tonight, because two break-ins in one night? It felt like a harsh bout of karma, but I didn’t know what I did that was so terrible to cause this .
“ Shit .” The voice was muffled, and I pushed my brows together. It sounded like Ronan’s voice. Was he out there? What the hell was he doing at this hour? Why wasn’t he passed out in bed?
Without telling them to, my feet carried me to the door. There was another quiet curse, then another thud, and I let out a harsh breath. I yanked the door open, and a heavy weight toppled into my legs, sending me flying through the air. A shriek escaped me on my way down, and I landed heavily on the floor. My eyes were wide as I stared at Ronan. He stared back, sitting back on his knees.
“What the fuck are you doing?” I hissed.
“I was—” He roughly cleared his throat. “I was sitting outside your door.”
I blinked at him. “What? Why?”
“I wanted to be close to you,” he muttered shyly. “In case you had a nightmare. Sometimes—” He cleared his throat again. “Traumatic events can cause nightmares. I just wanted to be around in case you needed me.”
I clenched my jaw as a wave of emotions rose inside me. There was no way this man was real.
“I’m okay,” I whispered, though I wasn’t. Every sound made me jolt awake and sent me back to those moments in the closet.
“You don’t have to be,” he said. The words hung in the air. Shadows covered his face, but his eyes shone in the low light pouring in through the window. “Have you slept at all?” I shook my head, and he sighed. “Come with me.”
He groaned as he pushed to his feet and held his hand out. There was no hesitation as I slid my palm against his, and he pulled me gently to my feet, but he didn’t let go of my hand.
“Where are we going?” I asked as he led us down the short hallway.
“You can sleep in my bed. It’s comfier.”
“Ronan.” I tugged on his hand, pulling him to a stop. “I can’t take your bed. You need your sleep.”
“I never sleep,” he said quietly. “I have insomnia.”
“I’m sorry.” I squeezed his hand, and his lips tipped up in a gentle smile.
“You take my bed, shortcake. I’ll lie on the floor.”
“Ronan,” I said again, exasperated. “You’re not lying on the floor .” He looked confused, and I rolled my eyes. “At least lie in the bed.”
His throat bobbed as he swallowed. Slowly, his tongue traced his lips, and all I could think about was the way he tasted, the way his lips felt against mine.
“I can’t do that,” he rasped.
“I’m not sleeping in your bed while you lie on the floor.” I lifted my brow, and that smile of his came back. It made me weak. How had I never noticed it before?
“Stubborn woman,” he muttered, and I grinned triumphantly. “Fine. Let me change the sheets quickly.”
I stood in the doorway as he hurried around the bed, changing the sheets, pillow cases, and grabbed a new quilt from the closet. He evened the sheets and quilt up perfectly before tucking the sheets tightly in at the bottom. I knew I’d untuck it immediately when I laid down. I hated for my feet to be trapped.
When he was done, he stood by the bed and stared down at it like he was scared to look at me.
“What side do you sleep on?” I asked to break the silence.
“Usually that side,” he said, jerking his chin to the side closest to the wall. “But I’ll sleep here tonight.”
“Why?”
“It’s between you and the door,” he said like that was a perfect explanation. When I just stared at him, he cleared his throat. “If someone came into the room, they’d have to go through me to get to you. Sleeping on this side makes it easier to protect you.”
My heart was in my throat. Who was this man?
“Oh,” was all I could say. It felt so stupid, so lackluster in comparison to what he’d just said, but what else was there? Thanking him felt weird. Telling him he didn’t have to do that would be a waste of time and a lie. “No one has ever done that before.”
“No?” He pulled the blanket back and motioned for me to get in. “Your journal said you had a fiancé. He didn’t protect you?”
I barked a laugh. “No,” I said. “He was too busy focusing on himself and finding a new woman to fuck every night.”
Ronan froze. “What?” His voice was deathly low, his eyes burning into me. I couldn’t look at him, not when he was so intense.
“Daniel was an asshole.” I shrugged.
“You knew he was cheating on you?”
“He didn’t exactly hide it.” I braced myself for the accusation everyone had— why did you stay? I answered before he could ask. “I stayed because my dad loved him. They worked at the same company, and I just wanted to make my dad happy. I know it’s stupid and not a good reason to stay with someone, but when I brought it up to my dad, he always told me Daniel would never do something like that. I eventually started gaslighting myself into believing I’d made it all up. Then…” I paused, not wanting to tell the rest of the story, but Ronan was staring at me, and there was something safe in his gaze. Something that made me want to tell him everything. “Then I found out my dad knew about the cheating the entire time. When they went on some business trip, he’d seen Daniel go to his room with a woman and still told me it was all in my head.”
“Those motherfuckers,” Ronan said with a snarl, his voice low. I blinked at him, at the anger in his voice. “Your dad—” He clenched his jaw. “Your dad is a fucking asshole for doing that to you, but Daniel,” he spat his name out, “is an even bigger asshole. And he’s a dumbfuck for cheating on you . I mean, he had you at home and he thought he’d find anyone better?”
A breathy laugh left me, but he was staring at me like he was deathly serious. “Thanks, Ro,” I murmured. “It was a long time ago. I’ve moved on.”
“If I ever see that man—” His jaw rippled again.
“What?” I teased. “You can’t fight him.”
“Like hell I can’t,” he grumbled as he rounded the bed. He sank onto the mattress, still muttering to himself. I couldn’t help but laugh again. It was cute. He glanced at me over his shoulder, his brows bunched. “What?”
“You can’t fight my ex, Ronan,” I said, exasperated.
“Can I fight your dad?”
“My dad ?”
“He deserves it, too.”
He turned the lamp off and lay on his back. I rested on my side, staring at the shadow of his profile.
“I read your journal,” he said softly. “I know what he’s like.”
“You don’t know what he’s like,” I countered. “You haven’t met him yet.”
“I’m sure he’s worse in person,” he muttered under his breath.
No one had ever spoken about him like that, and conflicting emotions fought inside me. On one hand, I appreciated that someone cared about me for a change. That someone saw my dad for who he was, that he wasn’t this amazing father, this amazing person he pretended to be. They saw beneath the carefully constructed mask to the secret monster beneath.
On the other…he was still my dad. And while it was sweet that Ronan felt so strongly, it was hard to listen to.
I rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling again. This time, Ronan’s presence beside me helped some of the fear from earlier wash away.
“I can’t stop thinking about it,” I blurted, needing to change the subject. “Every time I close my eyes, I see him standing by the dresser.”
Ronan stiffened on the other side of the bed. “It’ll take time before you can sleep comfortably again, but it’ll haunt you forever. You can get through it. You can work on it, but it will always be there. It’ll always be a part of you.”
I choked on a laugh. “Thanks for the pep talk,” I teased, but he didn’t laugh. He didn’t say anything.
I turned my head to look at him, finding his shadowed expression serious as he stared straight ahead. “I know what you’re going through,” he rasped.
“Someone broke into your house, too?”
His lips tightened into a tense smile. “No,” he whispered.
I stared at him, waiting for him to elaborate. Minutes slowly ticked by, and I turned my attention to the ceiling again. Maybe he didn’t want to talk about it.
But then he cleared his throat, and when he spoke, his voice was thick with emotion.
“Five years ago, right before you moved in next door, Trinity died.”
I stiffened. I didn’t dare say a word, didn’t move an inch, didn’t breathe too deeply.
How did she die when she was still alive?
“She was nineteen at the time. She’d gone off to college a year later than her friends because our dad was sick. She stuck around to help my mom take him to appointments and take care of him. And then our dad died, and I think a part of her was relieved. I know I was. Not because he was dead, I loved my dad, but because he was finally out of pain.”
My throat was too tight to swallow. All I could do was listen as he spoke.
“She went to Portland for school,” he continued. “I’d been a cop there just a year before, so I still had friends there. I knew they’d keep an eye on her, and I told my mom she’d be safe .” He choked on the word, and I squeezed my eyes shut at the sound of the pain in that single word.
“One night, she went to a party, and some frat guy drugged her. He raped her.”
I inhaled sharply, hot tears leaking from the corners of my eyes.
“She was so broken after that. She dropped out of school and came home. She was a shell of herself. My mom and I took care of her constantly. There were weeks where she couldn’t get out of bed to eat, let alone bathe or brush her hair. My mom would give her baths every night, and I’d brush her hair while we watched Love Island .”
That’s why it’s his favorite show .
“Six months later, we got a call that my little brother, Adam, had been injured. He was a Marine overseas, and there had been an explosion and he’d—he lost his leg.”
I was going to be sick. This poor man. This poor family.
“So much had happened in such a short time. And when Adam came back, he stayed with my mom. He was as depressed as Trinity had been but was a lot fucking grumpier. My mom and I were juggling them both, and my mom was still grieving my dad, and I was working hard at the station. It was a lot.
“One day, my mom took Adam to a prosthetics doctor in Portland. Trinity was left all alone—it wasn’t unusual for her to be alone. She always seemed to prefer it. But on this day, she called me seven times. She called me over and over, and I’d been too fucking busy at work to answer. I thought she was just being annoying.”
Shit .
Slowly, my hand slid across the bed, and I wrapped my hand around his. He intertwined our fingers together, squeezing until it hurt, but I didn’t tell him to stop. I wouldn’t. He needed this.
“When I called back, she didn’t answer, so I went to the house on my break. I knew something was wrong the second I stepped inside. I could feel it in the air, you know? I rushed to her room and found her covered in—there was blood everywhere. She stared at me, and I wasn’t sure if she was dead or alive. I don’t remember calling it in on my radio, but apparently, I did.
“She was so close to death when I started working on her. She’d lost so much blood, and her eyes were hazy, and she said—” He choked on a sob, and I squeezed his hand. “She said, ‘Let me go, Ro.’ But I ignored her, and I kept working on her. When EMS got there, she was hanging on by a fucking thread. Then she—” Another sob. “Then she died. She was clinically dead for forty-five seconds. For forty-five seconds, my sister wasn’t alive. She was gone. She was dead. I just stared at her body while they tried to bring her back, and all I could think about were her last words.
“They brought her back, by some fucking miracle. My mom and Adam rushed home, and Theo, my older brother, flew in on a helicopter.” He laughed harshly. “Leave it to him to somehow be the center of attention. After we knew Trin was going to make it, Adam left. We’ve only heard from him a handful of times in the last five years. He feels like it was his fault that Trin did what she did, so he stays away.”
Silence filled the room. Ronan sniffled, and I scooted closer to him, rolling onto my side. I rested my head on his shoulder, and he let out another choked sob.
“I saw my sister die,” he rasped. “And tonight, when you called me and I didn’t answer?—”
“Everything was okay,” I said, tears thickening my voice. “I was okay.”
“But you might not have been.” Reaching up, he pinched between his eyes. “I’ll never let you down again, . I promise to always answer when you call. I won’t let you down again.”
I pressed my lips against his shoulder, letting them linger. “I know,” I whispered, and I meant it.