I can’t stop reading. When I do, I have to face reality and I’m not ready to face the consequences of my decisions yet. I’d rather get lost in the pages.

Every time they kiss, I think of Jase Cross.

I think I love him.

I love my enemy.

Why couldn’t I be like the characters in this book? Why couldn’t I be like Emmy and fall for the boy who loves her just as much and the only thing they have keeping them apart, is whether or not they’re both still breathing?

Why did I have to fall for a villain? Maybe that’s what I deserve. Deep down inside though, I don’t think I even deserve him.

Books are a portal to another world, but they lead to other places too. To places deep inside you still filled with hope and a desperate need for love. Places where your loneliness doesn’t exist, because you know how it can be filled.

Jase isn’t a good man, but he’s not a bad one either. I refuse to believe it. He’s a damaged man with secrets I know are lurking beneath his charming facade, a man with a dark past that threatens to dictate who he will become.

And I think I love him.

I can’t bring myself to tell him that. I just had the chance a moment ago when he told me he wasn’t able to come tonight because he was with his brother and Carter needed him.

But he still asked if I needed anything. I could have told him I miss him. I could have messaged him more. Instead, I simply told him I would be ready for him when he wanted me.

The constant thumping in my chest gets harder and rises higher. I have to swallow it down just so I can breathe. This was never supposed to happen. How could I have fallen for a man like him?

I’m drowning in the abyss, and he’s the only one there to hold me. That’s how. I need to remember that.

He made it that way, didn’t he?

The sound of the radiator kicking on disrupts the quiet living room. I take the moment to have a sip of tea, careful not to disturb the open book in my lap. The warmth of the mug against my lips is nothing compared to Jase’s kiss.

With my eyes closed, I vow to think clearly, to step back and be smart about all of this. Even though deep inside, I know there is no way that means I could ever stay with Jase Cross, and the very thought destroys something deep inside of me. Splintering it and causing a pain that forces me to put the cup down and sink back into the sofa, covering myself with the blanket and staring at the black and white words on the page.

It all hurts when I think about leaving him.

That’s how I know I’ve fallen.

“Kiss me again?” Emmy’s voice is soft and delicate. It fits her, but she’s so much more.

“You like it when I kiss you?” I tease her and that bright pink blush rises up her cheeks.

“Shhh, she’ll hear us,” she says as her small hands press against my chest, pushing me to the side so she can glance past me and toward the hallway to the kitchen.

“Miss Caroline knows I kiss you.” I smile as I push some strands of hair behind her ear, but it falls slowly. It should be her mother who Emmy’s afraid will catch us. But her mother is never here.

“Maybe go check on her?” Emmy asks, scooting me off the chair. “See what she’s doing and if we have a little more time?”

It’s her elation that draws me to her. There are some people in this world who you love to see smile. It makes you warm inside and it feels like everything will be all right, if only they smile.

That’s all I can think as I round the corner to the kitchen. I’ve only been here to Emmy’s house twice, but I know the help’s kitchen is through one of these two doors. I’m right on the first guess and there’s Caroline, hovering over the large pot with a skinny bottle above it. Clear liquid is being poured into the steaming pot of soup.

Although I’d planned to offer to help, just so I can gauge how much time we have, my words are stolen.

The glass bottle she’s holding doesn’t look like it belongs in a kitchen. I feel a deep crease form between my furrowed brows and I stare for far too long as she pours more and more into the pot. She’s humming as she does. A sweet tune I’m sure would lull babies to their dreams.

Emmy has soup every night. Every night the caretaker makes her soup. And Emmy stays sick, every day.

“What did you put in there?” My question comes out hard and when Miss Caroline jumps, the liquid spills over the oven and the bottle crashes onto the floor with her startled cry.

I debate on grabbing the notebook from the kitchen counter where I left it. Just so I can add to the collection of underlined sentences. I’m reading without really paying attention, just letting the time go by.

My gaze skims the page, finding four sentences underlined this time and none of the four hold any new meaning. One is the same as it’s been for a while now. I’m invincible.

If it weren’t for the distraction of this story, the suspense and the emotion, I’d feel hopeless. I’m hopeless when it comes to Jase.

If hope is a long way of saying goodbye, hopeless can only mean one of two things. As the thought plays in my mind, my thumb brushes along my bottom lip and I stare at the page.

And that’s when I see it. What I’ve been waiting for. What I was so sure was here.

A chill spreads across my skin as the mug slips from my hand, dropping to the floor, crashing into pieces. If the letters weren’t staring right at me, I never would have seen them.

It’s not the underlined sentences. It’s the lines below them. The first letters of the sentences beneath the pen marks. C. R. O. S. S. She buried the message so deep, I didn’t see it before.

At first it hits me she left me a message, and there’s hope. And then I read the word again.

C. R. O. S. S.

“No.” The word is whispered from me, but not with conscious consent. My head shakes and my fingers tremble as I stare at the evidence.

C. R. O. S. S.

She did leave a note. My blood turns to ice at the thought. Jenny left me a message in this book, and it has to do with the Cross brothers.

“No.” I repeat the word as I lay the book down, although not gently, but forcefully, as if it will bite me if I hold it any longer. I nearly trip over the throw blanket in my rush to get off the sofa.

Thump, thump, thump. Ever present and ever painful, my bastard heart races inside of me.

My limbs are wobbly as I rush to the kitchen, searching for the notebook. I need to write it down. “Write it all down,” I speak in hushed and rushed words as I pull open one drawer in the kitchen, jostling the pens, a pair of scissors, and papers and everything else in the junk drawer. It slams shut as I bring the notebook to my chest, ready to face the book. To face the message Jenny left me.

Knowing she wrote something about the Cross brothers.

Knowing Jase Cross lied to me.

They had something to do with her murder. Maybe even him.

Tears leak from my eyes as I stumble in the kitchen.

“No,” I whisper, and force myself to stand. It will say something else. I tell myself it will, and the sinful whisper in my head reminds me, Hope is a long way of saying goodbye.

Swallowing down my heart and nerves, I push myself to stand, only to hear a creak.

Thump, goes my heart, and this time the beat comes with fear.

I couldn’t have heard that right. No one is coming. No one is here, I tell myself, even though my blood still rushes inside of me, begging me to run, warning me that something’s wrong, that someone’s here who isn’t supposed to be.

I keep silent and hear the sound of my front door.

Thump. Terror betrays my instincts. Stealing my breath and making me lightheaded.

The foyer floor creaks again and the front door closes, softly. A gentle push. A quiet one meant not to disturb.

The creaking moves closer and I listen to it with only the harsh sound of my subdued breath competing with it.

And I’m too afraid to even whisper, “Who’s there?”

There are many moving parts in this world. If you haven’t read Carter’s saga, starting with , I highly suggest you do that now. His story is just as intense and a tale that will stay with me forever. I hope these words stay with you as well. Read on for a sneak peek!

Here’s to love stories keeping our hearts beating.

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