Tonight was everything. I’m sorry I left when I promised I’d stay, but I just need some time to think. We’ll talk after the wedding.

Yours,

Lucy.

xoxo.

With one last look at his handsome profile in slumber, I slipped out of the room without making a single sound.

Chapter Nineteen

@SeanCassinova When you forget to pack gym socks and all you want to do is run until you’re numb.

*Sean*

I’d been accused of being heartless. Frequently. By everyone.

Well, everyone but Eilish. She was delusional.

Regardless, the accusation never bothered me much because I considered it entirely possible. I liked Eilish, I liked her a lot. I liked my shoes. I liked my fame. I liked having an effective moisturizer. I liked power and money and a good steak.

I almost loved SkyMall magazine.

The last and only thing I knew without a shadow of a doubt I’d loved had been my childhood dog.

But when I woke up and Lucy was gone, such a depth of sorrow and anger and fear flooded my chest that I felt as though I would drown in it.

At first, I tried to explain her absence. Call it self-preservation. Call it wishful thinking. Call it the power of Lucy Fitzpatrick’s messy influence.

However¸ I’d never been good at lying to myself. When I confirmed she was nowhere in the suite, I knew with absolute certainty I was not heartless. I pressed my hand to the ribs on my left side. A violent, stabbing sensation wrest a grimace from me, which made each inhale uncomfortable and shallow.

I was not without a heart. Because, and I admitted this fully aware of how completely pathetic I sounded, there was a good chance my heart had just been broken.

Really, until that moment, I’d been in denial. I’d thought the weekend was the beginning of something new and solid for us. I’d told her I hadn’t forgotten her like she’d insisted would happen. For some bizarre reason, I thought my devotion would make a difference. I thought she’d see my constancy and . . .

I don’t know.

See that I was right?

Give us a real chance?

Choose me?

Present a united front to her brother?

I was a fool.

Her absence could mean only one thing.

And because the acute pain in my chest had only grown more unmanageable within the span of five minutes, I picked up the lamp by the bed and threw it against the wall, shattered pieces of porcelain flying in all directions. I cast my gaze about the room, searching for something else to destroy, still unable to draw a full breath, and caught my reflection in the mirror.

I appeared dazed, incensed, and wholly uncivilized. I’d officially become a melodramatic, sentimental arsehole.

I was an ape.

Disgusted, I turned from the mirror. I stormed to my suitcase and dressed in my workout clothes. I let fly a string of curses when I realized I’d forgotten gym socks.

When the hell had I ever forgotten gym socks?

I’d been eager to see her and rushed through packing. All I had were gray argyles for my suit. I might have been mentally unhinged and enraged, but I was not without sensibility for fashion decorum. I wasn’t completely insensible. Not yet at any rate.

I wore my shoes without socks—which I abhorred—and slammed the door after me, not caring if I woke or offended any of the hotel’s prissily stoic inhabitants. I needed to use my body, run until I was numb, or else I would decimate the interior of my hotel room.

Perhaps I would do both.

Anger pumped through my heart, stitching together the broken pieces, hardening and cooling the blood in my veins. Too impatient to wait for the lift, I took the stairs, deciding as I descended that I was going to hate her. I needed to loathe her.

I’d already begged. Leaving after promising to stay meant she’d refused me. I would not pine.

Bursting into the lobby just minutes later, I made a beeline for the west corner of the hotel, irritated by the plaster pattern on the crown molding. Were those fish? Flowers? I hated it. Garish and appalling.

Since the K Club had an extensive world-class golf course, they also had a pro shop with a small collection of clothing. The hour was late, but not too late. The shop was still open.

A man lifted his head as I entered, his greeting dying on his lips at my glare.

“Socks,” I demanded.

His eyebrows jumped, his eyes widening in alarm. Swallowing nervously, he lifted his chin to the back wall. “Yes, sir. In a basket, just there.”

I grunted my non-response and marched to where he’d indicated. I glowered at the basket. It was full of the most ridiculous and tasteless patterned socks I’d ever seen. Golf balls on cartoonish smiling tees, golf clubs arranged in a heart, little golfing men swinging a club.

Atrocious.

I lifted my head to shout at the man, demand he bring me socks for actual athletes, when a streak of color caught my eye. More precisely, many colors. All the colors of the rainbow.

Lucy.

Heart and lungs seizing, I stumbled a half step back, blinking at the sight of her entering the shop, not trusting my eyes. Yet, there she was. Shopping.

She’d left—ended us—no more than an hour ago. Apparently that’s what one does after breaking someone’s heart. They browse the goods at a pro shop within a gaudy golfing hotel in Kildare.

Obviously.

My original errand completely forgotten, I stalked over to her. Because I had to. It wasn’t a conscious decision and I had no idea what I was going to say or do.

I just . . .

Christ.

I just wanted to see her.