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  Avow

  By: Holly Mortimer

  Copyright © 2016 By: Holly Mortimer

  All Rights Reserved

  Published By: Holly Mortimer

  Digital Edition

  ISBN 9781519929457

  All Rights Reserved

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  Prologue

  Ten Years Ago

  Ryan

  I slammed my locker shut and turned to head to my next class, narrowly missing her as she flew by me, like a bat out of hell.

  “Whoa, where’s the fire?”

  She skidded to a halt, turning in slow motion and I could immediately see what it was costing her to hold herself together. Her hands were fisted and she looked ready to implode from the effort she was expending holding in her tears.

  She cocked her head to the side, examining me as if I was a puzzle she needed to solve.

  “Ryan, right?” Her voice floated over to me, wrapping around my always horny teenaged soul, giving it the courage to move closer to her.

  I didn’t know her name. She was one of those girls who you always knew was there, but never actually knew anything about. I scanned my tiny brain for any information on her, coming up empty. All I knew was that she lived a class well above me. Quiet, shy and brilliant were words I would use to describe her, but damned if I could pull her name out of my memory. She was a year younger than me and I was a stupid, brainless eighteen-year-old who thought of nothing all day except my dick and when I would be free of the boundaries school put on me.

  “It’s okay. You don’t know my name and I’m not surprised. Guys like you don’t set foot in my universe.”

  “Guys like me?”

  “Yeah, you know, good looking, popular, athletic and slightly edgy.”

  “Only slightly?”

  She smiled through her anguish. I was captivated and moved a step closer. I could hear the crowd thinning around us but had no ability to care that I was about to be late for class.

  She turned to go and I knew I had to keep her with me just a little bit longer. “Wait, where are you going? It’s not the end of the day yet?”

  “I know. I just, have to go. I can’t stay here anymore.”

  She gave me her back and I immediately closed the distance between us. She was tiny, just hitting five feet tall. Classic Irish black hair, but without the Irish accent, so she definitely wasn’t from here. I was so pissed that I had never paid attention to her before this. She was stealing my senses one by one and I was struggling to control my teenaged impulses. I wanted to run my fingers through her hair, wrap my arms around her from behind, pull her in close and inhale her unique scent.

  I shook my head, afraid I might be under some sort of hormone induced spell. I walked around to her front and saw she had let a lone tear slip loose. I reached out, unable to stop myself, and wiped it away.

  “If you’re going to skip, you’ll need the guidance of an older and wiser man.”

  “Really? I’ll go see if I can find one willing to go on the run from the hall police with me.”

  I wasn’t giving her the chance to escape me, after I only had just found her. I grabbed her shaking hand and tugged her around towards my locker. I quickly dug into it to pull out my keys and wallet and propelled her forward, towards the doors and our temporary freedom from school.

  As we burst through the doors, I ground to a halt. “Wait.” I looked to the side and tried to hide my eyes from her scrutiny. “I don’t know your name.”

  I could see her smiling at me in my peripheral vision. Not her sad smile of three minutes ago, but a glorious challenging smile that turned my heart inside out. “It’s Chloe. Now, are we getting the heck out of here, or are you going to chicken out on me?”

  So, that was it. The moment I fell in love with Chloe Carson. My tiny firecracker. My perfect vision of forever, except forever had plans for us that didn’t include a yellow brick road to love. No, Chloe and I were headed to Hell, on a road paved with only the best of intentions.

  “Who’re you calling a chicken?” I grabbed her hand and we raced down the stairs to my car, hopping in and losing ourselves in the beauty and magic of the Irish countryside without a care in the world. Being teenagers, we never thought the world would hold us back, but it appeared the universe had other intentions and was going to make me work the hardest I had ever worked for anything before to keep her with me so my forever dreams could come true.

  Chapter 1

  Present Day

  Ryan

  “Drink! Drink! Drink!” The crowd was roaring and I was using their yells of encouragement to beat that fancy doctor, Aiden Murphy, in a beer guzzling competition. No one could take away my beer drinking record. I could easily down a beer in under a minute! What self-respecting Irishman couldn’t? Certainly not the American imposter standing beside me, looking decidedly drunk and about to lose his ability to stand up unassisted. Didn’t matter. He had his harem to hold his frat boy hair back when he was kissing the white throne tomorrow. He would be fine with his defeat.

  I slammed the cup down on the bar I was used to being on the serving side of, and turned to receive the adoration of my fans. That’s when I saw her. It would take a hell of a lot more beer for me not to be able to recognize her after all this time. I drowned out the cries of my friends and family and narrowed my eyes, willing them to focus.

  I didn’t make a move to go to her. In fact, I decided I would try to ignore her presence until I could figure out what the hell she was doing here. Ten years. It had been a decade since we had last laid eyes upon each other and she choose the day my cousin and best friend had gotten married, here, surrounded by all my family to show her face. She had balls I never knew resided on her tiny body.

  She hadn’t seen me yet and I took a tiny bit of pleasure at the scared look on her face as she was confronted with the crowd here to celebrate Brennan and Sam’s wedding.

  Aiden sidled up to me and slung his arm around me, pulling me in for a nuggie.

  “Fuck, brother. That hurt. What the hell is the matter with ya?”

  He looked at me with that same look he had when we were kids and he had one of his genius ideas that would lead to us doing hard time staring into the corner wall of our Granny’s lounge.

  “Ry?”

  “Aiden?”

  “There’s a girl staring at you. At least, I think she’s staring at you. She could also be staring at me, ’cause, you know, I’m just that fucking hot.”

  I pushed him off me and turned to angle my face away from hers. “There’s no one staring, Aiden. You’ve lost your ability to see straight, you see?”

  He tried to peer around me. “Nope, no, she’s definitely staring at you. Oh, and she’s coming over here. Shit, she’s hot. I wonder who she is? I don’t remember seeing her at any family stuff before.”

  A long lost, unfamiliar feeling of heat banked in my stomach. “She’s well above you, that’s for sure.”

  He looked at me funny. “Have you met me, cuz? I’m fucking amazing.”

  I laughed at the arrogance that only Aiden Murphy could get away with and for some God damned reason, women loved it. It looked like she was unsure of whether or not to continue on her quest to get to me. She had definitely found me and was alternating between staring at me and darting her eyes
around. She never did handle crowds well. She looked miserable. Cheers to that, I thought.

  She finally made it to where we were standing and I was torn between ignoring her like she had been me for the last ten years, or grabbing her and getting her out of this lion’s den of nosey family members. Aiden leaned in toward her and I fought the urge to pull him back. Unlike most women, she looked completely terrified of him.

  “Hey, babe,” Aiden drawled. God he was obnoxious when he was drunk. I’d never noticed it until this very moment. “Buy you a drink?”

  Her eyes flickered to mine and I raised one eyebrow. “Well, Chloe? What’ll ya have, love?”

  Aiden looked at me, as I had clearly shocked the shit out of him. “You know her name, Ry?”

  Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. “Aiden, this is Chloe. Chloe, this is my cousin, Aiden.”

  “And how did you two meet?”

  “Well, ya see, Chloe here, she’s my wife.”

  If I wasn’t so pissed she had shown up out of the blue I might have handled the next few moments better. It also might not have been good that I was completely shit faced drunk. Ten years of angry and hurt emotions decided to burst forth from me in that exact instant. Let’s just say, not one of my better moments.

  Aiden looked at me like I had just told him girls weren’t into him. “Your wife?”

  “My wife.”

  Chloe looked at me with those huge eyes that always hit me in the gut. I had been waiting for this day for years, but now that she was standing here in front of me, I couldn’t get away from her fast enough. I turned to block her from my sight, but made sure she heard every word I said.

  “My wife, that married me one day, then was gone the next. No note, no reason, no goodbye. Just, gone.”

  I picked up Aiden’s beer, finished it in one go, and walked away.

  Chapter 2

  Chloe

  I stood there, staring at the empty space in front of me. Ten years ago, I had vowed to love that man forever. What he didn’t know was that hadn’t changed.

  However, he had certainly changed. Gone was the tall, skinny rebel and in his place was a lanky, lean, gorgeous man. I’d been watching him for a minute once I found him in the boisterous crowd. He was, for lack of a better word, magnetic. Men and women were drawn to him. His larger than life personality, his charm and the thing that hurt the most to see, his happiness.

  The man who had stood in front of me bared some resemblance to Ryan, but I didn’t think I had ever met this version.

  Oh, Chloe, you’re an idiot.

  I needed to stop talking to myself and start figuring out how I was going to get Ryan to listen to me. I knew coming back to Ireland wasn’t going to be received all that well, but I didn’t know he would put up a brick wall. I was expecting anger and yelling and crazy emotion. After all, Ryan was Irish and was able to pull the most amazing feelings of highs and lows from inside me.

  I stuck my hand out to the gorgeous man left standing in front of me. “So, um, hi. I’m Chloe.”

  Aiden slowly smiled a grin that I was sure got him whatever he wanted in life. It was true, he was unbelievably good looking, but Ryan was all that and more to me. He took my hand and gave it a quick shake. “Nice to meet you Chloe.”

  “You’re not Irish!” Oh Chlo. You need to stop talking again. Thanks for once again being Captain Obvious.

  “Oh, I’m Irish, just not born and raised. My mother was Irish and moved to the States when she married my dad. This is our family pub, currently owned by that happy man over there, my oldest brother, Brennan. You happened to have chosen a most unfortunate day for your fateful reunion. Today is Brennan’s wedding day and the entire Murphy clan is here and then some. Ryan is our cousin and Bren’s bartender.”

  I felt myself go faint. It seemed I couldn’t get much right these days. The last thing I needed was Ryan’s family’s judgey stares. I barely knew them, and had only briefly met his parents years ago, but nonetheless, I needed to get this done with minimum mess.

  “I can see the wheels turning and I’m wondering whether I should help you find your husband or walk you around and introduce you to your family?”

  “I need to go.”

  “Yes, you do.” Ryan had apparently returned and his voice moved through my entire body from behind me. I turned to find his stormy green eyes staring at mine. This was good. The angrier he was, the quicker this could get done.

  “Ok, then. Is there somewhere we can go and talk? In private?”

  He just turned and started walking away, I guess, assuming that I would follow, which I did. He pushed through a pair of swinging doors to the kitchen and then led me out a back entrance. The night air was cool and refreshing and a welcome change from the heat of the pub. It didn’t help matters that I was sweating just thinking about the conversation about to happen.

  He finally stopped walking and leaned up against the hood of a car, casually crossing his arms and legs, effectively closing his body off from me. “Okay, Chloe. What the fuck? Why’re you here? Why haven’t I heard shit from you in nearly ten God damn years and suddenly, on the day my entire family is crowded into the pub, you show up like a walking, talking ghost of the woman I thought I had married?”

  I had tried to prepare for this day. I’d been trying to for nearly ten years. It had all been for naught. He was stunning, standing here in front of me, angry eyes, spitting fury at me. Long and lean body that had matured and come into itself after all this time. And that face. That classically handsome face that now sported a dusting of stubble and a small bit of wear and tear that added to his sexiness. When confronted with the man he had become, the girl inside me he had once loved wanted to weep.

  “I hope you’re not going to try to small talk your way out of the reason you’re here. Let me make this easy for you. I’ve got your repeated requests for a divorce. Obviously, none have been signed. You want a divorce, you’re going to have to give me an explanation. I think I deserve that after all this time.”

  “Ryan, it’s been ten years. Why haven’t you moved on?”

  He pushed off the car and moved towards me, forcing me to back up against the brick wall. “Chloe.”

  The way he said my name always made me weak. His Irish lilt softly floating around me. I was going to have to dig deep to get through this and never look back. “Ry—”

  His hand grazed my cheek, taking me by surprise as he moved his forehead to lean against mine. “No bullshit, Chlo. I deserve the truth and nothing less is going to be good enough. I’ve tried to move on. God, knows I’ve tried. Plenty o’ women. Loads of attempts, but nothing worked. There was nothing they could do could remove you from my heart.”

  Oh shit. The mixture of jealous rage and agonizing heartbreak was roiling inside my gut. As if controlled by an unknown master, my hand reached up to cup his cheek, while a single tear defied my orders and escaped from my eyes. “I’ve moved on, Ryan. You need to as well.”

  “Prove it.”

  “What? How? What can I do to show you that we’re over? We’ve been over for a really long time.”

  His breath mixed with mine as he fought for something I couldn’t understand. How could he really still want to be with me? I’d done everything humanly possible to push him as far away from me as I could. I was here to execute the last thing I could think of to convince him.

  I took a deep breath and started the beginning of the end. “I’m with someone. We’re getting married.” I raised my other hand to show him the ostentatious diamond residing there.

  He batted my hand out of the way and closed the fraction of an inch between us, angrily fusing his lips to mine. He pushed his body against mine, forcing me to slam back into the brick wall. “Ryan—”

  “Prove it, Chloe,” he said between kisses. He had moved to attack my neck and I was having a hell of a time staying on point.

  “We can’t do this.”

  He ignored me and moved his
way back up to my mouth, this time taking advantage of the opening I gave him. His hands grabbed both of my wrists and raised them up, pinning me against the wall with his body. He angled his head and gained full access to my mouth. Our tongues met and I was thrown back in time to the days we had endlessly kissed, unaware of time passing all around us. When we were all that mattered to each other and screw the outside world.

  I mistakenly let a moan escape from deep inside me and I could feel the small shift in power. He was in control of this kiss and he was making sure I knew it. The crazy thing was, if this was the end, I welcomed it. I wanted to feel him this last time and it would have to last me my lifetime without him, the lifetime I had vowed to him all those years ago.

  Sadly, he chose that exact moment to break free from the kiss and push off from me and the wall. “You can’t prove it.” He turned and walked back to the kitchen door. I could hear the music flow out when he opened it. He paused and looked back at me, stuck like a love sick idiot against the wall. “When you’re ready to tell me the truth and be honest with yourself about you and I, then we can talk. Until then, stay away from me and my family.”

  He walked through the door, letting it shut with a finality that resonated along the wall, hitting me right in the heart.

  I sank down to the ground, completely defeated and ready to be done with the whole thing. Just hop in a car and drive to a remote cottage at the tip of the country where no one could ever find me. Become that crazy cat lady who kids were afraid of and adults tolerated. But most of all, there I could just be free. Free of the demands placed upon me by a father who didn’t know when to stop and a life that continued to play its cruel jokes on me. I just wanted to be free.

  My phone started buzzing in my pocket and I knew my time here was running out. I needed to get this done and get the hell away from here as soon as possible. I let the call go to voicemail, but I knew it wouldn’t be the last time it rang tonight. I would eventually have to answer them.