The Best of Winter Renshaw - An 8 Book Collection - Winter Renshaw Page 0,12

cheap liquor in the world can’t prepare me for what I see on the other side.

The contents of my stomach swirl, and this time, it’s not the alcohol.

“Royal.” I say his name, out loud, for the first time in years.

He clears his throat, his familiar stormy eyes narrowing. “Demi.”

I’m hallucinating.

This isn’t real.

The alcohol is fucking with me, and I’m having some trippy dream.

Lightheadedness threatens to knock me off my feet. I lean into the doorway, folding my arms to resist the instinctive urge to fix the messy strands of unwashed hair that hang into my face.

I hate how good he looks. His shoulders are broader than they used to be. The hint of stubble on his chiseled face. The hollows of his cheekbones, deeper than ever. Full head of thick, dark hair, cut tight on the sides and long on top. It’s messy, but in a sexy way. And his face has enough of a five o’clock shadow to tell me either he doesn’t care, or he’s a man with other priorities. I don’t know if I want to know what those are.

Royal’s hands are jammed into the front pockets of his pants, but he doesn’t look nervous. If his heart is beating in his chest as hard as mine is, he doesn’t show it.

“What are you doing here?” My voice is breathy. I suck in air. “How’d you know where I live?”

I realize my second question is moronic in this day and age, but I can hardly think when he’s standing there, looking at me like that. He keeps his cool. I unravel before his very eyes.

A cool sweat glazes my palms before lacing across my forehead. I need to fan myself, but I’m paralyzed. How can he just stand there, acting like we just saw each other yesterday?

It hits me as my eyes lock in his. I clearly missed him more than he missed me. Seeing me doesn’t faze him or excite him or get him worked up.

“Can I come in?” He looks past my right shoulder. If he’s done his research, he’ll know this house is solely in Brooks’s name. I don’t own it. Maybe he’s looking for Brooks. He has to know that Brooks lives here too.

Doesn’t matter. He’s not coming in.

Royal Lockhart doesn’t get to abandon me and then show up like we’re suddenly old friends.

Not now, not ever.

“Nope.” I step back, my hand on the door, ready to slam it in his face. He places his hand out to stop it, but it only serves to piss me off even more. He’s lucky I don’t tell him exactly what I think of him.

And I would.

If my mind wasn’t going a thousand miles per hour. I can’t make sense of any of my thoughts. They’re going this way. And that way. And this way. And back. They’re racing in circles, some lapping others.

I want to slap him.

I want to kiss him.

I want to kick him and punch him, and then I want him to wrap his big, strong, full-grown man arms around me and let him squeeze me tight until I calm down. I want to feel the stubble on his chin scratch my forehead as he kisses it, and I want to feel the heat of his breath on the top of my head, because I’m convinced it’s the only thing that could prove he’s really, truly standing before me.

Maybe it’s the adrenaline mixing with the alcohol, but my course of action becomes clear, and I place a death grip on the doorknob, ready to slam this thing in his face with all my might.

I catch a glimpse of his face in the milliseconds before the door slams. He studies me, his chest rising and falling, and his lips straight, almost sympathetic. A whiff of his cologne floats through the doorway, and I don’t recognize it. It’s unfamiliar, and I’m irrationally pissed at him for it. I bet some ex-girlfriend picked it out.

And she was probably pretty, because guys who look like Royal can have any woman they want. I bet she wears Lululemon yoga pants and her topknots are always perfect, and I bet she holds his hand when he takes her shopping at the mall, and she smiles because she’s accessorizing her perfect little outfit with the kind of man most other women could only ever dream of.

Next time I’m at Neiman’s, I am not walking down the cologne aisle and spritzing my wrist with his old cologne for the hundredth time.