Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 97364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 325(@300wpm)
Daniel’s eyes narrow. “We all did.”
I shake my head. “I didn’t just panic. I did something …”
“What do you mean?”
All these years, he’s had no idea how much truth there was to his joking about me being a thief who stole his heart.
“I moved your name to the top of the transplant list, and I deposited a sizable amount of money in the accounts of anyone who would notice the change in the list.”
“You said …” He shakes his head. “You said the recipient died before the heart arrived. You said I was the closest match, and if I didn’t take it, the donor heart would be lost. You said it was a miracle.”
Oscar told me to “save the boy.” He said that between right and wrong, life and death, there existed a gray area called love. In his completely fucked-up book of life principles, he insisted that love was boundless, fairness was a flaw of the weak, and morals killed more people than they saved.
Until five months ago when I left London, I was a product of Oscar Stone, equal parts nature and nurture—a third-generation thief destined to get caught. We all do, eventually.
“I lied.”
“You lied? You LIED!?!”
“I’m sorry. For that, I am truly sorry.”
“So … so …” He laces his fingers behind his neck and turns his gaze to the ceiling. “You’re sorry for lying to me or you’re sorry for stealing a heart that should not have been mine?”
“Both.”
He laughs the most cynical laugh. “So looking back, almost eight years later, you wish you wouldn’t have stolen the heart?”
I shake my head. “I wish I wouldn’t have taken a life.”
“Semantics.”
“No. I had no issue with stealing the heart. I’d do it again. If there were some bank of hearts available to the highest bidder, I’d lie and steal from almost anyone to give you life. Even now.” I need him to understand that my love for him has not vanished. It never will. “But that heart didn’t belong to the highest bidder. It belonged to another human, just like you, desperate to live. So I didn’t just steal your heart. I stole a life. That I would take back. That I would undo if I could. Even if …”
“Even if it meant I didn’t live.”
I blink, releasing my tears as I return a slow nod.
His jaw clenches several times as his glassy eyes meet mine. Before me stands a man who feels guilty for being alive. I never wanted for him to feel this way, but my guilt nearly killed me. I honestly believe it played a leading role in my body succumbing to cancer.
“I still love you,” he whispers.
Biting my trembling lips together, I nod, wanting nothing more than to fall into his arms and sob. Of course he still loves me. I would never have said ‘yes’ to any man who didn’t love me so completely. As much as the old me wants this to be an epic moment about a woman who fell in love with two men, but ultimately chose the one she loved longer, it’s not.
I step closer to him and press my hand to his chest again. “I love you always, Daniel. But no matter what my prognosis is, the Scarlet you proposed to? She died. I’m not her. I’m not going back to London with you—to that life—to Oscar. Over the past five months, I found this person I never knew existed, and I like her and so does my body. She’s the Scarlet who is beating cancer. She lives in the moment. She doesn’t own a single electronic device. She sees life so differently. She doesn’t live with regret.”
My hand moves from his heart to his handsome face, wiping away his tears. “She … loves another man.”
Daniel collapses to the floor, hugging my waist. We’ve come full circle. I run my hands through his hair as he buries his face into my shirt and cries.
“Fuck you, Scarlet Stone. Fuck you for taking my heart. Fuck you for … for …” he sobs.
“Fuck me for living,” I whisper as I fall to my knees and hug him.
Right now, in the middle of the worst kind of pain, I realize I’m not choosing Theo. He may not love me. We may forever be nothing. I can live with that. I will live with that. I’m choosing to let go of the guilt and hold on to the sound of my own breath—breathing in, breathing out. I count them. Today, I choose Scarlet Stone.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Theodore
Fourteen trips.
It takes fourteen trips to the old Asian guy’s place to deposit the plants that she left behind. He regards me through his screen door, wearing a “poor bastard” expression that I sure as fuck don’t need. But he says nothing. I didn’t ask him if he wants them. When I set the last two down, he eyes me for a few seconds, then he nods.