Rose in Chains (The Evermore Trilogy, #1)

by Julie Soto

For the Saturday Girls…

respect for someone who knew they deserved more but held themselves back for whatever reason.

“Absolutely,” Toven said. “I am accustomed to having the finest thing in the room, after all.”

“Promises are only words after all. They can be broken.”

The demon who has shaken your hand is better than the one who hasn’t.

Rocking. Swaying. Briony was floating in the lake at school. The water was warm against her chilled body, and the gentle waves rocked her. Her mind floated up, thoughts attaching to memories. She’d been outside in the rain. She’d wanted to roll down a hill. Toven Hearst had stopped her. Her eyes fluttered, and she remembered the pain. Her body quaked, and arms pulled her closer. Someone held her to their chest, warm, solid, a steady heartbeat, walking, swaying, rocking her back to sleep. Her skin hurt. She could hear the rain but couldn’t feel it. Warm fingers pushed her wet hair off her forehead, and arms squeezed her tighter. She fell back into the blackness, like blinking.

“What’s in your mind can be taken from you.”

Her arms prickled with goose bumps, and that familiar sensation of watchful eyes washed over her. There was a soft tug at her hair, tickling at her neck. Her lashes fluttered, and she opened her eyes to her dark bedroom. She tilted her head to the door, certain for a moment that she hadn’t been alone. That a hand had passed through her hair, a gaze steadily watching over her. That maybe someone had come to check on her.

There was a drawer in Toven Hearst’s bedroom that contained a shoebox. Inside that shoebox was a hair ribbon. And try as she may to rationalize it in any other way… that ribbon was hers.

She needed to make amends with him. Even though he was in the wrong.

He’d pushed a curl over her ear and stared into her watering eyes like he’d been entranced.

“Sometimes I have to act without your approval to do what’s best for my family! Not just you, all four of us!”