~ Author ~

Ronan clicks off the call abruptly, his telephone sliding smoothly into his pocket as if the conversation never took place. The silence in the room is thick with the meaning of what Ronan has said, the beeping of the monitors boring into the silence like a heartbeat of indifference. Adeline is fixed on him, her lungs full of unexhaled air, her eyes scouring his face for some hint of joke, of hyperbole. But his face is impassive, a mask of hard resolve, until he relaxes his gaze ...