Chapter 1
Livia
I see him across the room. I’m utterly breathless.
My heart races.
My stomach flutters.
My soul disintegrates into a pile of scattered ashes once again.
I’m a complete fucking mess. No muscle will obey my command to move, even my eyelids. They refuse to take away his image for even a second.
Why is he here?
I shouldn’t be taking this risk. I shouldn’t be openly ogling him, but I can’t look away. Holy mother of perfection…he’s everything I remember and more. As breathtaking as the very first time I laid eyes on him. He’s every woman’s fantasy, probably men too. I see other women watching him and I want to scratch their eyes out. Some blatantly stare, as I do. Some sneak sly glances so their spouses or dates won’t notice.
Foolish.
Of course their dates notice a textbook male specimen such as him in the room. All other men are busy pissing in a circle around their women to ward him away.
As if sensing my weighty stare, his eyes lock with mine. Neither of us move.
The woman dripping off his arm, hanging on his every word, seems oblivious to our connection. Every sound fades away as we stare into each other’s eyes from across the ballroom. Eyes I’m all too familiar with but haven’t seen in what seems like a lifetime. Eyes that haunt me.
God, I miss him with a raw ache that intensifies daily.
“Wow, look at that fine piece of ass. He’s fuckable,” whispers one of my best friends, Kamryn, following my stare.
The best of my life.
He starts across the room in my direction, his date all but forgotten as he leaves her in his dust. She’s calling after him, but he simply waves his hand in dismissal, not bothering to look back. His angry eyes never leave mine, his full lips drawn in a tight thin line.
Oh shit. Time to go.
“Kam, I’m not really feeling well, sweetie. I’ll call you in the morning after my interview.” I’m frantic to escape. I turn to leave, heels clicking as I quickly walk toward the exit. Kamryn practically runs to keep up.
“Let me call my driver for you, hon.”
I call over my shoulder as I race toward my escape. “No, no. It’s fine. There are plenty of cabs out front. I’ll just hop in one and be home in no time. Really, it’s fine.”
Her grip is like an iron fist around my arm as she maneuvers me back to face her. Kam frowned, clearly not believing the blatant lie I threw her way. Whatever. Over her shoulder I estimate he’s just fifty feet from where we now stand and moving at a clipped pace. As if by divine intervention, he’s stopped by a buxom blond whose nipples are ready to fall out of her slutty dress any second. One deep breath and pop, they’re free. He shakes her off, heading in my direction once again. Can’t blame her for trying.
Crap Livia. Get. Out. Now.
“I think I may be sick, Kam. I’d really like to get home before I lose those little shrimp thingies I just ate.” Not so much of a lie this time. My stomach is doing somersaults.
I turn and flee. I hear Kam call after me, but keep going this time. Making it to the safety of a cab before he reaches me is paramount.
Damn Kam and her insistence that I wear her four-inch Louboutin heels. So what if the fire engine red is a perfect complement to my also borrowed black leather strapless sheath. The shoes are still half a size too small and pinch my feet, making a hasty escape nearly impossible.
I should ditch the damn things like Cinderella. I bet she didn’t even ‘lose’ her glass slipper. She was no doubt trying to escape this supposed Prince Charming because he was an arrogant asshole, and it fell off in her urgency to get away. In traditional antifeminism fashion, a man weaved an elegant story about how much better a girl’s life would be with a boy in it. He would swoop in and save her from her persecuted life and they would live happily ever after.
Bullshit. All of it.
There is no happily ever after. Not for me anyway. That childish fantasy was ruthlessly shattered over five years ago.
I make it out of the ballroom, down the stairs and have the front hotel door halfway open when a strong hand clamps down on my shoulder, effectively stopping my forward movement. An electric current runs through my body and I feel him everywhere. His hand may as well be between my legs for all my body cares.
Damn you Louboutin and your impractical shoes.
“Hello Livia,” a deep sensual voice drawls behind me. His voice and touch combined almost make my knees buckle. After all these years, he still has the same effect on all of my senses like the day we met. He sounds the same, albeit a bit more grown up. And a lot more sexy.
Jesus, I don’t think I can do this.
You can do this Livia.
You have to do this.
Be cold.
Be unaffected.
Lie.
I take a deep breath, will the tears back, and steel myself before turning to face him.
“Hello Gray. Fancy seeing you here.” Holy…breathe, Livia, breathe. I am almost taken aback by how utterly gorgeous he is. He had been stunning across the room and he was always beautiful, but up close he’s like a golden angel sent directly from heaven—or hell—to tempt me. His face is no longer boyish, but all man, complete with the sexiest scruffy whiskers I have ever seen. This is more than a five o’clock shadow, but not quite a full beard. I’m a sucker for scruff. Especially on Gray, but he’s never worn it like this. It’s downright sinful.
Double damn.
“What are you doing here Livvy?” Livvy. I haven’t heard that name in over five years. It sounds so damn good I want to weep.
Dig deep, Livia…maintain the façade you’ve perfected so very well.
“I came for the same reason you probably did, the animals.” Bravo for me. I sounded very confident…and very stupid. My internal head is shaking at me sadly.
He says nothing, remaining stoically silent, his eyes searching mine for the truth.
Subject change, before he asks too many more questions, for which I’ll have to build lie on top of lie. I’ve told so many lies I need a cheat sheet to keep track of them all. “So, why are you in Chicago?”
His penetrating gaze makes me even more nervous than I already am, and I start to squirm. I never intended to run into anyone I knew here, let alone him. I would have never let Kam talk me into this stupid fundraiser otherwise.
Shit. Shit. Shit. This is so not good.
“I took over my father’s company, and we moved the headquarters from Detroit to Chicago last year.”
He lives here? In Chicago? My mind is spinning. I’m trying to process the fact that my ex-fiancé lives in the same city as I do, and that he took over his father’s company already. I didn’t remember Frank being that old. I shouldn’t be engaging him in conversation, but I can’t help but ask, “Did he retire?”
“No. He died.” I gasp and my heart sinks.
“God, I’m sorry Gray, I had no idea. Your dad was a wonderful man.” He was like a father to me, more so than my own, who’d essentially sold me to save his own life. I loved that family. They were like my own until they weren’t anymore.
“Of course not, Livvy. How could you possibly when you fucking disappeared over five years ago, without a trace, without a call, without a forwarding goddamn phone number?” His retort was ripe with barbs, and it stung in the way it was meant to. I deserved some of his ire yes, but not all of it.
Gray has no clue the living nightmare I’ve endured. What I had done for my family or for him. And it would stay that way. I have to get away from him before I do something stupid, like spill my guts. He is my past, and as much as it deeply pains me, he has to stay that way. Too much has happened in the last five years that I simply can’t overcome. I am damaged goods now, and Gray would never want me if he knew the truth. I need to get the hell out of here before I break down. I can’t keep the tears back much longer.
“I have to go. It was nice to see you again, Gray.” I need to get out of here before I throw myself at him and beg for his forgiveness. Because even though I don’t quite deserve it, a small part of me desperately craves it. Gray is my first love. The only man I will ever love. And that young, naive woman now buried deep inside me will hold tightly to the memory of her first love with her last dying breath. It’s all that has gotten me through the worst days of my life.
And it’s all I have left.
I spin to leave when a strong hand pulls me back once again. Every time this man puts his hands on me, I bend to his will, and right now I feel like a torch has been set to my bones and they are far too pliable. My eyes flit between it and his ever so handsome face. He gets the gist and lets go.
Although his voice has softened, his annoyance clearly rings loud when uttering his next words. “How can I get ahold of you, angel? I’d like to have dinner. Catch up.”
My heart skips a beat. I haven’t heard that endearment in so long, I have to blink back the tears threatening to fall. I want to agree. I nearly do. But then common sense slams back into my frontal lobe at a hundred miles per hour. If I spend time with Gray, he’ll pepper me with questions. Questions he has every right to have answered. But those are answers I won’t give. I can’t. He can never know.
Gone is the young, naïve, rosy-colored glasses woman he fell in love with. Gone is the carefree, idealistic woman he’d asked to be his wife. What stands in her place, instead, is a cynical, horribly used and hopeless one. Shattered beyond all repair.
“I can’t,” I whisper. Then I do turn and flee. Luckily, there are several cabs waiting out front and I hop in the first one, yelling at him just to drive. As I turn around, I see Gray standing on the sidewalk, breathing hard, watching me drive away. Deja vu cuts me like a sharp knife and I begin to sob silently. These are the first tears I’ve allowed myself to shed in four and a half years.
Once again, I am leaving the only man to ever make my stomach flutter and my heart race. The man who pursued me relentlessly for that first date by returning for six straight nights to the pizzeria I worked at until I said yes. The man I’d dreamed of having children with. Growing old with. The only man I have, and ever will love.
All because of him. Always because of him. As with every day for the past five years, I curse the day Peter Wilder set foot into my life. And I curse my father for bringing him there.
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