With my mind a whirlwind of emotions I have no fucking clue how to handle, I dump the task of easing Andrik’s inquisitiveness onto Zoya.
The words of the lawyer dividing my grandfather’s estate between multiple organizations, charities, and people I’ve never met before today fade into the background when I move to a window stretched across one wall of the conference room.
My heart rate kicks up when I spot Emerson’s race across the packed parking lot. The wish to leave is all over her face. It starkly contrasts the expression reflecting off the tinted window of the conference room.
Ten years have passed, yet my feelings remain as strong as ever.
When Emerson’s brisk flee sees her losing her grip on her handbag, she curses into the cool afternoon air before she bends down to collect her belongings.
I use the delay in her departure to drink her in. She looks just as I remember, yet different. More poised, more mature.More beautiful. But also more distant.
I never thought Emerson would be a woman who’d hide behind others. She used to come out swinging, no matter the crowd.
I guess even the best fighters lose strength when they realize their opponent isn’t worth the effort.
Sensing my turmoil, Andrik joins me at the window. Air whizzes from his nose when he spots the cause of the angst on my face. Then words slowly trickle from his hard-lined mouth. “Emerson Morozov. I never thought I’d see the day.” I exhale harshly, forcing his eyes on me. “Do you know why she’s here?”
I half shrug and half shake my head, not trusting myself to speak. The weight of ten years of memories, unspoken words, and a feeling that will never fade hangs heavily on my chest.
Andrik gives me a sympathetic look. He knows how much Emerson once meant to me—how much she still means to me—because he was the first to voice concern about our plans to wed mere weeks after my twenty-first birthday.
His worries had more basis than I could have ever imagined, but at the time, I hated him for them. I didn’t want to be told who I could or could not love. I loved Emerson and wanted her to be my wife and, one day, the mother of my children.
She was the one who had a change of heart.
I can’t say I blame her, but I’d be a liar if I said it didn’t hurt like a bitch to be dumped by the only woman you’ve ever loved.
My mother was stripped from my life when I was too young to grant me a ton of memories, and although she’s back now, her fragile mental health makes it seem as if she isn’t.
With Emerson’s items gathered and my heart in tatters, I watch her walk toward a car at the back of the lot. It isn’t as flashy as its numerous counterparts, but it will get her from A to B, which is all Emerson ever cared about. She isn’t about wealth and influence. She loves fiercely enough to see through anyone’s flaws.
When she slips behind the steering wheel, I want to run after her and beg her to stay, to tell her to speak the fuck up and prove she isn’t the coward she made out when she hid behind a wall of nameless faces, but I can’t.
I must act unaffected, like seeing her again isn’t ripping me apart, because it isn’t her heart I’m protecting. It’s mine.
My pulse thumps in my ears when Emerson looks up for the quickest second, and our eyes meet. Something flickers in her gaze, something that doubles the roiling of my stomach, but it disappears again too fast to decipher.
Andrik squeezes my shoulder in silent support when Emerson cranks the ignition of her old ride, and I force a weak smile.
“I’m fine,” I lie.
I’m nowhere close to fine.
Seeing Emerson again has stirred up old feelings I’ve fought to keep buried for ten years, memories of what we had, what we lost, and what we could have been if we had fought harder.
We were young, so fucking young, but madly, deeply in love.
I thought nothing could tear us apart.
When she left me, I should have tracked her down and forced her to give me answers. I shouldn’t have backed down without a fight or acted like I did when I sensed her presence seconds before Zoya entered the meeting under the disdainful glares of the men Andrik will end the instant I pass on their hatred to the man responsible for his wife’s happiness.
The hollow emptiness in my chest when Emerson veers her car past the window and toward the lot’s exit should make my legs the heaviness of iron. I shouldn’t be able to move. But before my head can shut down the demands of my heart, I sprint for the exit she bolted through only moments ago, unwilling to let another ten years pass before seeking answers.
Complicated is an understatement to describe our relationship, but it is the truth. Our lives have taken different paths, but my heart stubbornly refuses to let go.
“Continue without us,” Andrik demands when the lawyer shouts my name like he did Emerson’s.
Despite running at the speed of sound, I burst into the parking lot two seconds too late. Emerson is gone. Again.
