"I missed you," I whispered as I took a sip of the amber liquid in my glass tumbler.
She looked taken aback by my comment and I couldn’t blame her. I always showed my contempt for her, even though that’s far from how I truly felt, but now was not the time to dive into those feelings.
I continued the conversation as if I hadn't just confessed what I felt for her. "You've changed, Stephanie. Forgotten about us. I'm hurt," I grabbed my heart in jest.
“I’m not here to participate in your crude games, Caleb. I’m just here for my girl.”
I slowly brought my hands down and narrowed my eyes on her. We could both feel the atmosphere growing thicker between us. That slight electrical current played havoc on us, igniting triggers in us both.
"Did you think I'd forget what you did?"
"There was nothing to forget. I left with what I came in with. That should have been enough."
"Oh, no." I shook my head. "Now you know that’s not true, Stephanie. You left with more than that, didn't you? Twenty million more."
Her eyes never wavered.
Not even a flicker of remorse. Not one fucking blink that gave away guilt or fear or acknowledgment. She stood there like a stone statue, calm and cold and pretending like the past never touched her.
Like she hadn’t disappeared with twenty million in clean cash.
Like ten million in product hadn’t vanished without a trace.
Like she hadn’t known exactly what Alan was doing and decided to keep her pretty mouth shut.
She kept that from me.
Me!
And no one crosses me. Not then. Not ever. But she didn’t just cross the line, she set fire to it and then disappeared into the ashes of what she’d destroyed for ten fucking years.
"I went on with my life, Caleb. Not sure what you’ve been doing with yours, but… "
"I spent it searching for you!" The words tore out of me, loud and raw, echoing off the glass walls like a damn outcry. The rage that had simmered for a decade erupted, and I slammed my hands against the desk, the impact sharp enough to rattle the furniture.
I stood, slow and deliberate, taking calculated steps toward her.
She backed up, just one step, but it was enough. I saw the flinch, the hesitation she didn’t want to show. Good. She should feel something. She should feelme.
"Every minute of every day," I growled, voice low now, dragging out the ache behind every syllable. "Ten fucking years of tracking ghosts and chasing shadows. I burned men to get answers. Buried them when they couldn’t give me what I wanted. I tore cities apart looking for you."
Her shoulders squared, but I saw her jaw clench. She didn’t look at me. Wouldn’t. And that was the part that told me everything.
"At first," I said, stalking her as she moved, "I swore I’d kill you. That was the plan. Hunt you down. Make you beg. Put you down like a traitor."
I cornered her near the edge of the office. The floor-to-ceiling window behind her reflected the tension between us.
"But that would have been too easy."
She finally looked at me then. And in her eyes, I saw it. Rrecognition of the man I’d become. Of the price she’d put on my soul the day she vanished.
"You don't get to pretend like nothing happened. Not with me. Not after what you did."
I leaned in close, breathing her in like a man starved.
"I don’t want revenge anymore, Stephanie."
My lips curled into a smile that didn’t reach my eyes.
