The floor doesn't move under me, but it feels like it has.
Demetrius turns from his grandmother to me. Slowly.
"Do you need help, Madison?" He does not say it warmly. "The Madison Berwick I remember didn't need anyone to care for her."
My cheeks burn with a sudden influx of anger and I narrow my eyes at him.
How dare he be this arrogant after what he did to me? Or more like, after what he didn't do to me?
I don't answer him, turning to Agatha instead.
"That's so kind," I tell her. "But I really do have it handled."
I bend down and hug her, careful not to move her, tell her I'll be thinking of her, then straighten up, grab my bag, and cross to the door.
To get there I have to pass within two feet of him.
I don't look at him.
But I do the next best thing.
Just as I pass by him, I shoulder-bump him right in his massive, well-muscled chest.
It is petty. It is deliberate. I should be ashamed of myself.
But it is the most satisfying thing I have done in approximately fifteen years. For one half of one second.
He doesn't even move. It's like I have walked into a load-bearing wall in a wool coat, and a load-bearing wall does not budge for a tiny human nurse. The impact runs the length of my deltoid and into my shoulder socket.
I don't break stride and I keep walking. I don't exhale until my feet touch the pavement in the sun-baked parking lot. I find my car. I sit down in it and stare at the steering wheel.
Verdict: Demetrius Thornwood is a jerk.
He was a jerk fifteen years ago and he's still a jerk now.
Just a richer, handsomer jerk.
But still a jerk.
Chapter Four
Demetrius
Ididn'tsleepwelllast night. It shouldn't bother me anymore. I haven't slept well in a decade. The cost of responsibility, like my grandfather used to say.
Cornelius Thornwood used to say lots of things.
Only what kept me awake all night wasn't the weight of responsibility of my multi-billion-dollar empire. No, this wasn't my usual kind of insomnia. The usual kind takes the shape of numbers and contract clauses. That kind of insomnia I can work with. Literally. I can get up, I open my laptop, and get down to it.
Last night, my insomnia had a face.
Specifically, it had the face of a girl I spent a decade chasing in my dreams and in every waking hour. It took me another five years for that face to fade to something like a ghost, haunting me from the corner of my bedroom late at night.
All those years pushing that face out of my mind were wiped clean by a single glance from Madison Berwick.
She's still as gorgeous as she ever was. More, even. Those plump lips, that soft, silky skin, the way she looked at me like she could see straight through my ribs. She haunted my hours as I tossed and turned, trying my best to ignore the raging hard-on that wouldn't go away even as I focused on how angry she was.
She hates me. It's plain to see. I understand why.
