AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Ignoring the look of confusion on his face, she turned and ran.
‘Eva, wait! Damn it. Come back here!’ Nick shouted, his voice raw.
He’d been riveted to the spot by the unexpected sight of her walking out of the building. She’d lost weight, and her eyes, those luminous blue eyes, had lost the trusting look he remembered. But then he registered the sound of her feet pounding on the pavement and he sprinted after her.
He caught her in a few strides, grabbed her round the waist and hauled her back against him.
‘Let go of me.’ She stiffened, struggled, tried to prise his arms from around her waist. ‘I can’t do this. Go away.’
He inhaled, smelt the glorious scent of spring flowers in her hair, and held her tight, the slope of her breasts warm against his forearm. ‘We have to talk.’
She bristled, her fingers digging into his forearms. ‘You have to let me go,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’
He lowered her feet back to the floor, released his arms, and she spun round to face him.
‘I don’t want you back,’ she said, but her voice trembled and he saw the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. She was lying. He knew she was. She still wanted him. His heart stopped kicking his ribcage and swelled into his throat.
Grasping her hand, he squeezed hard, the euphoria of having her close again overwhelming him. ‘Yes, you do,’ he murmured, already anticipating the reunion he’d been obsessing about during the long, sleepless night flight from San Francisco. ‘Dump Bill.’
She yanked her hand out of his. ‘There isn’t any Bill. Tess made
him up.’
‘Huh?’
‘You heard me. I don’t have a boyfriend. But I don’t need one to know I’m not going to fall for you again.’ Her eyes sparkled with temper, making the dark blue turn to a vivid violet. She looked indomitable and wilful and more beautiful than even he could remember, and he remembered a lot. But he had no clue what she was talking about.
‘Fall for me?’
‘Oh, come on, Nick. Let’s not be coy.’ She thrust her chin out in a gesture he did remember, but this time there wasn’t an ounce of hesitation about it. ‘You know perfectly well I fell hopelessly in love with you. That’s why you turned tail and ran.’
He’d heard the declaration before, from other women, delivered in clinging, dulcet tones, or in simpering desperation. Tons of times. And it had never meant anything to him. He’d never once heard it delivered like a slap, with the spark and sizzle of anger and indignation and the underlying tone of misery. And this time it meant everything.
But instead of taking her declaration and trying to make himself believe it, he said, ‘You don’t love me—you can’t,’ in automatic defence. However happy he was to see Eva again. However much he’d missed her. However much he might want her back. He would never ask for that. Would never expect it. Especially not from her. Not when he would only hurt her. The way he’d hurt everyone else who mattered.
‘Don’t tell me how I feel.’ She hurled the words at him. The moment of fragility he’d witnessed disappearing as quickly as it had come. ‘You arrogant…’ she sputtered. ‘You egotistical…’
‘Berk?’ he offered.
Her eyes narrowed, but not before he saw the unshed tears. ‘Yes, berk,’ she said, the anger subsiding to be replaced by something much more disturbing. ‘You broke my heart, Nick, when you dumped me, but I’ve spent the last six weeks healing.’ She hitched a shaky breath into her lungs, and the bottom dropped out of his stomach. ‘And maybe I haven’t healed all the way, yet. But I will.’ She shoved her hair back behind her ear, her fingers trembling slightly. ‘Goodbye.’
She turned her back on him, started to walk away.
‘I didn’t dump you,’ he said, his voice hoarse, but the words surprisingly clear despite the swish of passing traffic on the rain-slick streets. ‘That’s not how it was. I left to protect you.’
Eva stopped dead at the low words, turned round. ‘To protect me from what exactly?’ she asked. Did he really think she was going to believe that?
‘From me,’ he replied, frustration edging the words. ‘What the hell do you think?’
Her eyebrows shot up her forehead. ‘You’re not serious!’ She could see it in his eyes, the shuttered, defensive look making her heartbeat stumble. But as much as she wanted to give in to the tenderness, to hold him close and tell him he was mad to think so little of himself, more than that she felt anger. At what he’d put her through. At what he’d put them both through. With his stupid inability to accept the truth about who he really was.
She marched back to him and socked him hard in the chest. ‘You stupid berk!’ she shouted, having no difficulty whatsoever remembering the name this time.
He stumbled back, his eyes widening. ‘What was that for?’
‘I cried for weeks after you left me that stupid note. And now you’re telling me you did it for my own good.’ The more she thought about it, the more she wanted to hit him again. ‘Like I was a silly immature little girl who couldn’t make up my own mind about who to love…’
‘You were a virgin, damn it,’ he shouted back, rubbing his chest where she’d punched him and looking aggrieved. ‘How could you know you loved me? When you’d never been with anyone but me.’
