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Her nostrils flare, her anger getting the better of her now as her eyes water.
“Tell me that isn’t true. I dare you.” I take a calculated step forward. “Tell me I wasn’t enough for you.”
Knowing would make this easier. If I had an ounce of knowledge, I know I’d be able to contend with whatever else would follow my decision to keep her here for six months.
“You were everything to me.”
Her words pierce me like shards of glass, the lies inside of them too poisonous for me to resist.
“Liar.”
The resounding smack of her hand on my cheek rings around us, echoing in the silence that follows.
“I loved everything you were to me, Beckett. It’s fucking insulting for you to stand there and question that.”
I brush my fingers across my cheek, feeling the fresh blood coming from the cut that had only just scabbed over.
“Do you blame me?” I question, dropping my hand from my face. “One minute you were here, and the next you left, and you took everything with you! Our love, our life together, our fucking future.”
“Don’t you dare blame me for that.” She heaves heated breaths, bringing a shaky hand to her mouth. “We were both willing counterparts in all of this. You blame me. I blame you.”
“You stole my future, Natalia.”
“So what? You get to steal mine?” She surmises so quickly, and I settle instantly. “That’s what this is, isn’t it?” There’s a fleeting ebb of sadness, but she covers it well. “I took your future, so you get to take mine.”
My lips pull into a small, noncommittal smile, and I shrug. “What can I say? You take what’s mine, I’ll take what’s yours.”
“I don’t remember you fighting for it to be any other way.”
“Well, no. Why would I?”
For all the years she was gone, I wondered at what point our sins bled into our love. Was it in the midnight hour or on our every waking moment?
At what point did Natalia look at me and decide our life together was worth the gamble? When did I decide to change the game?
“So, the rumours are true.”
A sickly-sweet voice breaks the silence, and Natalia and I glance to the doorway where Cassie enters with Sebastian behind her.
“Cassandra.”
Cassie’s name is a sigh on Natalia’s lips as she pushes away from me as if she doesn’t want to be seen with me.
The same contempt Natalia used to match Cassie with hasn’t changed. The years haven’t diluted the mutual feeling between them.
“I tried to stop her,” Sebastian says, his lips curled in disgust.
I’m too focused on Natalia’s reaction to care.
“Aw, come on, darling girl. An audience never hurt before.”
Natalia is quick to shoot daggers my way, much to my amusement, and I decide to handle business.
“What can I do for you, Cassie?”
“Alistair told me I’d find you here. I wanted to tell you I’ve managed to do some damage control with Tobias.”
Natalia snorts.
