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I laugh incredulously, the sound reverberating down the car park. Hearing how he now sees me makes this moment both easier and harder. Naïve Natalia had always hoped we’d see one another across a busy London street and the past would be history, but the devastation between us is too treacherous. If anything, it makes the foundations of my plight a little easier.
“It is when they turn out to be as disappointing as mine did.” His bitterness comes out in the bruising force he presses against my wrists. “You made me this way, Talia. You don’t like what you see because you did this to me. So, do you see it yet, darling girl? Do you see what I’ve turned into?”
“Not your darling girl anymore,” I say, struggling against his grip. “You turned out to be everything I knew you would.”
“And what’s that?”
He grins, as if he knows what I’m about to say, but I have weapons he’ll have long forgotten I possess.
“Your father.”
His hold loosens for a moment before the iron grip resumes, and I can feel the pressure bone-deep.
“I bet Alistair loves that his protégé turned out how he always hoped,” I sneer, delivering the blow with a vicious tone. “Bet between them they really did a number on you. With me out of the way, you finally got everything you ever wanted. The name, the palace, the company.”
I laugh in derision; attack is my best form of defence, and I have so much to say.
“How does my place feel?” I ask, biting the question at him. “As comfortable as you always wondered? Was I worth the sacrifice?”
“Is that what you think you are?” he asks, the heat lost from his tone by only a few degrees. “After all the years we had, you think you were a sacrifice I made? You forced my hand, Natalia.”
“I did?” I gasp, not fully out of shock. “You had enough to say leading up to my leaving. All of the promises you gave, all of the ideologies you had… it all meant nothing but to get you a better standing. We were just an issue to resolve.”
The arguing is the first piece of normal I’ve felt in years, and while it’s nice, it doesn’t take away from the damage. I notice how his shoulders slump a little, and Beckett suddenly sighs. Our eyes meet, and there’s a glint of something familiar, but it passes.
“You feel this too, don’t you?”
If he means the way my body reacts to his, then yes. His body rocks slightly as if to force more contact between us.
“It’s like nothing’s changed when everything’s fucking changed.”
The thrill of his body pressed delectably against mine almost rivals the deep-rooted venom that releases whenever I think about him.
“You’ve waited a long time for this, haven’t you, Tally?”
His lips breathe the words into my ear, his tone low and full of husk, while his hot breath sweeps across my skin, bringing with it a trail of goosebumps. I turn my head away as lips meet skin, and the familiarity of it all—his touch, his smell, his weight against mine—renders me victim.
“You’ve waited seven painstakingly long years to feel me pressed against you like this, forcing you to remember the good times, making you trust that stupid little heart of yours.”
Twisting my head away from his lips, I fail to free myself, but while seduction sweeps over me, my anger is mounting, and soon, he won’t like my response.
“I always knew that a girl like you, one who fell so innocently as a child, would always come back to me.” I feel featherlight fingertips graze my inner thigh, and my legs part as if to welcome his touch. “Such a tragic excuse for a female.”
Irony is his fingers finding I have no panties on as those words fall from his mouth, and my hands solidly slam against his chest, forcing enough gap for me to push him. His shock helps, enabling me to grab his shirt collar and force him.
“Such a tragic excuse of a female,” I mock, forcing his back against the wall. I press my knee up into his groin, applying just the right amount of pressure. “Back when I fell for you, I would describe myself as naïve, but now?” I snigger, zeroing a gaze of pure seduction on him. “Now, I know better.”
He grins at me, clearly not buying what I have to say. He frees one hand to curl it high on my neck, cradling my jawbone and cheek.
“Y’know, we’re a tragic love affair now, Beck.”
I condemned our love a long time ago, but now it feels right to voice it. We were ash when we should’ve been fire—fierce, hot, burning for eternity. I hate that we stand here in the smouldering debris because it’s a testament of our reality.
“And what makes it sadder is the fact we could’ve had it all,” I murmur softly, closing my eyes to his touch. “We could’ve ruled it all.”
He moves. Fingers curl around my neck, the pulse in my carotid beats beneath his fingertips, drawing his hand to close, and I allow him.
“But you ruined everything.” His hot breath races across my skin as he answers, pulling me close and consuming me whole while sending a fresh wave of goosebumps across me in its wake. “You’re ruining it even more by being here.”
