Miles led me to a quiet corner near the terrace doors, his hand hovering near the small of my back but not quite touching—aware of boundaries now that it was too late.
"You really do look good," he said, his eyes traveling over me in a way that once would have thrilled me.
Now it just made me want a shower.
"What do you want, Miles?"
He had the grace to look slightly abashed. "Direct as always. I've missed that."
"Miles."
"Fine." He sighed.
"I've been thinking about us. About what went wrong."
I stared at him, incredulous. "Seriously? Now? After all of these months of silence?"
"I needed time to process. To understand what I really want." He stepped closer, lowering his voice.
"And what I want is another chance, Sav. We were good together."
"No, we weren't." The candor of my response surprised even me. "You wanted an accessory, not a partner. Someone to make you look good at events and wait patiently at home while you worked eighty-hour weeks."
His jaw tightened. "That's not fair. My career?—"
"Is important, I know. But so was mine, which you never seemed to remember." I shook my head.
"We're not having this conversation again, Miles."
"Come on, Savannah. You know how compatible we are." His voice took on that cajoling tone he used when trying to get his way.
"Your marketing expertise, my development projects. We make sense."
And there it was—the Miles I remembered. Framing our relationship in terms of business advantages, as if love were a merger to be negotiated.
"I have to get back to my friends," I said, stepping around him.
He caught my arm, his grip just shy of too tight. "One dinner. That's all I'm asking. For old times' sake."
I pulled free.
"Goodbye, Miles."
I walked away, feeling lighter than I had in many months. Whatever spell he'd once held over me was well and truly broken—and not just because of last night.
Therapy had helped me see what I hadn't wanted to admit: Miles had never loved me, not really. He'd loved the idea of me, the image we projected as a power couple.
As I approached our table, I saw that a newcomer had joined the group. A broad-shouldered man with silver hair was speaking to Cami, his back to me.
My heart stuttered.
It couldn't be.
But as I drew closer, that now-familiar scent of cedar and bergamot reached me, confirming what my racing pulse already knew.
My mysterious lover from last night stood at my table, chatting casually with my friends as if he belonged there.
I froze, uncertain whether to approach or retreat.
