My cheek feels an instant chill as his hand releases me. The pain in my right hand still burns, but when he releases it, it feels like its being crushed by four thousand pounds of metal again.
I hug my body tight and look up at him. His jaw is hollowed and his face is clenched. “Emma, I—I don’t know how to tell you. I’m trying to show you how I feel. I’m not good at this.”
I sniff back a tear and breathe deep into my gut. “You need to leave.”
My eyes clench shut, and I hold them still, waiting for him to move. When I open them it is just in time to see him back away, rubbing the back of his neck. He looks around the room one more time before gaining his full composure. Right before my eyes I watch as the Asher Gutierrez I met in Italy becomes the Alexander Asher I know he really is. The man who uses and takes. He didn’t get what he wanted so he is walking out the door.
I walk over to the window and watch him cross the street and climb on his motorcycle. He revs the engine and then just sits there idling, looking at my front door as if waiting for me to come out.
I must be a glutton for punishment because, for a brief moment, I consider going outside and going with him. Absolutely not. I have pride.
He’s forgetting he accused me of dishonesty and trickery. I can’t forget the way he made me feel, standing with my bare feet looking at a sea void of his presence. He left me. He disappeared.
And what did I do?
I followed him to New York.
“When you first took the job in New York I thought it was because he lived there. Like you needed to be near him or something.”Leah’s words echo in my head. I lean down and let out a low scream at the fact she was absolutely right. I didn’t know if he would be here. I didn’t know if I would ever see him again. But I have to stop lying to myself and own up to the fact I wanted to see him. And he’s here, looking devastatingly gorgeous and saying the right words and he wants me to follow him.
“There is a fire between us, Emma, and I know we’re gonna get burned.”
I walk over to the front door and slam it shut.
chapter TWENTY
Gasping.
Gasping.
Breathing is too hard.
I need to count.
Beats.
One, two, three, four . . .
One, two . . .
Gasp.
One . . . Two . . . Three . . . Four.
Breathe.
Breathing.
It’s pitch black and the clock confirms it’s the middle of the night. My shirt is plastered to my back. Sweat is trickling down my chest, starting at my forehead. I wipe my hand across my head, brushing the hairs stuck to my skin away from my face.
I had a dream. We were in the car driving fast. So fast. This time, instead of asking Luke to drive fast, I was begging him to stop. My voice shouting over the radio, pleading with him to save his life.
He wouldn’t listen. His foot like a lead weight pushed down on the accelerator and all of a sudden there was a bolt of lightening. Everything went white and then there was a fire. Raging fire. Burning. We crashed, and we were burning. When I stepped back to see if Luke was okay, his face had changed, morphed into someone else.
It was Asher.
I like to be the first one in the building every day. I do a check of every room, make sure the chairs are in place and stands are at the correct height for the first class. I assess the decorations on the walls and make sure they are relevant to the month’s theme. In a small room on the second floor, we keep an inventory of unused instruments. I double-check it every morning making sure nothing has been stolen.
When I have fully assessed the building, I make my way to my office. The building is mostly quiet. Classes don’t start until two and end around seven. That’s when the building is really alive.
