Chapter Text
JAMES
It’s only my second day back in London and I already loathe it.
It’s been raining non-stop — hardly shocking — and normally I don’t mind the rain, if I’m honest. But here it’s different; here it makes everything look grey and cold and vaguely depressing, as if every colour in the world decided to pack up and leave. And I hate it. Utterly.
Of course, it has nothing to do with the city and everything to do with me. I know that. I’m railing against my own country simply because being here is a constant reminder of every poor choice I’ve made and every regret I’m destined to drag around forever. So yes, I fucking hate coming to England, even for the briefest of visits.
I adjust my blazer as I step out of the limo, barely sparing the man who opens the door a glance. He probably thinks I’m some entitled arse who believes he’s above everyone else. The truth is far less flattering: I’m just an arse, full stop. And tonight I haven’t the patience for niceties or basic human decency.
Because I’m in London and I desperately wish I weren’t.
I stride into the building, ignoring the press calling my name. I don’t bother pausing for a single photograph, trying not to show how much the relentless flashes set my teeth on edge, or how the after-images leave black spots drifting across my vision all the way to the lift.
The days when I had to pose and smile because I was the golden boy and the face of Beaufort, are long gone. My father’s been out of the picture for years, so no one’s hovering over me demanding I grin like a soulless puppet.
Yet no matter where I hide or what I do, the press still manage to drag me into the spotlight.
I sigh, already exhausted, because I know that the moment those lift doors open I’ll have to smile and pretend I’m delighted to be here. Just another decorative background character at the Children’s Hospital Gala, which, admittedly, is a cause I care about and donate obscene amounts to every year. I simply prefer to support it from a safe distance. But this time my dear godmother, Elisabeth Ellington, is hosting, so I was morally strong-armed into attending.
Inevitably, the short lift ride ends, and I find myself before a pair of enormous mahogany doors, guarding a party packed with impeccably dressed members of the nation’s elite and enough fake smiles and hypocrisy to make me question humanity all over again.
I pinch the bridge of my nose and, for the hundredth time tonight, regret not insisting that Lydia come with me. The moment I stepped into the ballroom, I felt the shift — the way people turned to look — and now it’s painfully clear that arriving alone was a spectacular mistake.
The vultures have already begun to circle. A single, very wealthy man is practically sport at these events, and I’ve no idea how I’m meant to make it through the night without offending every woman determined to brand son-in-law or potential fiancée across my forehead.
So, naturally, I make straight for the open bar.
And of course Alistair is already there, nursing a drink and looking at the party as though he’s been done with it for hours.
“You’re late,” he says the moment he spots me.
I roll my eyes. “Be grateful I came at all.”
He snorts, unimpressed. “And risk the emotional guilt-trip my mother would heap upon you?”
I don’t flip him off only because the bartender asks for my preference at that exact moment, and well, priorities.
“She did threaten to hunt me down herself if I dared not to show,” I mutter, taking a sip of my drink. Whiskey. Neat.
Alistair hums and sips his own. I catch a glimpse of it and can’t help the snort.
“What on earth are you drinking?” I ask dryly, eyeing the pink-and-yellow concoction complete with a tiny pink umbrella.
Alistair rolls his eyes. “This was my dear brother’s choice,” he says, clipped. “He told the bartender to give me the gayest drink available.”
I stare at him, feeling my jaw tighten.
“Please tell me you told him to go fuck himself.”
“Couldn’t,” he says, setting the nearly finished drink back on the counter. “He was with his entire posse of posh, smarmy posers.”
I grunt. “Of course he was. Fucking arse.” We both stare indifferently at the room. “But why did you drink it, then?”
He gives me a sheepish smile. “It turned out to be pretty good.”
I huff a laugh. “Idiot.”
We don’t say much for a while — just two best friends standing there, looking thoroughly bored with the whole spectacle.
“How long are you staying this time?”
I sigh. “If it were up to me, I’d leave straight after this, but Ophelia wants me present for some business meetings this week and the next.” I roll my shoulders, already feeling the tension settling in. “So — two weeks, max.”
“And you won’t combust?” he teases, the annoying prat. “Two whole weeks in a place where—”
“Fucking shut up, man,” I cut in, my voice low and warning. I have no desire to be teased here, of all places, about the pathetic reasons I can’t stand being in England.
Thankfully Alistair bites his tongue, though he still rolls his eyes at me. And I know exactly what he’s thinking, because it’s the same bloody word that stares back at me every time I look in the mirror.
Coward.
And there’s no point pretending otherwise.
I finish my drink. “Come on. Let’s go say hello to your mum, then get the hell out of here and drink ourselves stupid somewhere else.”
Alistair raises his glass in a mock salute, drains it, and says, “And that’s why you’re still my best friend.”
We don’t get far before we’re cornered by the first group of women — of all ages, mind you — asking whether we’re available to dance. Even Alistair gets this sort of attention, despite never been shy of making his preferences clear. But they don’t care. They see the name, they want to marry into the name, and whatever indiscretions the man commits, they’ll happily overlook so long as they get to live comfortably and flash a respectable surname at dinner parties.
Not all women are like that, obviously, but the ones who stalk these social events like they’re on a hunt usually are. It’s a modus operandi we learned to spot early on.
I let Alistair do the talking — be his usual charming self — and very politely inform them we’re not available at the moment. Meanwhile, I allow my most unfriendly expression to settle into place, because the last thing I need is anyone getting the wrong idea.
When Lydia comes with me to these sorts of events, her perfectly honed “resting bitch face”, as she calls it, does all the work of keeping people at arm’s length. If only the twins hadn’t come down with the flu.
“Didn’t tell you,” Alistair mutters once we’ve shaken off the women, “but my mother’s been playing matchmaker. Went so far as to set me up on a date with a banker.”
I’m fairly sure my eyebrows are halfway up my forehead. “Why? I thought she was still pretending you’re going through some prolonged rebellious phase.”
He shrugs. “I’m almost certain she’s accepted my preferences are here to stay and is now terrified I’ll die alone. I’m the only one who isn’t married, after all.”
“Wouldn’t put it past her,” I mutter, shaking my head.
My godmother is a good woman who adores her children, but she’s also the sort who conveniently ignores anything she doesn’t like or can’t accept. And Alistair’s homosexuality has always been a sore subject for his parents, something they see as a major flaw in a son who, by every other measure, is the best they managed to produce. And since I know the other two children, I can confirm that’s not an exaggeration.
We find Mr Ellington first, deep in conversation with a few business associates, but he breaks off immediately to greet me warmly. Our exchange is polite and superficial — the only sort of conversation one can reasonably have at these things — but I can tell he’s genuinely pleased to see me. I think the last time we crossed paths was at New Year’s, nearly ten months ago.
A moment later, a female hand lands on my arm.
“Hi, stranger.”
My skin crawls at the voice, at that unmistakable tone. I don’t even need to turn to know it’s Elaine Lewis, formerly Ellington. And honestly, was it strictly necessary for her to give me that flirtatious look? She’s married. Her father is standing right there. Hell, her husband is in the same building.
I accept the kiss on the cheek because it’s expected between our families, but I pull back at once with a curt nod. “Elaine.”
I don’t even pretend to pay attention to whatever Elaine is saying. She’s the sort of person who twists every word to suit herself and stirs up trouble simply because she’s bored, which, somehow, she always is. And even if she weren’t married, that’s a mistake I’m not willing to repeat. Ever.
Thankfully, I’m spared when her husband comes to fetch her so they can go and greet some associates, none of whom look even remotely pleased about it. As I watch them walk away, looking like they barely tolerate one another’s existence, it only reinforces my belief that marriages of convenience should have died out decades ago.
There’s no amount of money worth selling your happiness for. And I sincerely hope those two never reproduce, that’s a fate I wouldn’t wish on anyone.
I share a look with Alistair, who has always regarded Elaine’s marriage with something between exasperation and pity. I know he feels sorry for his sister, but at the end of the day, that was her choice.
“James, darling, you made it!”
I startle at the cheerful voice. Alistair’s mother has always been unnervingly light on her feet, you never know she’s there until she decides to announce herself.
A skill we learned to be wary of in our teenage years.
I lean down so she can kiss both my cheeks. “I did promise I’d come,” I say, giving her a genuine smile.
Mrs Ellington nods approvingly. “I haven’t seen you dance, though.” She fixes me with one of her piercing looks before directing it at Alistair as well. “Or you, for that matter.”
“And you won’t,” Alistair replies far too cheerfully. “In fact, we’re leaving.”
Elisabeth looks at us as though we’ve personally wounded her. “This early?”
The shrug Alistair and I give her is so identical we’ve joked for years that we must have been separated at birth.
She huffs. “If you keep avoiding these parties, how are you supposed to find a partner and get married?”
The urge to roll my eyes is almost overwhelming, but I manage to restrain myself, otherwise I’d earn one of Mrs Ellington’s infamous lectures. Alistair, naturally, fails to show the same restraint.
“You’re not getting any younger,” she mutters sharply, planting her hands on her hips. “And I do want grandbabies.”
“You have those already. Two, in fact,” Alistair reminds her. “They’re spawns from hell, mind you, but they’re still Frederic’s kids, so they count.”
The look she gives her son is entirely unimpressed, but she doesn’t deny the ‘spawns from hell’ part, because, frankly, they are. The eldest is the same age as Lydia’s twins, but neither Rosie nor Henry can stand him. And the younger is no better.
“And let’s not forget Lydia’s kids — the only children we actually like,” Alistair continues. “So that’s four, Mother. Don’t be greedy.”
I shove my hands into my pockets and try not to laugh.
“Also, twenty-nine is hardly old,” I add, a bit more bitterly than intended, but honestly, every woman in my life has been pestering me to find a partner and settle down.
Even my niece and nephew made a comment this morning about worrying I might die alone if I don’t get married soon, an idea, I’m certain, planted firmly by my dear sister.
“Anyway,” my godmother says, brushing aside our words as if we haven’t said anything at all, “there’s someone I want to introduce you to. Two in fact. One, I think would make a suitable partner, the other is more of a backup plan in case I truly don’t know your tastes, but I doubt it.” Then she gestures towards a woman a few tables away, chatting with a mixed group.
She’s tall, curvaceous and—
“I don’t date brunettes,” I blurt out before I can stop myself, and my tone is so firm it startles her.
She narrows her eyes at me. “James Beaufort, you cannot seriously be dismissing a woman over something as trivial as her hair colour.”
I’m entirely unmoved by the glare. “That is exactly what I’m saying.”
And I’m not even remotely sorry about it.
Because it’s the truth, an absolute, immovable truth about me, and one I’ve no intention of changing, no matter how charming the woman in question might be. Blondes and redheads suit me just fine. But brunettes…
Nothing against them personally.
They just tend to confuse me, and drag up memories I’d much prefer to leave buried.
And of course luck isn’t on my side, because at that precise moment the brunette in question starts walking towards us, with a bright smile, eyes locked on me like I’m the bloody highlight of her evening.
Shit. Just when I thought I might escape this place without having to be an arse to a single woman.
Apparently, my dear godmother has also run out of patience for polite society.
“Don’t bother, darling,” she says to the woman the moment she reaches us. “My godson here doesn’t date brunettes.”
She delivers it snippily, as though it’s somehow the poor woman’s fault. The brunette blinks, confused, then touches her hair with the expression of someone who suddenly wonders if they’ve committed a crime.
“What?” she asks, forcing an awkward, uncomfortable smile.
“Nothing against you,” Alistair cuts in smoothly before I can open my mouth. “Our friend here is just… strange.”
I purse my lips, but fine, that’s fair. “That’s true,” I admit with a shrug.
Mrs Ellington gives us both a withering glare before sweeping the brunette away by the arm.
And knowing her, she’ll probably try to convince the poor woman to dye her hair or something equally ridiculous.
“Let’s get out of here before Mother returns with her in a wig,” Alistair mutters.
I nod far too eagerly.
“Wait a moment, the two of you,” Mr Ellington calls before we even manage a single step.
The men he was speaking with earlier have vanished.
“I’ll be giving a speech in fifteen minutes,” he says, checking his watch, “and I want the family present for it.”
He gives us a pointed look that makes it very clear this is not optional.
Fifteen minutes, plus another ten for the speech. Fine. I can endure half an hour more. Probably.
But before I can agree, Mr Ellington calls out to someone behind us, and we all turn.
The moment I see who it is, everything inside me stops.
It’s ridiculous how fast it happens, like someone has reached into my chest and pulled a plug. One second I’m upright, breathing, functioning; the next, I’m hollowed out.
I can’t remember his name, but I know exactly who he is. Wish I didn’t. Wish I didn’t care. But I do. I fucking do.
The ballroom noise seems to fall away in pieces, the string quartet blurring into a distant drone, the chatter dissolving into static. I let out a slow breath, and when I try to take another, nothing happens. My lungs clamp tight, stubborn, useless.
I force myself not to react, not to give any sign of the chaos detonating inside me. I lock my jaw. My fingers twitch. My vision tunnels, then widens, then tunnels again. I stare past the man as though he’s no one at all, while every part of me screams.
Alistair notices, I can feel his gaze on me, unblinking, far too perceptive for my liking. He knows perfectly well who this man is; he knows what this is; he knows me. His voice cuts through the fog when he says my name, sharp, insistent, but I keep my eyes forward, because if I look at him I’ll fall apart right here in front of half the aristocracy.
My eyes betray me anyway.
They slide back to the man.
He’s only a few years older than me. A notable MP, well-liked, polished — Conservative, naturally — which explains why Alistair’s father greets him so warmly. He carries himself with the easy confidence of someone accustomed to applause.
And my gaze, traitorous as ever, drops to his left hand. To the ring. The one I already knew would be there… but seeing it is something else entirely.
A punch.
Right in the ribs.
I need to get the hell out of here.
But he steps forward before I can move, offering his hand with a polite smile.
“Charles Doux.”
I shake it automatically, my body moving without permission. I think I say my own name, though James Beaufort sounds wrong — hollow, like someone else said it for me.
Then Mr Ellington asks after the man’s wife.
And it hurts.
Chris, it physically hurts to watch Charles’s expression soften, all fondness and pride.
“The pregnancy hasn’t been kind to her, but she’s managing,” he says.
The words land like needles under my skin. My chest tightens again, tighter this time, and I know, with perfect clarity, that I’m never coming back to England. Not willingly. Not sober.
My hands begin to shake, small tremors I can’t stop. I shove them into my pockets before anyone notices, though I know Alistair already has. He keeps whispering my name, quiet but urgent.
I don’t look at him.
I can’t.
I can’t face the pity there, not tonight, not ever.
“But my Alice has been a warrior,” Charles continues, oblivious. “Tough as anything. Nothing ever fazes her — that’s why I married her.”
He laughs.
And my mind simply… stops.
Everything inside me goes white and empty and burning.
This time, I do look at Alistair.
He takes one look at my face, clicks his tongue, and rolls his eyes — in that for fuck’s sake way of his — and then grabs my arm. Dragging me out of there.
He pulls me through the crowd, through the maze of tables and crystal glasses and oblivious smiles, and out onto the nearest balcony, blessedly empty. The October cold is knife-sharp, unforgiving but I welcome it. The sting on my skin gives me something real to hold on to, something that isn’t the aching collapse inside my chest.
I breathe in ragged swallows until I manage to reassemble myself enough to feel… not steady, but something resembling functional.
Alistair doesn’t speak. Doesn’t touch me. Doesn’t look at me.
He knows better.
He’s seen this before.
And only when I’m as close to “myself” as I’m going to get — which is not close at all — I whisper, barely audible:
“She didn’t marry him.”
Alistair sighs, long and tired and deeply exasperated.
“No. She didn’t.”
And just like that… I break all over again.
~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•
It takes me a humiliating amount of time to pull myself back together.
My body can’t decide which form of breakdown it prefers. I swing between not breathing at all and breathing too quickly, dragging in gulps of cold night air until the world tilts and darkens at the edges. My shirt feels too tight against my throat; I loosen the tie, shrug off my blazer, but it’s useless. I’m overheating, burning from the inside, while my hands shake with a cold that feels bone-deep.
After all this time, why does it still undo me?
Why can’t I move on?
It’s pathetic. I know it’s pathetic. But knowing it doesn’t stop the feeling, doesn’t stop the years-old wound from tearing open like it never healed in the first place.
Unresolved things and regrets are a bloody nightmare to live with. They cling to you like wet clothes. They lurk in the back of your skull like some stalking shadow. They’re the kind of pain that hides quietly until it’s ready to gut you. Like a cancer or terminal disease — invisible, but always there, eating away, consuming slow but sure.
I drag both hands down my face, far harder than necessary, trying to scrub away the panic, the grief, the years of everything I refused to face. Eventually, I gather enough of myself to look at Alistair.
He hasn’t moved from his spot. Hands in his pockets. Shoulders relaxed. Not once has he tried to calm me or touch me or say some useless “it’s okay” nonsense. He’s simply held the space around me, letting me fall apart without interference, without judgement, but also without leaving.
He’s always known the difference between comfort and suffocation.
His gaze stays on the city, not me. London sprawls beneath us, damp and gleaming from the earlier rain. The cold air clings to everything like a second skin. And even I can admit — for all the things I hate about being here — the city is beautiful like this. Quiet. Metallic. Bruised.
I rake a hand through my hair.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
It wasn’t meant to sound like an accusation, but it comes out that way regardless.
He doesn’t answer at first, doesn’t even twitch. He stands completely still, as though he’s weighing which version of the truth I’m capable of hearing. Then his eyes narrow, his mouth pulls into a thin, unimpressed line, the kind that promises I’m about to get the answer I asked for, but not the one I want.
“Didn’t find out until a month later — after we saw her accepting the ring,” he says, his tone thoughtful, his gaze still pointedly avoiding mine. “My father told me she only said yes to avoid humiliating the man,” he adds, tilting his head towards the glass doors, indicating the party beyond — the man beyond. “Since he proposed in a very public place.”
He’s right.
Who the hell proposes in the most posh restaurant in all of London? A high-profile arena filled with politicians, celebrities, journalists, people who thrive on gossip and scandal. Even bloody Charles Doux would go to a place like that.
“But apparently she ended things that same night,” Alistair finishes.
My eyes slip shut.
Because that was two years ago.
Two years ago we were in the same fucking place at the same fucking time, watching another man slip a ring onto her finger. And I felt something inside me collapse, implode quietly, like someone had knocked the last support beam out from under me when I saw her accept it.
But Alistair’s explanation still doesn’t answer my bloody question.
“And why didn’t you tell me then? When you found out?”
He lets out a long, heavy sigh. His shoulders sag, the kind of sag that comes from carrying someone else’s self-inflicted burden for far too long. And when he finally turns to look at me, the expression I feared — pity — isn’t there.
Instead, there’s anger.
Real anger. Worn, exhausted, justified anger.
“I tried,” he says, voice rough from the memories. “I tried a hell of a lot. Until I got tired of smashing myself against your stubbornness.”
The words hit with more accuracy than I expect. I flinch, jaw tightening, breath catching. I open my mouth to deny it, to argue, but he doesn’t give me the chance.
“I flew to bloody Hong Kong when you wouldn’t answer your phone in those first months. You didn’t even bother opening my emails. The ones I had to send like I was a fucking coworker.”
This time I flinch visibly. Because it’s true.
After that day, I ran. Not just left, ran. Fled. The only thing I knew with certainty was that I couldn’t be here, couldn’t stay in the same country as the mistake I’d made and the aftermath that haunted me.
I lied, even to myself. I claimed I needed to oversee the Asian expansion, that work demanded it. But we all knew the truth. Lydia knew. Alistair knew. They let me go anyway.
And I didn’t answer their calls of their texts.
Not for weeks.
Not for months.
I drowned myself in work and alcohol, day bleeding into night until everything blurred into numbness.
“And no matter how loud I shouted,” Alistair goes on, voice cracking, “no matter how much I wanted you to hear me, you bloody wouldn’t. You’d just shout louder. Or get drunk and high on whatever you could get your hands on.”
He drags in a ragged breath.
“You wouldn’t listen to Lydia or me if we so much as mentioned her name. Then you’d stop talking to us for weeks. So we gave up.” He shakes his head, jaw tight. “We figured at some point your pigheaded stubbornness would give way. That you’d ask about her. Or at least keep tabs on her — like you did for years.” He rubs the back of his neck. “But you didn’t. You just kept avoiding everything. Even coming back to your own home.”
I shut my eyes, and it hits.
All of it.
Everything I’ve avoided. Everything I’ve run from. Everything I’ve pretended I didn’t feel.
“You can’t force someone to listen when he doesn’t want to,” he says, softer now, not pitying, but tired. “And a part of me hoped that if you wouldn’t listen, then at least you would move on.”
My throat tightens. I swallow, but it does nothing.
Move on.
Those two words feel like a sick joke.
Move on from what? From who? From the one thing I’ve spent years pretending didn’t exist while breaking myself in every possible way to avoid thinking about her?
“But you didn’t,” he finishes.
And this time it doesn’t feel like he’s accusing me.
It feels like he’s stating a fact, something carved into me years ago, something I’ve never outrun despite all my frantic attempts.
Something ugly.
Something true.
I feel it crack through my chest, and for a terrifying second, I’m certain the whole bloody party can hear it.
I grip the railing behind me, knuckles white, because if I don’t, I might actually slide down to the floor.
I can’t look at him.
Can’t look at anything.
He’s right. He’s fucking right.
And hearing it out loud makes everything I’ve buried roar up all at once, violent and merciless.
I didn’t move on. I never even tried. I just ran — and kept running — and now here I am, cornered by the truth I’ve been sprinting away from for not just two fucking years, but far, far longer than that.
And there’s nothing left between it and me.
~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•
I’m a fucking joke, that’s what I am.
Ten fucking years and I can’t move on. Not even an inch. I’m still trapped, stuck in the amber of everything I didn’t get to keep. Everything I ruined with my own two hands. Everything I never apologised for because I left before I could even try.
I’m condemned to be a walking mistake full of regrets, dragging the same ghosts behind me like a chain I welded on myself.
Alistair and Lydia don’t understand it. Or maybe they do, maybe they’ve always understood it too well. Maybe that’s why they never push, never demand more than the scraps I’ve managed to give them over the years. It’s not hard to figure out what my problem is. I’m not complicated. I’m not some tragic mystery.
I’m just… stuck.
Rotting where I stand.
Still bleeding from something that should’ve scabbed over years ago.
A round of applause erupts from the other side of the doors, sharp and sudden enough to jolt me out of the spiral. Right. Mr Ellington’s speech.
We missed it entirely.
I glance at Alistair. He meets my look and nods once, and just like that the spell breaks. We both know what comes next: reality. Pretence. Polite masks and rehearsed smiles. Back into the glittering room full of people who have no idea that I nearly fell apart twenty feet from them.
We start walking.
“If he asks what part we liked the most, I’m throwing you under the bus,” Alistair mutters as we step inside.
I try to smile, to play along, but it comes out as a grimace, a pathetic twist of my mouth that fools absolutely no one.
I really want to leave this place.
I fucking need it.
And just my luck, that Mr Ellington walks straight towards us, and for a split second I genuinely fear he’s about to quiz us about the speech, and my mind is already rifling through believable lies, ready to bullshit my way through whatever sentimental nonsense he surely said. I’ve sat through enough of these events to fake my way blindfolded.
But he doesn’t stop.
He walks right past us — right between Alistair and me — not even slowing.
I blink, taken off guard.
Alistair tracks him with his eyes, curious but relaxed.
I turn too, more out of habit than interest, just following the line of Mr Ellington’s purposeful stride.
He’s tall enough to block whoever he’s approaching. Broad shoulders, perfect posture, that commanding Ellington presence that always makes people step aside. All I can see is the vague outline of a smaller figure hidden behind him.
And then—
A hand.
A small hand lifts into view, gesturing lightly in greeting, fingers moving in that familiar, delicate way.
And the world beneath my feet goes loose.
Because I know that hand.
Even before I see her face.
Even before my mind has time to form her name.
My body knows.
It’s like recognising a ghost by the way it breathes.
My heart stumbles once, hard enough to hurt, and every drop of blood in my body seems to surge upward, roaring in my ears.
I know exactly who that hand belongs to.
And suddenly the room feels too bright, too loud, too close, like the air has warped around me.
“Holy fuck,” Alistair whispers beside me.
And some twisted part of me wants to laugh. Because of course. Of course this fucking day keeps getting better and better. Of course this is what I get for coming back. I should’ve stayed in Hong Kong, or New York, or the bottom of a bottle, anywhere but here. Anywhere but where she could be.
Mr Ellington steps fully aside, turning toward us, placing himself beside the person he greeted with more enthusiasm than I’ve seen from him in years. That alone should’ve been a warning. That alone should’ve told me something was coming.
I don’t look at her face.
Not immediately.
Not even though it’s the one thing I’ve wanted, needed really, for years.
My eyes latch onto the safe details first. The details that won’t kill me. Or so I tell myself.
The hair — long, chestnut, falling in soft waves to the middle of her back. The exact colour that has haunted every woman I’ve ever tried to date since. The silhouette — lean, elegant, wrapped in a black dress that fits her like it was stitched directly onto her skin. Understated, effortless, devastating.
And then… her face.
Minimal makeup.
She never needed more than that.
Almost bare-faced, and still she’s the most beautiful woman in the room. In the city. In the fucking world, if I’m honest, which I hate to be.
I swallow, throat painfully tight, then wet my lips as if that will somehow fix the dryness in my mouth. It doesn’t.
Yeah.
I don’t date brunettes.
Because the only brunette I ever wanted — the only one I ever begged the universe for — is standing right there, looking at me with nothing more than a polite, bored sort of acknowledgement. A glance that means absolutely nothing to her and everything to me.
My heart twists in on itself, sharp and humiliating. The old wound splits open like it’s been waiting for the chance.
Ten years.
Ten fucking years of not being able to move on.
Because one doesn’t move on from Ruby Bell.
Not really.
Not ever.