Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Bea.”
Her steps faltered. She turned, already knowing who she’d find. It had been a couple of days since the benefit dinner. This city was plenty big enough for avoidance. Part of her was alarmed at the sight of him, now, outside her office. A smaller part was glad he’d come.
Gage King was as tall and broad as she remembered, but he looked leaner now, harder. Every hair on his dark head was in place, jaw freshly shaven, three-piece suit cut to perfection. Her heart softened at the sight of him.
She slowed as she approached. It was December, warm, early evening—any other time of year might have felt less wistful. He stood perfectly still beside the car, posture composed, contemplating her in this…way, steady and unreadable in equal measure.
He’d always been untouchable, his control a wall no one breached.
Until her, but that was before. Now she saw him again from the outside, looking in.
She stopped two steps farther away from him than she would have just over a year ago.
She registered the extra inches, and from the way his fingers twitched, so did he.
He tilted his head toward his Aston Martin, idling at the curb. “Get in.”
That was a uniquely terrible idea. Rafael would hate it. Every bone in her body implored her to walk away. But she was curious, too—about his timing, and what in the world had possessed him to come.
Gage didn’t speak again, just waited. That was worse than words. It made refusal feel theatrical and obedience inevitable. Because it was him.
Her first love. Her first everything. The man who’d never been careless or cruel. It wasn’t altogether simple to turn away from that man when he wasn’t asking for anything but a conversation.
Is that what he’s asking?
Bea moved toward the Aston. He pulled the door open.
She could still change her mind. Still turn and go. She could do anything except get in.
She slipped inside. The leather hugged her, remembering her shape, and for a beat it was like stepping back in time. The scent was familiar, so was the way the car seemed to cocoon her from the world.
Only this time it nipped, because she didn’t belong here anymore.
The door clicked shut like a verdict. Her stomach pitched. Not fear—premonition. Neither of them was going to come out of this moment totally unscathed.
“You saw me the other night,” she said, as he pulled them into the Northgate streets.
“I did.”
“You didn’t…say hello.” She played with the straps of her tote bag.
He glanced over. “You were busy.”
No hint of accusation. But it still stung.
She stared forward. “It’s been a long time. What are you doing in Northgate?”
“Meetings.”
“Of course.” Brilliant, Bea. Pulitzer-worthy reply.
His gaze traced the waves of her shorter hair. Seen through his eyes, it felt oddly like rebellion. “You’ve changed.”
Her throat pinched. She had to force herself not to touch it. “Just a hairstyle.”
“More than the hair,” he said quietly. His gaze lingered. “You look good.”
Her heart kicked. The last time she’d heard from him was that text about eating more. The one she never responded to. “I’m sorry I didn’t reply,” she blurted. “I wanted to thank you. I got the food you sent, I just didn’t know how—”
“Bea,” he said in that understated way of his. “I got it.”
She needed to steer them to safer territory. “The internet tells me you and Nate have been breaking records.”
Hopefully that didn’t make her sound like a stalker.
“Work keeps us busy,” he said vaguely.
She shifted in her seat. “Um, how have you found London?”
“Not that different from the UR.” A pause. “Just colder.”
Her gaze darted up, snagged on his for a beat, then skittered away.
They came to a stoplight. He kept looking at her until she looked back. His blue eyes caught hers. “And you?”
“What about me?”
“How was the Graduate Enrichment Program?”
Bea gave a half-shrug, lips quirking. “Like torture I enjoyed. Stockholm syndrome, but with data. So much data. I still wake up sweating about the Capstone Project.”
The corner of his mouth edged higher. Approval she didn’t want to crave. It still felt like winning something, making him do that. The light turned green.
He didn’t say anything more, just let the silence stretch until her skin itched with it.
Finally, Bea sighed. “Why are we driving, Gage?”
He smoothed a hand once along his jaw, eyes never leaving the road. “Because I wanted to see you. And we both know Griffin wouldn’t let me close.”
He was right. Not alone, anyway.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
She swallowed dryly. The real answer was that she shouldn’t be here at all.
Bea gripped the straps of her tote bag, searching for words. He didn’t push. Gage, with all his maddening patience, simply needed to wait.
“Because I’m not sure I can not come when you ask me to,” she whispered, finally.
His grip on the steering wheel tightened infinitesimally, but she caught it. They sat in charged silence for long moments.
“Are you happy?”
The question gutted her. She wanted to explain, to apologize, to justify…to spare him. Truth was the only avenue.
“I am.”
His jaw ticked. He seemed to be concentrating on breathing steadily.
Then came the dagger. “You love him?”
Her lips parted. Closed. Tried again, failed again. She didn’t owe him a response. But the fact that she didn’t have one was a different sort of answer, one that said too much.
Gage waited. Patient, merciless. She had no idea what he read into her silence.
At last, he nodded once. “Let’s get you home.”
Bea’s phone buzzed in her tote just as Gage pulled up to her apartment complex.
RAFAEL
Missed call (3)
Her palms went damp. Fingers hovered. She looked up—and her body locked still. Rafael was already there. And every line said he’d been waiting.
“Always a nuisance, Griffin,” Gage said, tone mild.
“I have to go,” she said hurriedly. This could still be salvaged. She just needed to touch him, explain.
Gage didn’t stop her. He simply watched calmly as she climbed out of the car. Bea glanced left and right. For now there was no one else nearby, except both of the men’s security. She had only taken a few steps when the driver’s door opened.
Bea could feel the storm rise in Rafael as Gage adjusted his cuffs like he had all the time in the world. His control itself was the provocation.
“Rafael—” she began.
But Gage spoke first, walking forward. “Relax, Griffin. She’s safe.”
Bea’s breath caught. Her stomach turned with dread. If Gage put himself in the middle, Rafael was lost to her.
Her gaze cut to Gage, sharp with alarm. Don’t put yourself there.
But he wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were on Rafael.
Rafael scanned her once. Clothes. Demeanor. Skin. As if confirming she was unharmed. Then—the shift. The second his attention was leveled at the other man, the air around him turned lethal.
Gage saw it too. When he spoke, his tone was almost conversational. “She’s still cautious about you.”
Her lungs constricted. Don’t. Don’t throw it in his face.
“You don’t get to speak for her.” Rafael didn’t raise his voice, yet every syllable carried possession and warning.
Gage made a sound in his throat, between a hum and a scoff. “And you don’t get to pretend you’re the only one who knows her.”
Bea’s gasp was audible. That wasn’t him—Gage didn’t provoke. Not like that.
Rafael went still. Just long enough for her to hope he’d let it pass.
She didn’t even register the movement when it came.
Rafael’s fist cracked against Gage’s jaw, clean and brutal, the sound shattering the air. Gage’s head snapped sideways. He staggered but steadied, rolling his jaw once.
Blood was already at his lip, but his reaction was calm, cutting. “Predictable.”
Rafael surged forward, all power, no pause. He threw another blow at Gage’s ribs. Gage absorbed it, grunted, and answered with his own swing. Not speed—mass. Rafael’s brow split open, a thin line of red cutting through control.
They were too close now. Rafael’s movements were clean, precise, a fighter’s economy. But Gage took punishment like something built to endure. Every time a hit should have dropped him, he straightened, jaw set, and smashed back.
Each strike landed like it had been waiting years. They weren’t just colliding: they wanted this.
“Stop!” she yelled.
Her voice vanished under the sound of bone on bone.
“Gage! Rafael! Stop it!” Neither man seemed to hear her over the reckoning that had finally found them.
She looked frantically over at Rafael’s men.
They’d leaned forward a fraction, tension visible in their shoulders, but they stayed rooted.
Gage’s detail stood the same way, suits stark, eyes fixed on the fight.
Four trained men, close enough to stop it, choosing not to.
As though they understood why it had come to this and why intervening was impossible.
Bea couldn’t stand still and watch them tear each other apart. Not over her. And she knew, with a sinking heart, that she couldn’t save one without losing the other.
Urgency dragged her forward. She closed the space behind Rafael and wrapped her arms around his waist, holding on. He reacted instantly. She felt the shift through him, a sudden reorientation of weight as he moved to cover her rather than avoid the hit.
Which meant that Gage’s next punch, already in motion, landed clean against his ribs.
Rafael inhaled sharply beneath her hands.
“Rafael!” she yelled, voice cracking. “Take me inside!”
Her plea sliced through the noise like shattering glass. Both men froze, breath ragged, bodies coiled tight, the space between them still vibrating with violence.
Rafael turned. He looked down at her, eyes burning.
Her stomach twisted at the sight of him—blood streaking down one side of his face, swelling at his cheek, fury still alive under his skin. She started to check on Gage.
But before she could, Rafael lifted her, scooping her into his arms. And maybe that was mercy. Because if she’d seen Gage’s face, she might’ve undone everything.