Page 12 of Nemesis

No… It couldn’t be.

The blood drained from my face and my mask faltered when I came face-to-face with the one person I never thought I’d see again, the only man I’d ever loved.

The man I spent seven years trying to forget.

The man I left behind to kill another.

He stepped across the threshold, and the room instantly felt smaller. The air shifted, Victor’s greetings fading into the background as everything seemed to come to a stop. As if he could hear my thoughts, he lifted his head and familiar dark eyes settled on mine, holding me in place.

I couldn’t look away even if I wanted to.

It can’t be.There is no possible way for him to be here.This has to be a dream.

The air pressure in the room dropped, leaving something heavy sitting on my chest, crushing it under its weight, stalling the breath in my lungs. My heart hammered against my ribs as blood roared in my ears.

How is this even possible?

I was prepared for every obstacle that would come my way, but I had never prepared for this.

Never prepared for him.

He is even more beautiful than I remember.

In front of me, dressed in an all-black suit, stood the only man who had ever haunted my darkest desires. The only person who showed me that I wasn’t alone in this life after the murders.

The man I left to protect. And now he was back to protectme.

My chest ached at the thought, pain searing through my middle as if the bullet that had lodged inside years ago was resurfacing, leaving a firing trail as it crept up without warning, threatening to take me out at the knees.

He seemed to occupy more space than what I remembered. Everything about him just seemedbigger.

Despite the blaring alarm in my head warning me to break the connection, I couldn’t resist taking him in. My gaze moved over his form. He was taller, had broader shoulders, and thicker thighs filled his suit. My eyes trailed over his face, taking in this older, more… ruthless version of him.

Tanned skin, dark brown eyes with a small speck of hazel in the left bottom corner of the right one, and full lips with a full beard decorating his jaw.

Even after all these years spent apart, he was still quite possibly the most beautiful man my eyes had ever landed on, and despite all the slight changes, he still was, stillfeltlike my Theo.

Everything about him still felt so familiar, all the way down to the ache in my chest that had never left.

Fuck, is this why this hurts so bad?

Knowing how good he felt in my arms but not being able to run up to him. Knowing he’d been mine once and I’d forfeited the rights.

As he approached, a single tendril of his dark wavy hair fell down his forehead, brushing against his harsh brows, grays gracing his temples.

My mouth went dry and a tingle of awareness spread across the pads of my fingertips. A flush enveloped my entire body as the memory of my fingers running through that same hair, tugging, pulling him closer flooded my mind.

It’d been seven years, yet my body still reacted to him as if I’d only left yesterday.

The memory quickly dissipated when I realized he stopped in his tracks, a slight frown pinching the skin between his brows. His strong bearded jaw shifted as he took me in, his deep brown eyes roaming over my body in a slow, calculated assessment.

His eyes traced the shape of my face, sending a rush of warmth through my body. For a slight moment, we both shared the same stunned expression, an unspoken connection coursing between us. The longer I stared, the more I was convinced I was imagining him.

Until my name escaped his lips on a breath, confirming that this really was him, that he was really here.

“Sofia…?”

My name on his lips triggered something inside me, something I hadn’t felt since the night we’d spent together.