This isn’t real.
I must be hallucinating.
Or maybe I’m dreaming again, stuck in an imaginary moment and never woke up this morning.
But the more I stare at the man in front of me, the more tangible this becomes. He’s not disappearing.
Why isn’t he disappearing?
He usually vanishes about now. He becomes one with my dreams and stops bothering me.
Not now, though.
Now he’s coming inside the elevator—where I currently am.
Oh, shit.
The need to run hits me out of nowhere and it takes everything in me not to jump out of the elevator like a monkey.
My mission is put to an abrupt halt when the doors slide closed with brutal finality. Now, it’s only he and I in the car.
And I can’t breathe.
Damn it. Damn it.
Listen, brain, this is about the worst time for your meltdown. Help me out here, please.
I inhale deeply through my nostrils and exhale through my mouth a few times. That’s it.
The buzzing in my ears slowly subsides, and it helps that he faces the door, cutting off that intense eye contact. Or maybe I’m the only one who thought of it as intense.
His back is the only thing visible as he focuses on his phone and scrolls through it.
I’ve forgotten how larger than life he looks, how broad and tall he is. How physically perfect he is that it’s impossible to focus on anything but him. He’s wearing another Armani suit, dark gray, like the expression on his face when he walked in.
It’s been only a few seconds since then, but I could swear that he saw me, that he made eye contact. Did he not recognize me?
It must be the different clothes, hair, and thick glasses. Right. He couldn’t possibly relate Anastasia to Jane. We’re not the same anymore.
A brick the size of my laptop sinks to the bottom of my stomach, and it’s completely illogical. I shouldn’t be feeling this way because he didn’t recognize me. If anything, I should celebrate it. I should feel lucky.
But that’s the last sensation inside me as I dig my nails into the heel of my palm.
Then I peek at him, at the stranger from that night, and I’m once again struck by his majestic presence. He seems different than back then somehow, more serious, hard. Stuck-up.
And I can’t help thinking about his dominant orders when he fucked me.
Those dirty, dirty orders that subconsciously make me clench my thighs.
I internally shake my head in an attempt to push those images away.
What’s he doing at W&S anyway? Please tell me he’s only here on a visit and doesn’t actually work in the same building as me.
That would be just…cruel.
Just when I’ve left everything behind, something has decided to follow me. And not just something. Someone.
The British stranger who should be in New Jersey where I left him after he fucked me senseless.
“Do you work here?”
I jolt at the deep tenor of his voice, and an electric sensation zaps through my entire body. I almost forgot just how commanding his voice is, how it’s a bit mellow and cool to the ears.
God, just why does he have an accent?
He’s asking me, I realize. Either that or he’s speaking to a nonexistent person. I realize I’m praying he sees a ghost lurking in the corner. That would be less catastrophic than the alternative.
Next step of denial: hope that he’s merely curious about a random stranger in the elevator.
Though he doesn’t strike me as the type.
“Yes,” I say as calmly as I can manage. “I…started today.”
Please, let it go. Please.
My prayer is obviously not answered when he asks, still not facing me, “Which department?”
“IT.”
“What’s your name?”
“Jane.” My voice is lower now and I hope he doesn’t notice it, he doesn’t sense the tremor behind it.
But what he does is worse.
He turns around.
As in, he’s now facing me and I have a full view of him, of his chiseled face, sharp features, and piercing eyes that are glaring at me now.
He so infuriatingly beautiful, so handsome that there should be a rule against it. And when he glares? It makes him inexplicably hot and scary at the same time. His lips are set in a line, as disapproving as his eyes.
“That’s not true, now, is it? If I remember correctly…your name is Anastasia.”
Shit.
Fuck.
No.
He recognized me. Even with a completely different appearance, he recognized me. He shouldn’t have, but he did. And holy hell, did I tell him my real name? How could I be so careless, just how?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I feign nonchalance even though I’m physically pushing back against the metal railing.
It’s a cheap tactic, but it should be effective. People are mistaken for others all the time. This shouldn’t be any different. Besides, I did everything in my might to become the opposite of who I am. I wouldn’t be recognized by those I’ve known for years, let alone someone I spent a few hours with.
He steps toward me, or more like, he stalks, moving fluidly and with predatory steps that nearly make me wheeze.
Or maybe it’s the way he keeps staring into my eyes as if he’s ripping every single one of my façades apart and digging his fingers into the broken parts inside me.
It hits me then, the reason why I’m hyperventilating. I’m being burned alive by his sharp hazel eyes. They’re crushing and melting me and I have to stop looking at them.
But I can’t.
I feel like if I break eye contact, I’ll be in a worse danger than I am right now.
That he’ll use the change to confiscate a side of me I’ve been hiding from the world.
Even from myself.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about.” He reaches a hand toward my face and I flinch away, but he wasn’t actually going for my face.
His fingers flex around my throat and he digs the pads into the flesh of my neck as his other hand hits the stop button and something else.
But I don’t focus on that.
I can’t.
Not when all my blood rushes to where his hand is on the sides of my throat. It’s not harsh with the intent of stealing my breath, but it’s firm enough to trigger memories of that night.
Memories of him touching me, immobilizing me, and setting me ablaze in a blast of smithereens. And those thoughts are plaguing me right now.
They’re tearing me to pieces.
Setting me on fire.
Ripping through my bones.
And I can’t stop the images or the full-blown heat that invades my nerve endings, specifically the ones he’s touching.
“You don’t know me, so this is my first and final piece of advice to you. Don’t fuck with me. Not only will you be the one fucked over, but I’ll also take pleasure in tearing you apart and feasting on the remains.”
I’m used to living under threat. Being offered an ultimatum and never actually having a choice. But his way of doing it, with cold calm, slashes through the fairies in my stomach. They’ve turned black now, which is a signal to run the fuck away.
But I can’t.
Not with his savage hold on my throat. There’s a control in it, a simmering firmness, and it’s much more ruthless than the dominance I experienced when he fucked me.
This one is laced with a tinge of anger or displeasure. Maybe both.
“Now tell me what your name is. The actual one.”
“J-Jane…” I don’t mean to stutter, but I did and he must hear it, because his hold tightens on my throat.
“I don’t appreciate liars, beautiful. Especially conniving ones.”
“I’m not…a…liar…” He has to believe me. Otherwise, the new beginning I painted for myself will be null and void.
He can’t know who I actually am.
No one can.
“Your blood that I found on the condom would testify otherwise.”
I gasp, wheezing and shaking while he stands there still as a stone, a cold one that could be used as a weapon.
“I thought you weren’t a virgin.”
I press my lips together, unable to utter a word.
“Turns out, you were a virgin, after all, and since you lied about your name just now, it means you’re used to lying. So tell me, what’s your purpose, hmm? What are you after, Anastasia?”
“Jane… It’s Jane…”
“So it is Anastasia. I suspected it before, but now that you’re insisting it’s Jane, I’m sure that isn’t your true name.”
Oh, God.
Just who is he and why is he doing this? Is it just because I lied about my virginity?
But he shouldn’t be this intense, angry, and violent about it.
“What’s with the name change, Anastasia?”
Every time he says my name, a jolt rips through me. It’s fast and sharp and leaves me as breathless as his hold on my throat does.
I tap his arm, choking on my nonexistent inhales, but I don’t fight him. If I do, I’ll be giving myself away.
Besides, it’s not that I need him to release me because he’s hurting me. It’s more because my reaction to his hold is scaring the shit out of me.
It’s scaring me more than the fact that he found me or that he’s endangering my new beginning.
He releases me slowly, and I grab the assaulted spot, breathing harshly, the sound ugly in the silence of the elevator.
I should be focused on that, but all I can do is inhale his cologne, basically sucking it into my lungs. The lime and male musk is too familiar. I recognize it because it’s been on my mind for two weeks
“You didn’t answer my questions, Anastasia.”
“Stop calling me that.” I adjust my glasses, using them as a shield. “It’s Jane. My name is Jane.”
He’s about to grab me by the throat again. I can tell from the darkening of his eyes, and if he does, I’ll find no way out this time.
I won’t be able to escape.
So I use a tactic that’s common in my family. Distraction.
“I have an idea,” I say.
“What’s that?”
I duck and before he realizes what I’m doing, I push the elevator button.
The moment it opens, I’m dashing outside, running with all my might.
But I know, I just know this is only a temporary escape.
The war I unintentionally started is far from over.
