Forbidden Stranger Read online

  Nina was proud of him.

  She didn’t have the right to be. She’d had nothing to do with what he and his team had accomplished. Nina also didn’t have the right to be jealous of Ewan’s life without her, because she’d made this choice. She’d left him on the island, she’d done it again in that hospital parking lot, and if she was going to be brutally honest with herself, she’d also done it a few times before that. She’d left him, over and over, each time because she felt as though she had to. Every time she had returned, the next time she ended their relationship had been worse.

  If you left someone again and again, how could that be called love?

  Just remember that when you need me, I’m here.

  She believed him without a doubt. She went to sleep every night with his face in her mind; she woke every morning thinking of his voice. Yet so far, she’d been unable to bring herself to reach out to him, and the more time that passed, the more convinced Nina was becoming that she was never going to see him again.

  “It’s called closure,” Al said to her now as she tipped the bottle of wine to refill both their glasses.

  Nina rolled her eyes. “Closure. Uh-huh.”

  “Yeah. You know. Where you confront your feelings and then talk to him about them, maybe get an apology or something.”

  “He already said he was sorry a lot of times,” Nina said.

  “You didn’t accept his apology?”

  Nina shook her head. “It’s not about accepting the apology. It’s about being able to move past everything, to face the future together. It’s not about believing that he’s sorry, or even saying the same, myself. It’s about believing that neither one of us is going to keep making the same mistakes and causing the same hurts again and again.”

  “And you don’t think you’ll both change? Or haven’t already?” Al sliced into a thick slab of beef and tucked it into her mouth with a sigh of contentment.

  Nina had ordered the catered meal to her apartment, the best of everything Ewan’s money could buy, but although the food smelled good, she was weirdly not hungry. She had been without an appetite since the moment she’d watched Ewan walking away from her.

  Al noticed. She pointed her fork at Nina’s plate. “If you’re not going to eat that, I will. The question, though, is why aren’t you going to eat it?”

  Nina shrugged and debated pushing the plate across the table. She did, after a moment. Even if Al ate Nina’s meal, there was always more.

  “I don’t need to, I guess. I haven’t been as active lately. I’m turning into a couch spud.”

  “I hear that. I haven’t had my psych clearance yet, which means I can’t take any new jobs. Honestly, I figured I was done with all that, at least until they told me I wasn’t allowed to do it anymore. Have you thought about going back to work?” Al patted her flat belly lightly.

  “For ProtectCorps?” The question startled Nina. “No.”

  “Did Leona call you?”

  “Yes, a bunch of times, but she hasn’t asked me to come back to work. She just wanted to check in with me.” Nina paused, then added, “It took me a few minutes to remember who she was, the first time. I didn’t tell her that, though.”

  Al laughed and took another bite of meat. She chased it with some wine and sat back in the chair to study Nina. Her expression softened.

  “How is all that?”

  “It’s fine. Once the memories started coming back, they kept coming back. There will always be things I don’t remember, but that’s probably not a bad thing. I’m not having the blank-outs anymore. That’s what counts, in the long run.”

  Nina sipped her wine and forced herself to reach over to the plate she’d given up to Al. She cut into the thick slab of meat on her plate and took a bite. Tasteless. Nauseating. She stopped herself from spitting into the napkin, but only barely.

  “And your sister?” Al pulled Nina’s plate toward her with a pointed look.

  “The only reason she’s not in prison is because I pled on her behalf. She has kids,” Nina said in response to Al’s disgruntled expression.

  Al shook her head and gave Nina a sour look. “You forgave the woman who got your ass kidnapped by a bunch of lunatics determined to rip your head apart, yet here you are drinking wine with me on a Saturday night, instead of snuggled up somewhere sexy with your hot boss.”

  “He’s not my boss anymore.” Nina laughed, but ruefully.

  “All the more reason for you to work this stuff out.” Al leaned back in her chair and pushed the plate away from her with a sigh that said she wanted to eat more. “Listen. If you’re not going to get back together with him, you still need closure. It’s the only way you’ll be able to move on.”

  Nina rolled her eyes. “Al, c’mon. Since when did you get so philosophical?”

  “In my old age.” Al grinned and buffed her short nails against her shirt front before digging back into the food. She spoke around a mouthful. “But I’m serious.”

  The idea of seeing Ewan again, in person and not on a viddy screen, pushed waves of tingling anxiety through her. Al’s enhancements would let her sense Nina’s stress, probably. There wasn’t anything Nina could do about it.

  “It’s been months. Not a word from him in all that time.”

  “Sounds like he’s being respectful of your wishes. I mean,” Al paused to give Nina a look, “did you want him to chase you? I didn’t think you were the sort of woman to play games like that.”

  “I didn’t want him to chase me,” Nina said flatly. “I guess maybe I just didn’t want him to give me up so easily.”

  “I hate to break the news to you, lady, but you can’t really have it both ways.” Al finished what was on her plate and moved to Nina’s to chomp another piece of beef.

  Al was right, but that didn’t stop Nina from frowning. “Remind me again why I’m taking relationship advice from you?”

  “Because I’ll give it to you straight? I mean as straight as I can get, which we both know is generally not the term anyone who’s met me would use to describe me,” Al said with a grin. She sat back again with a sigh, this time to raise her glass. She eyed Nina. “He loves you, Nina. And you love him. I’ve never been much for that romance business myself, but you two almost make me believe it could work.”

  “There’s so much between us. I’m not sure we can ever get past it. Maybe Ewan and I aren’t meant to be together.”

  “Love doesn’t just stop because you want it to, Nina.”

  Nina shuddered and closed her eyes, embarrassed to weep in front of Al but unable to stop herself from giving in to the flood of emotions. She pressed her fingertips to her eyes hard enough to cause bursts of color. “I used to want this so desperately, you know? To feel again. To remember things. And now that I can, Al, it all hurts so damned much.”

  “Would you want to go back to the way it was before?” Al’s quiet words helped push away Nina’s tears.

  She opened her eyes. “No.”

  “Do you regret meeting him?”

  “No,” Nina said after a hesitation.

  “Do you wish you’d never loved him?”

  Nina had felt that way, but not anymore. “No.”

  “Far be it from me to tell you what to do with your life, but if you don’t just freaking go see him, I’m going to have to kick your ass.”

  Nina blinked. Al sounded serious. Looked serious, too.

  “I will fight you,” Al continued. “Rough you up. Knock some sense into you.”

  Nina laughed. “Yeah? You want to go a round with me?”

  “I could take you.” Al gave a small smile.

  Impulsively, Nina reached across the table to take her friend’s hand. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.” Al squeezed Nina’s fingers. “Now, what about dessert?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Ewan ought to have been better at giving speeches by now. He’d done his share of public speaking, spent his time in the public eye. He should have been used t