Page 116 of Contention

“You’ve got to be fu…Gale! You can’t just drop him on me and go on vacation.” Kara feels like pulling her own hair and throwing herself out a window. Like going splat on the cement outside. Like looking at her guts on the sidewalk. “This- this isn’t a good time.”

Gale’s eyes are soft, almost pitying as she quirks her lips at Kara. “He’s sending me for you, Kara.”

This gives her pause, chilling her. “Who is? And why for me?”

“Dieter. He’s sending me down to Arizona to meet with your father and represent him during the initial investigation of embezzlement. Dieter’s paying for it.”

Shock is a dull sensation, like a smooth rock rubbing against her skin. Kara knows she should feel special; Dietrich sending Gale, his prize representative, means something. At the same time, it also means he’s closing the net around Kara, removing the only barrier between them.

Gale.

Chapter 28

Frustrated that she can’t find her wayward date, Kara heads out towards the empty elevator hall, eager to get outside and get some fresh air. She needs to escape. Hell, she’s happy to go home and hide for as long as it takes for her heart to repair itself.

“So, that’s it? You show up here and tell me off, only to run and hide?” Nick’s cold voice stops her in her tracks. “Disappointing. I thought you’d fight a little harder. Instead, you just want to lie down and die.”

Kara swallows thickly, hearing him walking up behind her. “I bet you’re blaming me for having morals,” she says shakily. “I bet you’re blaming me for your mistake. Guess what, Nick; mistakes have consequences.”

His hands fall on her shoulders and instantly she feels the walls come down around her. She wants to turn around and cry into his chest and beg him to tell her it isn’t true, that he hasn’t been promised to someone else all this time.

The what they had…twisted as it was…was all a lie.

A strangled sob curls in her chest, slipping out of her lips against her will. Hearing it, Nick turns her around slowly until she’s facing him, her eyes wide and her lips trembling. Her anger has burned into mental anguish.

“How could you do this to me?” She stares up at his pretty blue eyes, noting the way he exhales hard, his hands tightening on her.

“I didn’t do anything to you,” he replies with a whisper of frustration. He really seems to want to convince her that nothing has changed. “I’ve been engaged to her for years. It has nothing to do with you, Kara.”

“Regardless of how you feel about it,” Kara says with a cracking voice, “You’ve made me feel like a whore in at least a thousand different ways. But this? This hurts. The backstabbing-”

One of his hands runs through her hair before touching her cheek. “You’re beating yourself up overnothing. Just let it go. Forget you ever found out.”

“Well, are you going to break off the engagement?”

“No.” Flat. Final.

“Then, we have nothing to talk about. I’m not going to play this game with you, Nick.”

He presses his forehead to hers, grinding his teeth. “Kara,” his voice is husky. “Please, sweetpea, don’t be like this. I want you-”

A soft voice breaks through the tension, cutting right through the emotions burning the air into nothing. “Excuse me. I’d like my date back, Nick. You appear to be monopolizing her.”

Nick stiffens, pale eyes shadowed in the dim lighting of the hallway. He pulls back from Kara slightly, searching her face, anger in his jaw. Not directed at her. “We’re in the middle of a conversation. Entertain yourself with someone else for a few minutes.”

Dietrich is a shadowy silhouette in the archway, leaning against the frame, arms crossed. Kara can’t see his face, but she knows he’s likely watching them with that awful, shark-like expression. Cruel, empty, and cold like the ocean far from land. Ominous. Ruthless. “Shall I tell yourfiancéewhere you are? She’s looking for you. What would she think if she saw you two together…” his voice drops in midnight chocolate tones, “…whispering in the dark, alone?”

The verbal reminder is like a knife, digging just under Kara’s ribcage. A burning, sharp pain. Suffocating in how terrible it hurts. A gentle reminder that the man in front of her can never be hers.

“It doesn’t matter what she thinks,” Nick replies sharply, jaw clenching, shoulders hunching up. “Dieter, if you could fuck off, that would be absolutely welcome.” Kara marvels that he must be upset, to curse like that. He never curses unless he’s fucking.

There’s a snort from the archway.

“It’s over, Nick.” Kara says as calmly as she can, even though it feels like her heart is shriveling into nothing. “You may not care about the situation, you may live a nice little private life, but I refuse to be wasted on someone who will never be with me the way I want.”

“No, no no. Kara,stoptalking like that,” Nick rasps, looking at her with a strange sort of nervousness in his eyes. “This doesn’t have to end. Nothing has changed! Weagreedon no strings attached.”

Feeling her eyes watering, Kara can’t stand to meet his gaze any longer, averting her face sharply, inhaling. It feels like inhaling a burning gas, the way her lungs catch. “I wish that were true. You expectfar too muchof me. I’m not emotionless. I’m not a machine.”

---