Page 46 of Daydreamer
We all turned towards him as he stormed across the atrium.His eyes were fixed on Harry’s arm, and a muscle was jumping in his jaw. Harry looked between us for a moment before a sly smirk took over his features.
“Moretti,” he said, tightening his arm so he was pulling me into his side. Felix’s eyes flashed. “What are you doing inmybuilding?”
“Your building?”
I breathed a sigh of relief when Verity broke through the tension, slapping her husband on the chest as his arm went from around me to give his wife a hug and kiss the top of her head.
“Idesigned it, you cheeky sod,” she said to her husband and then turned towards Felix. There was a beat of awkward silence with both men staring daggers at each other. “Hello again, Felix.”
“Don’t even look at my wife,” Harry snapped at Felix before he could answer, moving in front of Verity to block her from Felix’s view. “And bugger off. I don’t want someone who would accuse me of industrial espionage in our building.”
“I apologised for that,” Felix said through gritted teeth and Harry narrowed his eyes.
“That’s all very well, but it’s my reputation you threatened. I could sue for defamation of character, you prick. As for what you did to Lucy?—”
“Lucy’s none of your business,” Felix spat out.
“Oh really?” Harry taunted. “She’s more my business than yours apparently. Look what happened to her when you made her your business?”
You could cut the testosterone with a knife, which was completely ridiculous, but I wasn’t about to make a scene in the middle of?—
“Fuckoff, city wanker,” spat out Emily, as she strode over to us, back from her loo break. Emily had never been afraid of ascene. “Who let this dickhead in?” She walked right up to Felix and gave his shoulder a hard shove. He barely moved, but his gaze did flick down to her.
“Hello, Emily,” he said evenly. I was surprised he remembered her. Felix always seemed so above me and my friends back in Little Buckingham.
“You’re leaving,” she said as she gave him another hard shove, this time with both hands. He still didn’t move. It was like his body was made of stone. Probably from his stupid gym in his stupid house. Vain prick. It’s not like he needed all those muscles for the boardroom. Anyway, I didn’t care about him and his stupid muscles now. At least that’s what I told myself, ignoring the fact that my stomach was flipping and the yearning I had to walk into those muscular arms was so strong I almost couldn’t catch my breath.
“I need to talk to Lucy,” he said, his gaze going from a now red-faced Emily, who was still putting all her force behind trying to shove Felix out of the building, to me. She carried on shoving and grunting, but his eyes and focus never wavered from my face. He looked like shit. I mean, don’t get me wrong, on a hotness scale of one to smokin’ he was still a solid eleven. But his tie was loose, and his shirt was a good few days past needing an iron, and his stubble was no longer designer – it had progressed into a thick, scruffy beard. My chest felt tight. Was he missing me as much as I missed him? I took a step back, fighting against the urge to go to him and forcing down the acute need to hold him. This wasn’tmyFelix. That Felix had never really existed.
“She’s,” Emily gave another shove, “not,” another shove (harder this time), “going,” she was now breathing hard as she gave Felix a continuous push, her feet sliding on the floor unable to get a proper grip, “to speak,” another grunt, “to you,” a growl, “you fucking prick.”
One of her feet did slip then, but Felix grabbed her by both shoulders to steady her, then lifted her gently in the air and put her on her feet to the side while muttering, “Careful, you’ll hurt yourself.” Emily was red with rage now. She was not the type of woman able to tolerate being lifted off her feet with very little apparent effort and set to the side. Emily simply wasn’t the type of human you set to the side at all. Her face started screwing up and I could see a serious escalation in the offing.
“Em,” I said, and everyone’s gaze shot to mine. “Stand down.”
Emily huffed and crossed her arms, but she didn’t go back to physical assault, so I took that as progress. When I was sure that she was no longer in attack mode, I transferred my gaze to Felix. His eyes scanned my face as if he was memorising every inch of it. He took a step towards me, and I took a corresponding one back. His eyes dropped to my feet, and he frowned, but he didn’t step closer again. Then he did something so un-Felix, so earnest, it almost shook my resolve. Whilst holding eye contact with me, his blank expression cracked, and naked pain flashed across his features.
“Please,” he whispered; despite the buzz of the room, it was like he’d whispered it directly into my ear. The raw quality of his voice, the absolute desperation had me rocking forward onto my toes. I was so close to just going to him. He tensed at my movement, his whole body on alert, muscles bunched in tension, practically shaking in an effort to hold himself back. But then I remembered. Felix didn’t care about me. He fired me. He hadn’t protected me. He didn’t like who I was, and he had never really bothered to find out anyway. So I rocked back on my heels, taking another small step back. Felix’s eyes flashed before he closed them slowly.
“I don’t think she wants to talk to you, Moretti,” Harry’svoice filled the silence. He was enjoying this. “So, I’ll repeat: get out of our goddamn building.”
Felix ignored Harry, reaching into his back pocket and pulling out a copy of my book.
“I’ll leave once I talk to Lucy,” he said, still staring at me.
“Moretti—”
“For fuck’s sa—” Emily started, but I cut her off.
“It’s fine,” I said, just wanting to get this over with. I took a deep breath in and out and walked towards Felix, away from the others. His chest deflated as he let out the breath he must have been holding.
“Lucy… Are you okay?” he asked when I stopped a couple of feet away. Now that I was closer I could really see how terrible he looked. His cheeks were a little more hollow, like he’d lost weight, and there were dark circles under his slightly bloodshot eyes, “I had to see you. I’m so sorry. Lucy, I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I should have listened to you. I should never have?—”
“How did you know I was here?” I narrowed my eyes at him.
He cleared his throat and darted a look at the interested bystanders, two flags of colour riding high on his cheekbones. “I may have had some security watching your flat.”
My eyebrows went up. “What on earth?”
