Page 57 of No Strings Attached
She leans in with a laugh like it’s a joke, like this is cute, like I didn’t just lose the only woman who’s ever made me want more.
In that second, the realization lands so hard I almost forget where I am. It might be too soon, it might not make sense on paper, but that’s never mattered to me before. My instincts havealways been my greatest strength, and in this moment, they are screaming at me with perfect, jarring clarity.
I’m falling for Amira.
This isn’t just infatuation or attraction or something easy to walk away from. What I feel for Amira is rooted in something far more real.
And now, because of Celia, that woman is gone. Vanished from the room, the air sucked out with her.
She probably thinks I’m just like the last guy who let her down.
I’ve never been the kind of man to chase after something I wasn’t sure of. But I’ve also never been afraid to fight for something when I was.
And Amira is everything I’m not ready to lose.
“Come on, honey. Let’s enjoy the party.”
“Don’t,” I snap under my breath. “Don’t do this, Celia. Not here. Not tonight.”
But she’s already smiling wider, eating up the attention from onlookers and my mother, who looks as if she’s about to faint from joy.
I grab Celia’s wrist and drag her through the crowd, ignoring the way heads turn as we pass. I pull her into the corner hallway near the study, a place that is now completely soured.
She stumbles in her heels and scowls. “Henson, stop manhandling me?—”
“Youkissedme.” My voice is a whip now. “In front of everyone. What the hell were you thinking?”
Celia pouts. “I missed you. I wanted to surprise you. Isn’t that what people do when they want to fix things in a relationship?”
“Fix things?” My laugh is sharp. Bitter. “You dumped me over the phone, Celia. Because I wasn’t ready to propose to you, and then you gotengagedto someone else weeks later.”
“I made a mistake, okay? I regret it.”
I stare at her. At the flawless makeup, the dress, the calculated way her voice softens when she adds, “I want this. I want you.”
How could I ever have loved her?
And then I catch the sparkling ring on her left hand.
My stomach sinks. “Where the hell did you get that?”
“Your mother gave it to me when I arrived a few days ago. She said it was a family heirloom. That if you ever wanted to propose, this would be the ring.”
My blood goes cold.
Why the fuck would my mother give her that ring without talking to me first?
“Nadine invited me to celebrate New Year, and since I pieced together that you never told her we broke up, I just knew…” Celia smiles, twisting the ring on her finger.
“You knew what?” I snap.
“That you stillloveme and that you want this.”
I don’t even recognize my own voice when I say, “You have got to be fucking kidding me.”
Because I know what this looked like to everyone else in that room. She’s wearing my family’s ring. She just kissed me. She called me her love.
And Amira…
