The Lie

She looks back at me.

“Yes,” I tell her. I can’t lie. “I’m always happy with you.”

And yet the truth is so hard to swallow.

Her eyes dance softly, her smile a delicate profession. “I’m happy with you.”

My breath leaves me. I can’t explain how her simple words make me feel. It’s as if my soul has been gently nudged awake from a long slumber and she’s the first sight I’ve seen.

There’s nothing to say to that. Just this understanding of how each of us feel. We make each other happy.

I almost reach out with my hand and place it on hers, just to feel her flesh, her warmth, but then the warning bells go off, ringing in my ears.

“You’re leaving,” I say suddenly. “Next week is your last.”

“I know,” she whispers. “I’ve been trying not to think about it.”

“I’m nowhere near done with the book.”

“You’ll find someone else to help you with the research.”

“But someone else isn’t you.”

“I guess I’m irreplaceable,” she says smartly, though when I glance at her, her expression is pained as she stares out the window.

Eventually we arrive at Balmoral, only to see the gates are closed.

“Maybe the Queen doesn’t want visitors today,” I tell her as I put the car in park, engine running.

I expect her to be disappointed but she just shrugs. She takes a sip of her coffee, now cold, and winces at the taste of it.

“Maybe we could find another castle nearby,” I suggest.

“It’s fine, really. This was never about the destination, Brigs. This was just about spending time with you.”

She’s slowly undoing me, thread by thread. I stare at her in near awe, this wondrous creature who wants to spend time with me. This rare and beautiful being who says I make her happy, maybe as happy as she makes me.

“Whatever do you see in me?” I ask her quietly. I can’t help it.

She tilts her head, frowning at me. “I see you. What do you see?”

I suck in a breath through my teeth, the words hesitating in my mouth. I let them go.

“Everything,” I tell her with a pure ache in my chest. “I see Natasha. I see everything I shouldn’t want. Everything I do want. Everything that makes the world keep turning on its axis. You have no idea what you do to me. No idea.”

She leans forward, eyes pleading. “Then show me what I do to you.”

“You’re leaving,” I whisper.

“Show me,” she says more urgently. “Show me.”

I oblige her.

I grab her face in my hands, my fingers pressing into her soft cheeks, and I kiss her. It isn’t gentle. It is hard and feverish and wet as my lips crash against hers, as our tongues flow over each other, uninhibited. The fire inside is spreading everywhere, filling every hollow part of me. I let out a moan into her mouth as she returns my kiss with wild desperation, her hands holding my biceps tight, her nails digging into my shirt. My cock twitches in my pants, nearly a surprise, and I’m suddenly aware of how acute my desire for her is.

I slide my fingers into her hair and she moans softly, the thread around my heart spinning and spinning.

My lust is growing, unparalleled, and I’m very close to losing control of my body, of my spirit, and just handing it all over to her.

But I’m married and she’s leaving me.

And whatever it is I want from her, it can’t continue like this.

I break away, my lips aching from her absence, and we both stare at each other, breathing hard.

“I’m sorry,” I say, trying to catch my breath and compose myself. “I’m sorry. That was wrong.”

“Was it?” she asks softly. Then it’s as if she catches herself. She shakes her head and leans back from me. “Yes, of course it was wrong.”

“You’re leaving,” I tell her.

“And you have a wife.”

“But I don’t want her to be my wife anymore,” I say, shocked at my admission. I exhale loudly and rest my head on the steering wheel. “I never wanted it like this. A fucking mess. I would have gone on in my marriage for many more years without knowing I was missing something.”

“Eventually you would have woken up,” Natasha says. “The human heart isn’t meant to be caged by someone who doesn’t feed it.”

I turn my head, still pressed against the wheel, and manage to smile wanly at her. “That’s very poetic.”

“It’s true. You owe it to yourself to make yourself happy, especially when you’re with someone who isn’t happy either.”

“What are you saying?”

She raises her brows. “Well, I’m saying…what are you going to do when I’m gone?”

I shake my head, staring absently out the window at the trees that line the estate. “I don’t know.”

“Go back to the way things are with her? You said yourself there is no fixing it.”

“There isn’t…but…I would do it for Hamish.”

“That’s not the right answer.”