Natasha’s mind was moving a million miles a second, flashes of a younger Roan like a sheen over the figure that was headed in her direction in long, powerful strides. The memory of him. The mocking innocence of it all, how life had seemed so much easier. But with each step, it was fading, and his true colors loomed like a mournful shrine to the past he’d abandoned. On one side, she had as many questions as he did – what the hell was he doing back in New York, and why the hell hadn’t he told her he was leaving in the first place? On the other, there was blind fury, a red tinge like a haze over her powder blue eyes. She’d been two seconds away from grabbing the nearest empty beer bottle and chucking it at his head.
Murderer! She wanted to scream at him, her shoulders heaving as she sucked in several deep breaths. Her scowl was practically tattooed. You’re just like the rest of them! And he was – his shock at the sound and lack of verbal response to his given name was enough to confirm it.
But instead, she was lifting her pocketbook and pointing it at him accusingly as he leered closer, his face losing the shocked expression she’d initially installed on it. “Don’t you dare,” She warned, as if her purse might stop him from swooping down on her. “I swear, if you so much as touch me – “ But his arm locked around her, and Natasha’s body went as rigid as ice. It was a split second – enough to let her be herded towards the door. But it was his silence that broke the spell – what reignited her previous anger even brighter than before. She dug her heels into the tile, the sound scraping across her eardrums as the bar-goers moved fully to the back of her mind. It was only after he’d pushed her completely out of the bar that she managed to spin out of his hold.
Crack! At a slender 5′9 – taller, in heels – striking him clean across the face had come almost easily. The slap echoed in the empty hall, and she became all too aware of the tingling across her palm and the red mark appearing on his cheek. She’d hit him, and she’d hit him hard.
“You – how stupid are you?” She demanded, not bothering to lower her voice now that they were alone. Natasha hated him – her blood boiled, and despite the emptiness of the hall, there was a roar in her ears. The heartbreak he’d caused her was threatening to bubble back to the surface, to send her into a puddle of tears and sorrow like it had when he’d first left. Seeing him was like ripping her heart out again and cutting it clean in half. Natasha thrust her hand into her pocket book, letting it clatter loudly to the floor as she brought out her cell phone, unlocked it, and practically shoved it into his face.
It was a picture of him on a New York sidewalk, headed into The Garden. An image her friend had texted her only hours ago, which had spurred Natasha to leave the office and head straight there. Roan had taken everything into account – everything except that the mafia weren’t the only ones who remembered him.
“I should turn you into the police! You murdered him.” She seethed. You left me. “I should hand you over to the Italians – better yet, the damn Irish!”
She put up a fight, which wasn’t unexpected. Natasha had always been her own woman, no matter how much care she put into the politicians she managed. They didn’t own her heart or mind, and she was fiercely protective of both. But Roan did still have the advantage of strength, one of the few advantages he felt he had left to his name, and though she dug in her heels, she couldn’t stop him from hurrying her out the door. The sooner the better, too; he wasn’t much for praying, but he prayed now that everyone in the bar let it go as just another one of “those things” that happened in New York.
No sooner were they in the hall than he saw a blur out of the corner of his eye. Her palm landed squarely on the side of his face, and the skin she’d hit immediately flushed and stung. His cheek throbbed and his mouth hung open, but it happened so fast that it took him a moment to actually realize that she had indeed smacked him. One hand prodded gently at his face as he stared at her in shock. To be honest, it wasn’t the first time she’d had cause to hit him like this—when he’d been younger and even more stupid, he’d said one or two things that warranted a good wallop, and she’d rightfully delivered. But of course, this was the first time they were seeing each other after years, and this was the first smack that he felt as much in his heart as on his face.
The shock (tinged with a bizarre feeling of pride for her) melted quickly into dread that dripped like a sickly syrup into his stomach. The photo she held up to him on her phone was not what he wanted to see. No one should ever have seen this. Or him. Fuck. Natasha was ranting at him, but there was a ringing in his ears that wasn’t actually from the smack. Who took that photo? Who were they working for? How had they recognized him? Had they been told to look for him, or was it a coincidence? Millions of questions ricocheted around his skull, adding a headache to the throbbing in his face.
Finally, he looked up at her again. For a heartbeat, he was seeing her as he’d last seen her years before, young and hopeful, graceful and ready to take on the world. Then he blinked, and time righted itself so that he could see better the difference seven years could make. She was still beautiful beyond words, still graceful, still poised and polished, but she bore herself as a woman who had already experienced her share of hardships and had come away from them stronger than ever. The way her jaw was set, the rage in her eyes that made their blue irises crackle like lightning, he knew she’d learned better than most civilians how to take punches and throw them back (literally and figuratively) harder than she was given.
He tried to come up with a response. But nothing came to mind. No words that could explain away over five years of separation, of the things he’d seen and done, why he’d left her without a word as though nothing had ever happened between them. So his mouth made do for him.
