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Almeida’s.
    Their eyes met across the room, and Lila saw it.  The moment that fake smile was wiped clear off his face.  She saw the Jack Almeida that she’d known all those years ago for the first time, clear as day, right there in front of her, at his engagement party. Not at the Crimson event, not on the desk in her office, but right there. There he was.
    It made her heart start a war inside her chest, desperate for escape.  Without a word, she turned and made her way quickly toward the door, ripping her eyes away from the stage just in time to see Jack bounding down after her.
     

3
     
    He’d better not be behind her.
    That was all Lila knew as she sped out of the reception room and down the long hallway.  She wasn’t sure where she was going, or whether this was the direction she and Chelsea had taken when they’d walked in.  They’d been so busy joking and laughing, Lila hadn’t thought about paying attention to what path they were taking.
    Simpler times.  Lila longed to go back to fifteen minutes ago when her biggest worry in the world was how to get the confetti and glitter off her red lipstick.
    This building was more complicated than she remembered. As she made millions of desperate lefts, rights, twists, and turns, she knew that she’d gotten lost.
    She also knew that he’d better not be behind her.
    She was afraid she might murder him.
    As she turned down another deserted hallway, she found herself at a dead end. With a curse from deep in her throat, she turned on her heels, ready to move the other way.
    The sight of him stopped her cold.  He was behind her, standing dead center in the middle of the hallway, closing in on her with long, slow strides.  His chest heaved under his suit as if he’d just finished running a marathon.
    “Get the fuck away from me,” she growled.
    He held out his hands and braced himself.  He was ready to catch her if she ran.
    Lila thought about trying it.
    His hands shook.  “Lila…” His voice shook, too.
    Lila clawed at her bedazzled clutch, gritting her teeth against the tears that threatened to sting her eyes.  She’d be damned if she started crying.
    “Get the fuck away from me.”
    “I was going to tell you.”
    “Oh yeah?  And when was that, Jack?  Before or after you fucked me?  Because you haven’t had one real thing to say to me since the moment we saw each other at that Crimson event.  Or the moment you took me out of my classroom and screwed me in my office.  So, please, tell me… when the fuck were you planning on bringing up the fact that you’re about to be married?”
    “I didn’t… I couldn’t…” His mind raced, and so did his eyes.
    She could always tell when he was struggling with the words in his head, picking, choosing, rearranging.  That was the lawyer in him.  He was sure he could talk his way out of this one.
    Lila jabbed her trembling clutch bag towards him.  “How could you fuck me in my office, on my desk, knowing good and well that you had a fiancé waiting in the wings, Jack?  How could you?”
    “Because, Lila, I don’t know how else to be,” Jack erupted, having given up the struggle against the words buzzing in his mind.  He couldn’t take the time to think up the perfect thing to say to her at that moment because he realized it didn’t exist.  All that existed to him at that moment, looking at her for the first time in a year, was the god’s honest truth. It was all he had left for her. It was all that coursed through his veins every second she stood there, looking at him the way she was now.  “I don’t know how to be near you and not be inside you, touching you, fucking you.  I don’t know how to do that.”
    “You son of a bitch.”  Lila’s chest heaved as she shook her head. She moved to walk past him, not surprised when he reached for her.  She snatched her arm out of his reach, feeling like her heart had been ripped clear from her chest.  The strong flash of pain she felt