one night with the alpha

009

Cressida

Her eyes fluttered open to a sunlit room and the last man she'd ever expected to see sitting by her bedside. She tensed and her heart stopped for a moment before racing on as if she were being chased. Clutching at her covers she slowly sat up.

Cress pressed herself against the wall as if to force it back and give her room to escape the incisive gaze of the man she'd never wanted to see again. The man she'd ached to see so much it hurt.

He looked aloof, unapproachable, nothing like the man she'd known five years ago. His eyes were direct as they trapped her gaze, hard and uncompromising. He still looked the same as he had that day as if time had had little effect on him. But there was a hardness to his handsome face that her memory had somehow missed.

Whilst she fought against the surge of confused emotions that rioted inside her, there was nothing on his face to indicate he saw her as anything other than a distant acquaintance. Nothing to show that he'd ever undressed her with reverence and sweet kisses.

Shame washed over her as she drew her legs up as if to shield herself from the disinterest he showed her. Why had she thought he might feel something for her? Just because she'd never felt anything close to what he'd engendered in the few hours they'd had together didn't mean he'd felt the same. Just because his mere presence had her heart speeding in excitement and the attraction she'd felt for him was even more potent didn't mean he'd be as affected.

Was she ever going to stop making a fool of herself over him?

"Cressida," his voice was even-toned, low and cultured. Against her will, her better judgement, she reacted to it, a shiver racing down her spine. A caress that had pleasure curling into the pit of her stomach. "I'm sorry for all the trouble that has come your way because of me."

A lump lodged at her throat as tears fought to fill her eyes. She held them back. "Is that all you can say?" she asked in a pain-filled voice. The last thing she wanted was to let him know how much he still affected her but she couldn't seem to hold the hurt back. "After all this time that's all you can say?"

"What would you like me to say?" he asked in that same calm tone.

That you missed me, thought about me over the years, looked me up and wondered if I'd ever been with someone else the same way I was with you. That you regretted leaving me that day and thought about coming back to me.

Cress had better sense than to say any of that out loud. Her ego could only take so much damage before she came to her senses. "Nothing," she replied to him with a slight stiffening of her shoulders. "Now that you've apologised you can leave."

"You must have some questions," he stated instead of leaving as she'd asked.

With her heart squeezing itself into a painful lump she straightened her legs from a position she realised was too vulnerable, too telling of her state of mind. "Why would you give me straight answers?" she asked him aware of the tinge of bitterness in her tone.

"Nothing I ever told you was a lie," he replied in that calm tone that she wanted to shake out of him if she hadn't been so intimidated by him.

"But it was never the whole truth."

"It was deeper than I've ever told anyone."

Cress looked away from him, wondering why she was so desperate to rewrite what they'd had, to make it seem like it was something more dignified than what it had been. A one-night stand. Was it so terrible that she had been human enough to fall for a handsome face as had many other women before her? She might just be one of the few he'd bothered with after, even if it was years later.