The Forbidden Throb Chapter 54

Nicholas's POV:

I spotted her the moment I turned the corner.

Emma. Standing on the curb in her professional clothes, one hand raised to hail a cab, her profile sharp against the afternoon sun.

My hands tightened on the steering wheel.

*Finally.*

Since the makeup ball, she'd been a ghost. No calls returned, no texts answered, no trace of her anywhere I looked. Days of feeling like I was losing my goddamn mind while she just... disappeared.

And then Tom's text days ago: *Saw Emma getting dropped off at her dorm. Luxury sedan. Looked expensive.*

The image had been burning in my mind ever since. Emma, climbing out of some stranger's car. Emma, who'd claimed she had a boyfriend at that stupid party.

I'd even swallowed my pride and called Daniel yesterday, asked him to check the buyer list for that model—limited edition, couldn't be that many in Boston. He had the connections, the resources.

But he'd refused. Flat out.

I pulled the Porsche up to the curb and killed the engine, climbing out before I could second-guess myself.

"Emma!"

She turned at the sound of her name, and I watched her entire body go rigid.

Perfect.

I stalked toward her, my boots hitting the pavement harder than necessary. "Where the hell have you been?"

She didn't answer. Just turned back to the street, scanning for a cab like I wasn't even there.

The dismissal hit me like a slap.

"I'm talking to you," I said, stopping a few feet away. My voice came out sharper than I intended. "You can't just ignore me forever."

Still nothing. Her face remained impassive, her attention fixed on the traffic.

*Like I'm invisible. Like I'm nothing.*

Something hot and ugly twisted in my chest.

"Emma—"

"If you have something to say, say it." Her voice was flat. Cold. She still hadn't looked at me. "Otherwise, I have a class to get to."

I stood there, the words I'd rehearsed on the drive over suddenly lodged in my throat.

She was different. This wasn't the Emma who used to smile at me across coffee shops, who'd laugh at my jokes even when they weren't funny, who'd wait up when I texted that I was running late.

This Emma wouldn't even meet my eyes.

For a split second, something uncomfortably close to regret twisted in my chest.

"I just want to talk," I managed, hating how defensive I sounded.

"Then talk."

The coldness in her tone made my jaw clench.

Part of me wanted to demand answers. To ask if the boyfriend she'd mentioned at the party was real or just another attempt to make me jealous. To confront her about Tom's report of seeing her climb out of some luxury car the other night.

*Is she really being kept by someone? Did she move on that fast?*

But the questions stuck. Because beneath the anger, beneath the wounded pride, there was something else. Something I didn't want to examine too closely.

I'd come here to mock her. To throw her apparent downgrade in her face, maybe make her feel as off-balance as she'd made me feel.

But standing here, watching her treat me like a stranger, all I felt was... hollow.

"Where are you going?" I heard myself ask instead.

Emma's lips pressed into a thin line. "That's none of your business."

"I can give you a ride." The offer came out before I could stop it. "Wherever you're going. "

For the first time, she actually looked at me. Her blue-green eyes were distant, unreadable.

"No, thank you."

"Come on." I gestured to the Porsche, trying to inject some levity into my voice. "You seriously turning down a ride in this?"

Her gaze flicked to the car, then back to me. "I don't understand what you want from me."

*Neither do I.*

The thought caught me off guard.

The street around us was getting busier. Rush hour. Cars behind my Porsche started honking, the sound sharp and insistent in the air.

I grabbed Emma's hand before she could walk away. "Either you get in yourself, or I'm carrying you. Your choice."

Her eyes widened slightly—the first real reaction I'd gotten from her.

She glanced at the growing line of traffic, the curious pedestrians, the phones definitely pointed our way now.

"Fine," she said through gritted teeth.

I moved to open the passenger door, but she sidestepped me, pulling her hand free and walking around to the back door instead.

I paused, hand on the door handle. "What?"

"The passenger seat belongs to Megan." Her voice was matter-of-fact, clinical. "I'm not interested in that kind of drama."

The words hit like ice water.

*Megan.*

I released her wrist, watching as she opened the back door herself and slid into the rear seat.

"Emma—" I climbed into the driver's seat, twisting to look at her through the rearview mirror. "Megan and I aren't together. We never were."

She said nothing, just gazed out the window.

"She was... around. After you and I..." I couldn't finish the sentence. "But she left. When the money slowed down, she just... walked away."

Still nothing.

"Doesn't that mean anything to you?" The question came out more desperate than I intended. But she continued staring out the window, her profile expressionless.

Frustration flared hot in my chest.

Finally, Emma's eyes met mine in the mirror.

"You have money again," she said quietly. "She'll be back."

The observation was delivered without malice, without emotion. Just a simple statement of fact that somehow cut deeper than any accusation could have.

I pulled into traffic, navigating through the congestion while my mind raced, suddenly unable to remember what I'd planned to say.

"What about you?" I asked.

"What about me?"

"Would you—" The words caught. "If I still had money, would you—"