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The weird thing about working in London is that everything is geographically close together; you can barely walk down one street without having a popular coffee chain – hell, some streets are so long there are two of the same brand on the same road – and yet because London is always so busy, it takes forever to walk down one street to one of these chains. It took me fifteen minutes to move down the street this time and get into the shop to get August's coffee order this morning – the morning after we became official – and it's super weird. He stayed over last night but we came into work separately with a promise to act professional. Yet the texts I've been getting suggest otherwise.

It's been another five minutes of queuing, and now I have to wait longer for the two coffees I'm picking up – always one for me as payment for the 'trouble', as he's always called it. For four years he's told me to always get a drink for myself, so it's definitely not going to arouse suspicions.

When the drinks are finally done – his usual and a vanilla latte for me – I put them in a cup holder and start carefully manoeuvring myself around the bodies in the shop, which in itself is an art that comes naturally when you've lived here for so long.

"Avie."

My eyes roll as I force myself out of the shop. Of course, yesterday, he said it wasn't over, but I didn't expect Isaac to follow me today.

I could answer him, tell him to shut up, or go with August's idea and call the police, but all of those ideas mean I have to put these drinks down and do something other than get lost in the crowds of tourists and people in suits. That idea appeals to me more because he'll lose me, just like he did when I told the police his name in exchange for my freedom.

Which I don't doubt he wants revenge for. That's despite saying yesterday that he wanted me. I also don't doubt that for a second, either. He'll get his revenge somehow and then all will be 'forgotten' and he'll bring me back into the circle if he had his way. In fact, I wonder if his revenge plan just involves me coming back into the gang itself and hooked on drugs again.

People sometimes don't realise that heroin is one of the easiest drugs to get addicted to and one of the most dangerous. All drugs have their dangers, obviously, but because of heroin's sedative effects, it comes with extra dangers. One of the members when Isaac and I were on the streets died because their body just forgot how to breathe during a high. There were plenty of case studies during my detox where the doctor told me stories of people choking on their vomit while sleeping on a high, or people so addicted that they had to take more and more drugs to get their high that they took so much they just shut down and died.

I already have issues with the long-term effects, I don't need more danger in my life. Being in a sort-of-but-not-official relationship with someone I shouldn't be is just the perfect amount of danger for my life right now.

Yet here I am being followed down the road by my ex-boyfriend.

I dive through a few people in suits and a couple of tourists until I take a small alley that will take me the long way back to the office, but it means I can get the chance to lose Isaac.

"Avie, come on."

As I turn the corner, he's suddenly in front of me, making me nearly lose the damn coffee.

"Come 'ere." He grabs the coffees in my hand, managing not to spill them.

"I need to get those back to work before my boss gets annoyed." I don't mention the fact August won't give two shits when he hears the truth. "So let me go, Isaac. I'm working."

He smirks and puts the coffee on top of the bins next to us. Clearly, he cares a little about the fact I need to get them back otherwise he would've thrown them to the floor without another care.

"You work taking coffees to others? You an intern or something, Princess?"

"Not that it's your business, but no, I'm admin. Because of my history, I can't find much else. But, hey, it's better to have an honest living, right?"

He smirks again, but this time it's tinged with annoyance. He approaches me, so I move back until I'm against the brick wall. It's a chilly spring day, but not too chilly that I decided to wear a dress and no tights. The backs of my legs can feel the rough bricks behind me and as he stands a cat's whisker in front of me, I realise how trapped I am.

Do I believe Isaac West would hurt me? I don't. There are a lot of things Isaac is, but he's not a predator – for humans, anyway.

What I do believe he'll do is take me somewhere only he'll know. I believe he'd, well, kidnap me to his place and hold me so he can use me as his trophy woman, a status symbol and get me hooked again.

His green eyes meet mine and his breath beats down on mine. "You fucked me over, Avie. You dragged me through the shit so you could stay out of prison. The cosy little life you have now with your friend... that's at the cost of my freedom. You forget that you chose to be with me back then, darling, and now I'm king of the castle, you get to lie in the bed you made."

His hand caresses my cheek, but it just feels wrong.

"Avie, sweetheart, if only you knew what you'd done."

There was a time when I was seventeen, head high in the mixture of a drug high and thinking I was in love when this kind of move would make me kiss him and take him into our tent to shag.

Naïve Avery Wren was stupid. She was caught up in the charm, thinking that bad boys were the way forward. Seventeen-year-old me thought Disney princes were cliché and overrated, and the bad boys with their delinquent tendencies were something to be proud of. She allowed him to whisk her up, spin her around and show her a world where wrecking your body with drugs and selling sex was the norm, and where ruining your education and life by getting criminal records was fun.

In reality, it was the opposite. I now have a Disney prince of my own and he's the very thing that keeps me on the straight and narrow. Addiction and crime don't have to be the only way – I just needed to be found by my prince charming. Or, well, I needed to find him by breaking the villain's curse.

Life isn't an online serial where criminal and controlling boys are hot. They may look hot on the outside, but it's all part of the charm of luring you in like a siren's song. Normal, non-criminal men who have emotions and aren't afraid to show them aren't any less hot for being real and non-dangerous. Shove them in a leather jacket, slick back their hair and put some tattoos on them and they're the same, but less dangerous.

I dare to look at Isaac. His nose is so close to mine that if anyone looks at us, they'd be forgiven for thinking we're just a couple of lovers making out in an alley.

"It's been a long time, hasn't it?" His hushed whisper makes it seem like a siren's song; a lullaby that'll make me fall asleep and bend to his will. "I missed you, Princess."

His breath smells like coffee and mint with a hint of cigarettes. Has he swapped his vice? Is tobacco his new heroin or is he masking it?

There was a time when this kind of move from Isaac would be romantic to me: the feel of his body pressed against mine would arouse me, the breath fanning on my face would be irresistible and his whispered words would send me wild with lust. But now it just makes me want to push him off me and kick him.

Somehow, my knees aren't working like I want them to. Maybe it's this damn skirt that makes it hard to move so much in. Why did I have to choose the thing with a skirt this morning?

"Leave me alone, Isaac. I need to get back to work," I plead.

He smiles. A knot forms in my stomach in retaliation.

"This time, I'll let you go because of work, but it sounds like work is going to be a problem, isn't it? Thing is, darlin', when you finally realise that you're mine and come back to me, you won't need to work. You'll have money without workin' for it, to do with what you want. You'll have a better place than you have now, a bigger place with all you need and want. You'll have a life of luxury. Hell, I'll get you a car and chef... it'll all be yours. I shower my girl with what she deserves. You won't have to lift a finger."

I meet his gaze. "I'm not yours, Isaac."

At that, he steps back, giving me room to step right. Finally, I'm not trapped by him. Physically, anyway. Emotionally is a different story all together. I've been trapped by Isaac West emotionally since I was seventeen. He has a cage around me that I can never get out of, and now he's just here to enforce it, upgrading it to make it a gilded cage if I go with him and 'be his' again.

There's no doubt he has plans for me – there's no fucking way this man will let my betrayal slip like he's seemingly doing right now. Both of us know it; it's in the air that burns around us.

"I don't think you quite understand; there is no way I'm going to come back to you. I'm not yours, nor do I belong to you. Despite your position and shit, I'm a human being. I'm my own person who got clean and found an honest living. I like my life and that's how it's going to stay. Please leave me alone, Isaac. I'm not interested."

I grab the coffee and start moving away.

"You know I was meant to be out a year ago? My sentence got extended because of a manslaughter charge."

I snort. "Assuming that's how you got to your position, then. But that still doesn't help your case to me. Goodbye, Isaac."

"You think I've forgotten your betrayal, Princess? I haven't. Not only did you ignore me for five years, but you exchanged my freedom for yours. I get it, Avie, I do. In your position, I'd do the same. I had previous, I was known to them, I wasn't going to get out of a prison sentence anyway, but your word helped them solidify a case, which got me a bit longer. But in reality, you helped me. Without you, I wouldn't be able to be where I am now."

Fuck. So he's not just angry, he's grateful in a way.

Why does this make it seem so much worse than just his anger?

"Goodbye, Isaac." I walk down the alley and around the corner, ignoring his calls of Avie as I make my way back to work, hoping to fuck these coffees are still warm.

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"Why didn't you call for help?" August hisses when I'm back in the office. "And, yeah, the coffees are still warm. Even if they weren't, I would've got some delivered. Are you sure you're okay?"

The way his eyes furrow shows the barrier we need to keep up at work is nearly slipping.

"I'm fine, boss." I sip my drink. Just warm. Luckily. "He just chatted some bullshit. He'd never hurt me, not in public. Isaac knows better than that."

"You can go home if you need to, Avery." He glances away, the wall going back up. This is what I've always been afraid of; despite us both discussing how we could become a couple officially, this wall between us we need to keep up will be hard to maintain. Especially because we've been waiting for something between us for literal years.

"I'll be fine. Just need a few moments to drink my coffee, if that's okay?"

August nods and adjusts his glasses. "Of course. He didn't hurt you?"

I shake my head. "No. He wouldn't. It was much of nothing. I'm really sort about the coffee, it's probably shit now."

He scoffs. "Tastes fine to me. I'm much more worried about you." He glances at his phone before looking back at me. The app for his blood sugars is up, but it looks in the green, which means good. "I will call the police in here if we need to."

I shake my head. "It'll be fine, honestly, August, it's fine. There's nothing the police can do at this point. He's just an annoyance."

He moves to the office door and closes the blinds so no one can look in. The door is already closed, and no one is around anyway, all with their heads in work, earphones in (August allows earphones with music in around the office if working) and no one gives two shits.

Being in here like this doesn't raise any suspicion anyway because I'm his admin, and we usually have a coffee while chatting over something or having a meeting anyway.

"Avery—" His voice is quiet as he leans against the desk to my right. He's so close, I can smell his aftershave and his hips are at my eyeline. I want to jump his fucking bones right now.

"Yeah?" I ask.

He sighs and folds his arms. "This is serious. It's day one and he's tracked you down near where you work. How long has he been out and looking for you? We don't know. I'm assuming he knows pretty much everything. How much more do you have to go through until he does something? Even if the police can't put him away, surely you can get a restraining order?"

I sip my drink before looking him in the eyes. "Not a bad idea. I can look into it. But for now, there's nothing I can do. He's not really doing anything besides telling me he wants me back."

"This is how it starts, Aves."

Our eyes meet again. My breath hitches, so I sip my drink. "Don't look at me like that, it... you know."

He smirks, knowing what he's doing. "Trust me, it's difficult for me, too." He stands properly and sits on his side of the desk. "I, uh, advise you to go to the police. I'll get the security here to make sure a man of his description is never allowed into the building."

"Thank you."

He nods and gives me a small smile, but beneath that is everything – he's concerned. This is no longer just about our forbidden romance, this is about a whole host of different, and dangerous shit.

I can't deny it's worrying, but somehow I'm not as worried as August is, and I don't know why. Maybe it's because I know what Isaac is like deep down, and I know he wouldn't hurt me. But that remains a question as I finish the rest of my drink – did I ever truly know Isaac West, or did I just know the side of him that he wanted me to see, or the side of him that was just desperate and addicted?

I was a different person back then to the one I was before I met him. I'm also a different person now from the one I was back then. Surely it's the same for Isaac – he's a different person now than back then. Deep down, that should worry me like it does August.  

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