The Storm In Their Hearts - Aching Hearts Series #3

Morning Surprises

This is very brief, but I wanted to give an insight on Byron and Maya's story ;) more to come about these two :)

CHAPTER 22 - MORNING SURPRISES

BYRON'S POV

After a long sleepless night, all I needed was a good dose of adrenaline, that's why my first thought, as soon as it was dawn, was going for a run. Usually it relaxes me, well, it does when working serves to nothing.

I work more when I'm stressed because knowing that I can do something, be it even only making sure that an exploited workman gets what he deserves from his bastard of an employee, that is good and helps making the world a little better, that relaxes me. But when things don't go as planned, the last resort is a long run, and if it's raining it's even better.

That's what I did this morning, as soon as the sun seemed ready to make its appearance. My roommates were still sleeping, so I paid attention not to making any noise. I ended up jogging for three hours straight, successfully shutting out my thoughts for a short period, but then I came home, took a shower, and before I could even get my coffee, I was faced with the same thought that's been tormenting nonstop. Maya.

She was here, right in front of me, wrapped up in a towel, her barely reaching her shoulders, standing at the entrance of the living room while I was heading to the kitchen. She was here. Why?

I remained there frozen, unable to speak, my eyes fixated on her, as if she were a hallucination of some sort, but then it clicked in my mind that she was standing half naked in our apartment, by the hall that leads to Al's bedroom.

No matter how much I trust him, with her standing right in front of me, the seed of doubt was inevitable, and while normally I'd be dead certain he'd never do something like that to me, the situation seemed to belie me.

"What are you doing here?" Were my first words, which came out too harsh, but I couldn't retract them, and besides, bitterness was kicking in. Not only she's marrying my boss, now she sleeps with one of my best friends, too. How am I supposed to take that lightly?

Her dark brown eyes were fixed on me as well, and her plump lips pressed against each other, giving me flashbacks of the times I used to nip on those nonstop, and how much I craved to do that now. I've been thinking of her so much these days, I just can't get her off my mind, and I guess that, having Josh rub in my face every moment possible that he's marrying such a gorgeous girl, doesn't help.

He doesn't know she's my ex, when he introduced us, she pretended she was meeting me for the first time, so I complied, which was the right decision, because, one, for how jealous Josh is, he might have suspected the worst, then, being such a bastard as he is, I'm sure he would have cared to rub salt in the wound nonstop.

We don't really get along, in case you were wondering, he's not firing me only because he can't, it's not in his power.

Maya sagged her shoulders, sighing, and my stupid heart started racing as she took a few steps closer to me, till she was standing right in front of me, having me look down because she's fairly shorter than I.

"You're not thinking what I think, are you?" She wondered.

"What should I think? You're half naked in my –"

"I'm not you, Byron. I don't cheat."

My jaw clenched. "I never cheated on you." I spat. She snorted, crossing her arms. I've tried endlessly to convince her that what she thought she saw happening between me and Mel was all a misunderstanding, but Maya is so stubborn, she never believed me, and I can't deny it hurt that she wouldn't trust me after all we'd had. "Maya ..."