Читать книгу Hard sex. Rear entrance - - Страница 9

Tanya despised this place with every fiber of her being. She loathed the scent of lavender that wrapped around her softly, yet irritated her like a counterfeit kindness, a mockery of care. She hated the cozy cushions scattered across the couch, as if their plush softness could somehow cushion the raw, jagged edges of her inner pain. Most of all, she detested Eduard’s calm gaze, which seemed to strip her bare—not of clothes, but of the fragile armor around her soul, exposing every crack, every hollow void within her. She sat in the waiting room, flipping through a glossy magazine, her eyes blind to the words and images, her fingers mechanically turning pages while her mind swirled in a dark, inescapable whirlpool of despair. The door opened, and her heart, taut as a violin string, trembled.

Alex walked in, accompanied by someone else—a young, lanky boy with a distant gaze, his eyes fixed on some invisible point beyond reality.

“Hello, we have an appointment with Eduard Viktorovich at five. Alex and Semyon,” Alex’s voice was steady, yet warm, like a ray of sunlight piercing through storm clouds.

Tanya couldn’t tear her eyes away. She watched as he helped his brother shrug off his jacket, his movements gentle, almost tender, as he murmured, “Sema, sit here, okay?” The boy obeyed, sinking onto the couch, resuming a quiet hum, a melody that seemed to be his sanctuary from the world. Alex sat beside him, resting a hand on his shoulder—a gesture so natural, so full of quiet, brotherly care, that something inside Tanya lurched, like ice cracking beneath her feet. She couldn’t decipher it—was it irritation, envy, or something deeper, something she hadn’t felt in so long it was almost foreign?

She expected him to speak to her, to throw a barbed remark, sharp as a thorn, to prick at her pride. To ask what she was doing here, with that familiar smirk in his voice. To attempt to rekindle their old, dirty, soulless connection, where passion was nothing but a mask for emptiness. But he didn’t look at her. His entire focus was on his brother. He whispered something in Semyon’s ear, and for a fleeting moment, the boy smiled, his face lighting up like a pale glow in a dark room. That simple, human moment cut through Tanya sharper than any words could.

A venomous irritation, sharp and toxic, rose within her like a hissing serpent from the depths. Who was he to ignore her? This former cameraman, one of many who had lain in her bed, a mere pawn in her games of power and control? He should have been groveling for her attention, chasing her gaze, desperate to reclaim what once was, when she was the queen and he, just another subject. Yet there he sat, with his fragile brother, looking… whole. Grounded. As if his world hadn’t shattered in an instant, as if he hadn’t been crushed by her icy betrayal. It was unbearable.

The door to the office opened, and Eduard emerged, his figure in the doorway like a lighthouse in a storm, though to Tanya, he was just another test to endure.

“Semyon, come in, please. Alex, will you wait here?”

Alex stood, guiding his brother into the office, his movements confident yet soft, as if carrying something delicate. When the door closed, he finally turned to Tanya. His gaze met hers directly, calmly—a mirror in which she saw herself not as a queen, not as a seductress, but as a broken, lost woman.

“Hey, Tanya,” his voice was even, devoid of mockery or malice.

“Hey,” her reply came out hoarse, as if the words were stuck in her throat. She braced herself for a jab, a reproach, anything that would give her an excuse to lash back with venom.