HATE ME LIKE YOU LOVED ME..

CHAPTER 1

ALFIE RETURN

.........

Amelia pushed the door open and walked in, muttering under her breath, rehearsing what she would say to the president.

The door slowly closed behind her. Her hand clipped together as she muttered under her breath.

Her feet halted the moment she looked up to meet the President, the man who had refused to pay her claims any attention.

"Mr. Presiiid..."

The words died in her mouth.

As her eyes locked onto a peer of familiar blue eyes.

She stopped.

The anger she had carried washed down immediately.

"Alfie?" Her eyes moved over him, taking in the office, the desk, the name plate. "You are the president?"

She caught herself, straightened her back, and let her face go still. Her abandoned first Love is now the man she has to call sir and Mr. President.

"If Alfie is the President, why did he refused to pay me?" Her face frowned slightly.

Maybe he was still holding a grudge but this isn't the right way to settle it.

She turned to leave. His voice stopped her before her hand touched the handle.

He was grinning, so hard that Amelia almost asked him what he was grinning for.

Alfie looked at her as if her shock was the funniest thing he'd seen all week.

"Didn't you come to see me? Or did you think it's one of your numerous old boyfriends?"

"You!" The word came out sharp, angrier than she meant it to sound. She stood still, staring at him.

He came around the desk slowly,

He chuckled as if her presence in his office was nothing more than an inconvenience he found entertaining.

"Amelia, you are still bold..." He tilted his head, sarcasm dripping from every word. "You just walked into your president's office without knocking. Or is there any appointment you have with me?"

She had rehearsed an answer somewhere between the manager's office and this door, something about her missing file, the pay she hadn't seen in two months. Standing in front of him, all of it came out tangled.

"You want to know why I'm here?" Her voice cracked, but she pushed through it. "A file went missing from my desk. A file I never touched, never opened, never lost. And because of that, they've frozen my pay for two months."

She paused. "Two months, Alfie. My name is not even on the payment list anymore, like I don't exist in this company."

He said nothing. His silence pushed her anger higher.

"I asked them to check the CCTV. One look, that's all it would take to prove I didn't do this. They wouldn't even give me that. They just decided I was guilty and moved on with their lives, while I'm out here trying to prove" Her hands were shaking. She pressed them together to stop it, but it didn't help. "So yes, I walked in without knocking. Because nobody in this building has bothered to hear me since this started."

Something shifted in his face. Gone as fast as it came.

"Amelia, you seem to have been living well all these years."

It wasn't an answer. It wasn't even close to one. She waited for something, an apology, an explanation, anything. He only watched her, arms folded.

She turned again to leave. This time he didn't stop her with words. He let her walk. As soon as her hand found the door, his voice pierced through to her.

She didn't turn around. She pushed the door open and walked out, past the assistants who stared, past the hallway that suddenly felt too long, until she was outside, trembling, asking herself what she had done to deserve running into Alfie again, in a place like this, at a time like this.

Alfie stood alone in his office long after the door shut behind her.

He had waited for this. Planned for it, even, in the quiet hours when he told himself he was over her. Now that it had happened, nothing about it felt the way he expected.

He swept his arm across the desk, sending the files scattered across it to the floor, and sank into his chair. His jaw worked, but no sound came out at first. When it did, it was low, almost to himself.

"She has been living in peace. But me? Me..." He pressed his palm hard against his chest. "What was I in her eyes? I must have gotten it all wrong. But right now, she didn't act like it was all lies."

He stared at nothing, replaying the last five minutes over in his head, her voice cracking, her hands shaking, the fire in her eyes that hadn't dimmed one bit in all these years.

His fist came down on the desk.

"I will make her life miserable."

The words hung in the empty office long after he said them.