The Billionaire from Her Past Read Online Free PDF

his coffee, his fingernails digging ever so slightly into the takeaway cup’s corrugated cardboard outer shell. He stared at nothing—at the sky, at the passing traffic—and finally at the stencilled company name on the side of the battered skip, letting his gaze lose focus.
    He’d read somewhere—or heard, maybe, on a podcast or something—that grief hit you like a wave. At first the waves just kept on pounding. Pounding you down and down, with barely a breath of air before you were sucked back under again. But then, over time, the gaps between the waves would grow. They would still hit just as hard—and be just as shocking—but in between you could begin to breathe. To exist again.
    Sometimes you even got better at handling the waves, at bracing yourself and swimming back up to the surface. Not every wave though. Some would always sneak up on you and drown you as brutally as the first.
    Every memory of Steph...every reminder of his many mistakes...what he could have done...should have done... It wasn’t getting easier.
    Seb had discovered that the waves didn’t stop coming. He had just got better at swimming.
    Footsteps drew his attention back to his surroundings. He looked up to see Mila striding along the footpath, her gaze on the screen of her phone. Her eyes flicked upwards as she approached, and the moment her gaze locked on his it skittered away again.
    It was just like yesterday: that same unexpected and suddenly closed expression. He had absolutely no idea why.
    But then her gaze swung back, as if she was really looking at him now, and her long strides came to a halt in front of him.
    â€˜I didn’t see you there,’ she said.
    He had a feeling if she had she would have exited via the rear of her shop. The realisation frustrated him. Why was she keeping her distance?
    But now she was studying him carefully, as if attempting to translate what the sum total of his face and posture actually meant.
    He pushed away from the wall and rolled his shoulders back, uncomfortable with whatever Mila might have thought she’d seen.
    â€˜Are you okay?’
    He nodded sharply, not quite meeting her eyes. ‘Of course.’
    â€˜You don’t look okay,’ she said—which shouldn’t have surprised him. Mila wasn’t one to accept anything at surface value.
    She took a step closer, trying to catch his gaze.
    He knew he was just being stupid now, but for some reason he just couldn’t quite look at her—the knife-edged echo of Steph’s remembered words was still yet to be washed out to sea.
    She reached out, resting her fingers just above his wrist. Her hand was cool against his sun-warmed skin.
    â€˜Last night,’ she said, as he focused on the deep red shade of her nail polish, ‘do you know what I did? I found that photobook Steph made after our trip to Bali when we were about twenty. Remember? Our first holiday without our parents. We thought we were so grown-up.’
    He nodded. They’d gone with a group of his and Steph’s friends from uni. Mila had just dropped out of her umpteenth course, but that had been back when she and Steph had done everything together. There’d never been any question—of course Mila would go with them.
    â€˜Do you remember that guy I met? From Melbourne?’ She laughed. ‘Oh, God. What a loser.’ She shook her head. ‘Anyway, last night I wanted to see Steph—see her happy—with you and...uh...me, of course.’
    Her words had become a little faster, and he was finally able to drag his gaze to hers. She must be wearing boots with a heel, as she looked taller than he’d expected—actually, simply closer to him than he’d expected.
    â€˜It made me smile,’ she said. ‘And cry.’
    Her hand was still on his arm, but she’d shifted her fingers to grip harder—as if she was desperately holding on.
    â€˜What I’m trying to say,’