Trapped With Him

Chapter 19: Memories & failures

Catherine

Nathaniel's expression scared me. His perfectly formed eyebrows knitted together in an expression of failure, a line appearing between them. His dark eyes on the other side, showed almost no emotion. Every hint of hope I had inside, disappeared.

❞How'd it go?❞ Tasha asked him, putting her arm on my back in a comforting gesture.

Nathaniel's expression remained, ❞I need to announce that your companies officially belong to...❞ He sighed, suddenly his eyebrows relaxed. ❞You.❞ He said emotionless, before a smile crossed his face. ❞Congratulations.❞

Me and Tasha gasped loudly, but her gasp wasn't louder than mine. I was covering my mouth in shock, not believing what I just heard. It meant that everything I've been working so hard on, for such a long time, belonged to me again. Officially. Which also meant, that I could finally be free.

❞Oh my God!❞ Tasha screamed as she jumped and hugged me, shaking me.

Everything we've went through for the past year was finally paying off. I was almost free, and I wasn't about to give up. It felt like a missing piece of myself was found and reconnected to me.

❞We did it.❞ I said quietly, almost whispering because of the shock, but Tasha heard it.

❞We did!❞ She screamed. ❞We did it!❞

I hugged her back, tightly, being indescribably thankful for having her as my best friend, who stuck by my side through every part of this. We made it. Carter didn't come here for nothing, he gave me support that I needed and motivated me to never give up.

I finally came to realization, and that's when the widest smile appeared on my face. My cheeks were almost hurting from the happiness on my face. I felt my eyebrows rise in happiness and excitement. Nathaniel was still standing near us, just lightly smiling at the situation. I approached him and hugged him, which caught him in surprise. The deep smell of his cologne dug into my nostrils intensively, and his warmth caught me as he returned the hug.

❞Thank you so much.❞ I expressed in greatfulness. ❞Thank you.❞ I repeated, not being able to thank him enough.

I could feel him smile, even though he was surprised by my actions. ❞I just did my job.❞

I pulled out, looking at him and giving him a smile of greatfulness. Soon, my look turned to James who was standing on the other side of the room, with his lawyer, Harry. We were caught in a deep eyecontact, stuck to each other. He didn't look surprised, Harry neither. Harry was sitting down on the bench by the wall, while James stood and looked at me. His bottom lip rose up and built a line out of his lips, showing sadness. He knew that this would come to an end.

❞You got your hotel back!❞ Tasha discontinued our eyecontact with her excitement. ❞Your got your restaurant back!❞ She added quickly. ❞You got your appartment back! Everything is yours again!❞ She hugged me again.

I was more than happy in the moment, I was truly happy and thankful. I didn't know why there was a little, just a little hint of guilt inside of me when I saw James's sad expression that he tried to hide. I tried to shake it off, focusing on my happiness and excitement for the future.