I even found myself questioning my own sanity. It was almost like I was hearing a man’s voice for the first time, and what I experienced was incredible, like some warm comforting blanket had been thrown around me. In fact, the last time I had felt this comforted was when snuggled up in the hand of my Beast.
“Fitzwilliam,” I muttered, testing the name myself, and whispering it on my tongue, seeing how well it fit there. But then something in me said that this wasn’t the name I was destined to call him. But as for that voice, well I knew that was one I was most certainly fated to hear speaking my own name, I was convinced of it. But right now, I was almost desperate to know what his first name would be, but this was nothing compared to the desperation I felt at needing to see him. However, it was a woman's voice that I heard answering him that stopped me from stepping around the corner.
“Oh, my dear Fitzwilliam, look at you here, bringing me flowers again, for they’re so beautiful,” a woman said, in a fake tone of voice that grated along my nerves enough so that I actually tensed.
“My lady, you are the one who grants me such a gift of beauty, for they are not as beautiful as… and your performance tonight, it was simply… perhaps exquisite is a worthy enough word and I… well, I wanted to tell you, to perhaps ask of you, I mean…” he paused as if needing to take the time to compose himself. It had to be said at this point, the guy wasn't exactly what I would have called a smooth talker… which was another term of my own. But then, I cared little, for I was currently too consumed with another emotion. One that burned inside of me, and was of a raging jealousy and one born solely from hearing him calling another woman beautiful. To such a degree that it had me having to hold myself back from walking around this corner and confronting her. I wanted to face her, tell her he was mine and then gouge her eyes out to prevent her from ever looking at him again!
And this was coming from someone who was not the jealous type.
In fact, I couldn’t recall even once ever feeling the emotion before. Which meant this must have been the day for them, for I had never been hit in the heart when hearing a single voice before. Making me now question everything. Had the Fates been right, could this really be him? Could this really be my fated partner in life? It seemed implausible, incredible, and impossible all at the same time. For was it really fated for me to find him that quickly? And if so, how could I be sure?
I also was forced in that moment to look at the facts. I had been dumped back in London, and not ten minutes after opening my eyes I had being chased to a place that I had acted upon without thought, as if actions had just compelled me to be here, right now and out of all of the corridors, out of all of the doors and out of all of the rooms this theatre held, I had chosen my pathway straight to a voice that affected me to the core.
How could any of this be denied?
It could not.
It was him.
And yet, despite knowing this deep down in my heart, it was as if by some cruel twist of fate my meeting him for the first time was when he would be trying to woo another woman. Had the thought not been such a depressing one, I would have laughed at the irony of it all, for here I was trying to search for a fated vessel to be combined with the Beast I loved, and here he was, no doubt trying to convince this woman to love him.
It seemed as if we were both searching for the wrong thing, for I should not just view this as any man who could be connected with the Beast that I loved, but in actual fact, that I would love them both equally so. I knew that now. I knew it as certain as the sun would rise tomorrow.
I knew it the moment I heard his voice.
A voice he was currently bestowing on another.
“Oh, Fitzwilliam, you do me great honour by lavishing me with these gifts.