AMIRA

 

 

Someone who needed me as much as I needed him. I watched with a captivated regard, wanting to know what the hell he was thinking. What the hell was going through his mind…

Love proved to be blinding and, at times, cruel. You only saw what you wanted to see. What you so frantically desired in life. Only picturing the good and never the bad. I knew Damien would always have demons lurking within him, waiting just around the corner to take him under. His internal struggle was written clear across his distressed expression. It was evident in his handsome face, marring into villainous features. He was trying to show me something he couldn’t say with words.

I knew something was brewing.

Something big.

Important.

Life-changing.

“Baby, what’s wrong? Did something happen today? Is that why you’re home early? Is that why you’re trying to push me away? Damien, talk to me please. Don’t shut me out like this. Not after everything we have overcome and built. Please, just talk to me.”

He scoffed out, taken back, “What the fuck do you think I was doing before, Amira?”

He was the first to break our connection, as if he could no longer bear to see the woman staring back at him. He abruptly stood and left, taking my rapidly beating heart with him.

My eyes widened as I shook off the haze from what the fuck had just happened. Jumping off the counter, I pulled my pants back up, buttoning them into place to follow him.

“Damien! What the fu—” He sharply turned around, and I halted in the entryway.

“Answer my fucking questions!”

I jumped out of my skin, taking in his disheveled hair that he must have been running his hands through, his loosened tie, and untucked shirt. Noticing for the first time since he got home, his appearance resembled a man who had been through Hell and back. A place we’d visited together often.

“Oh my God,” I voiced, feeling as lost as he looked. “What do you want me to say? What can I possibly tell you that will make anything easier for you? Why are you trying to hurt yourself? Why now?! What the fuck happened today?!”

He was over to me in four long strides, backing me up into the wall with a hard thud. Caging me in with his arms. The expression on his face read nothing but love, while his words were filled with nothing but hate when he growled, “You are what happened to me. Then and fucking now.” Taking one last look at me, he spun and walked out the door, slamming it behind him.

My body jolting from the impact. I stood there for I don’t know how long, utterly speechless and confused. Staring at the door like he would magically reappear. My heart, my mind, my sanity couldn’t take it anymore. For the rest of the evening, I moved in an autopilot state of clarity, not knowing which way was up or down. In or out. My thoughts swinging back and forth along with my emotions. I was suffocating in them. It didn’t help that I still felt him there with me, gripping my soul like a fucking vice.

The condo was eerie and silent, his scent masking the air all around me. Working my nerves into a frenzy. Feeling the anxiety for what was to come thriving, living, breathing inside of me. It soured in my veins, producing a splitting vibration at my temples. I did my best to ignore the looming suspicion in the depths of my core. Waiting for I don’t know what.

I sat on his chair in the dark living room, lost in his actions, in his words, in his questions, in everything that happened in such a short amount of time. The only light came off the moon shining from the floor-to-ceiling glass slider in the back of the room. I grabbed my stomach, suddenly feeling nauseous.

This wasn’t right.

I needed to make it right.

“Jesus, fuck this,” I said out loud to myself, grabbing my cell phone from the coffee table. About to dial his number, but it rang instead. I didn’t pay attention to who was calling, answering, “Damien?”

“Amira, I’m sorry to call so late.”

I instantly recognized the man’s voice as my eyes shifted to the clock on the wall that read ten-fifteen. “Yeah. It’s not a good tim—”

“This can’t wait. I just received confirmation that your shipment is arriving at midnight.”

“What?” I replied, caught off guard. “I thought it wasn’t—”

“You thought wrong.”

“No, no, no… I rescheduled! You must be mistaken. Listen to me, the shipment can’t arrive tonight. Do you hear me? I will have whoever’s balls that fucked this up!”

“Technically, Amira, midnight is tomorrow.”  

“No shit, but… fuck…” I murmured. “I can’t… I mean… what am I… fuck… I gotta go.” I hung up, peering at the clock again which now felt like it was a ticking time bomb.

Would Damien come back home tonight?

There wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it now, the plan was already set in motion. As much as I didn’t want him to find out this way, I needed to remain calm. All I could do was pray Damien would understand I did what I had to do.

He had to understand.

My life fucking depended on it.

This was the only way, it was my only choice. After the ball dropped, there would be no more shadows between us. I’d step back. I’d leave this life behind, for good.

My home was with him.

Only him.

I took a deep breath, making my way into the master suite. Deciding to take a shower to try to loosen the tension continuously building in the forefront of my mind. I grabbed a cream silk nightie with a matching robe from the closet, and walked into the en suite bathroom, closing the door behind me. Turning on the shower, I set it on the hottest temperature possible and slipped out of my clothes before stepping inside. Welcoming the heat against my tensed frame and allowing the hot water to burn into my pores. Hoping it would relax the strained muscles on my back and neck.

I pressed my hands against the shower wall and leaned my forehead against the cool stoned tile. Closing my eyes, still feeling his strong, callused fingers all over my flesh. His body on top of mine, hearing echoes of his reassuring words and his hurtful ones. No matter how much I tried, how much I wanted to push away the unrelenting questions with no answers, it was no use. My mind ran wild. I couldn’t get it to stop playing image after image from today in front of me.

“I just want to know how many times he touched what’s mine.”

I stayed in the shower until the water ran cold over my aching body and got out. After drying off, I threw on my nightie and robe, wrapping the ties around my waist and knotting it off in a bow. I finished brushing my damp hair, going about my nightly routine, and opened the door. Shivering when the cool air hit my warm skin. Immediately walking over to the bedside table to turn on the lamp. Instantly, sensing I wasn’t alone, I rapidly spun back around. Shrieking as soon as I saw him sitting at the table by the sliding glass door in his room.

Placing my palm on my chest, I yelped, “Jesus, Damien. You scared the shit out of me.”

Even though he was intently staring right at me, he didn’t say a word. He just sat there in the shadows with his elbow leaning against the armrest, rubbing his fingers back and forth across his lips with a drink in his hand. Once again, lost in his own purgatory in a way I’d never witnessed before. His unruly hair draped over his face, obstructing his view, only being able to see through the slits in the strands. It didn’t matter, I could still see his dark, cold, beady eyes penetrating deep into mine, igniting a profound reaction within my heart. The alcohol he’d been drowning in only fueled the way he was glaring at me. It was then I realized he wasn’t looking at me.

He was looking through me.

I don’t know why, but I found myself wanting to stay lost in his eyes, raptured in the blaze that was searing into my skin. Like a snake slithering its way toward you, drawing you in with its sinful dance and hypnotic movement before it unexpectedly swallowed you whole. As much as I was terrified by what could happen, I couldn’t look away because there was so much beauty in his catastrophic pain.  

He was luring me in with his dominating stare, pulling every sentiment from my body as if it belonged to him. Like we were the only two people in the world. Time just seemed to stand still. It felt like every passing second between us was another thought, another emotion, another memory for him. He was physically there with me, but his mind was somewhere else entirely.

Making me question what or who he was truly seeing in front of him.

“Damie—”

“Come here,” he ordered in a stern tone through his index and middle fingers, which hadn’t let up on rubbing his lips. Almost like he needed something else to keep his focus on besides me, and what he was overpoweringly struggling with.

I wanted to move but I couldn’t get my feet to step forward. My heart screaming for me to go to him, although my body declared war, determined to ultimately win the internal battle erupting inside me. Awakening every last demon that had laid dormant and had always bowed down to my heart, swaying my decisions since I was a little girl. Once again protecting me from the man who had always been my everything. I clenched, locking up, staying firmly rooted to the place I stood. I surrendered to my hesitation for however long I could, seeking refuge within myself. Though I was still willingly held captive in his haunted composure, and he knew it too.

He cocked his head to the side, reading me like the back of his hand. “You scared of me, baby?”

“Of course not.”

“You will be if you don’t come over to me, now.”

I stood taller, angling my chin up. Challenging him. A hint of amusement passed through his eyes, but he blinked and it was gone. Making me think I possibly imagined it, needing to cling onto some sort of connection with him. Until I finally chose to fight back for what would forever belong to me.

Him.

To hell with reason, with doubt, with the unknown.

To hell with it all.

Including us.

If that was where we were meant to be, I’d eternally stand by him. We were Heaven and Hell. Andromeda and Perseus. Damien and Amira.

Till the end.

My chest was rising and falling, my heart lying out in front of us as I started to walk toward him. Each step precise and calculated, each stride more unnerving than the last. Feeling as though I was making my way over to a stranger that I was unable to run away from. Waiting, holding my breath with every last fiber in my being. I couldn’t breathe the entire thirty steps it took to get to him.  

I knew because I counted.

It was the only way to keep myself from passing out from the sensations I couldn’t control for the life of me. He simply nodded for me to sit down on the table beside him, when I was standing a few feet away.

I did.

Cautiously crossing one leg over the other, watching as he eyed me, taking in every last curve of my body, every last inch of my skin. Like he was trying to memorize it, engrain it into his heart and soul. There wasn’t one nook of my figure that he hadn’t already explored with his hands, tongue, lips, or dick. Producing a nostalgic state of mind, although he’d just had his way with me that morning. I anxiously waited for his eyes to stop and look deep into my unsettling glare. All it would take was for him to sincerely look at me for one second, to see how I felt inside. To put an end to this.

The way he was treating me.

Looking at me.

Making me feel alone and afraid.  

I needed to see his serene honey colored eyes exactly like I did as a child. A little girl. Only reminding me why I craved them in the first place, causing shivers to course down my spine. He must have noticed the shift in my demeanor because his eyes finally locked with mine. Looking for his girl, his Muneca. Breaking our connection when she couldn’t be found, he moved on. I felt his fingers slip through the knot of my robe, untying it. Ever so slowly opening the silk, similar to unwrapping a gift.

My eyes never wavered from his as he began skimming his fingers along my collarbone to the sides of my breasts, and over to my beating heart. He lingered there for a moment before continuing to slide them down the center of my ribcage, placing his entire hand over my stomach.

I sucked in a breath, knowing what he was thinking. “Damien, I h—”

“Do you have any idea how much I fucking love you?”

Before I could respond, he uncrossed my legs and leaned forward in between them, wrapping his arms around my waist. Resting his chest on my thighs and his head against my belly. He held onto me for dear life, so tight, so hard, so strong.

My heart pounded harder against my chest.

Did he know the truth?

Is that why he was so upset?

All the blood drained from my face, and my stomach dropped to the ground when he followed it up with, “Did Roman know? Can you at least give me that?”