by M. G. Morgan
This has got nothing to do with Bella. This is to do with you dragging me here so you could show me how happy you were. This is about you rubbing salt in the wound. Revenge for what I did to Paige.”
Will’s face changed then, he rammed me back against the wall, his hands pinning me.
“That is not what I was doing, but if you want to make this about revenge for what you did to Paige? For what you put her through then I will happily accommodate you.”
He gritted the words out and I smiled. Paige appeared at Will’s elbow, her small hand pressed against his cheek as she turned his face to look at her.
“None of it matters now. He wants to draw you into a fight, you can see it in him, the guilt he carries… He loves her and yet he’s afraid to tell her, afraid to let her see what he became in order to get her back.”
Will turned back to look at me, the anger in his gaze melting away. He released me suddenly and I slumped to the floor. What was I becoming, there would have been a time when I’d have punched him, knocked him on his ass for pinning me to the wall. But nothing seemed to matter anymore, none of it mattered. All I wanted was Bella.
“Look, you need to go and tell her how you feel. She needs to know, Aidan. If I were her I’d want to know.”
Paige crouched on the floor next to me, tentatively she reached her hand out to me and let it rest on my arm. She was behaving like I was something dangerous, something to be wary of, and maybe I was. I had certainly been that before… Now I felt pathetic, pathetic and broken. How could Bella ever want a fool like me? I wasn’t good for her, and I’d proven that I couldn’t protect her. She deserved something better, someone better than me.
“I can’t.”
Paige shook her head and gripped my arm tighter. I stared down at the place where her hand touched my arm.
“You have to. Aidan, I don’t think you understand how much she loves you… When she knew that you were there all she wanted was one more chance to see you. It nearly broke my heart to see her like that, you meant so much to her…”
“She gave herself to him to save you.” My tone was bitter and I couldn’t hide it. I was angry about what she did. She knew I was coming, she knew I would try and find her and yet so close to the finish she gave herself to that monster rather than wait a little longer for me to save her. It wasn’t something I could shake from my mind. As much as I didn’t want to blame her for what had happened, and I didn’t blame her, a part of me was still angry at her.
Paige stared down at the floor, her fingernails leaving little half moon marks on my arm.
“I know she did, I feel terrible about it. She saved me and nearly died because of it… It’s not something I will ever forget. I’m not even sure how I’m supposed to thank her for it. But I know she did it because she was strong enough. She was strong enough to face him because she loved you, because she knew you loved her.”
I shook my head. “How could she know?”
Paige smiled at me. “She knows… But you need to reassure her, tell her that you love her no matter what happened. Even if she never wants to tell you about it, you still need to tell her that you’re there for her.”
She was right of course. It made sense. After everything Bella had been through she probably thought I looked at her differently. And I did look at her differently, I was a changed man after all. I wasn’t young and foolish anymore, running headlong into whatever situation I thought looked like a challenge. But my love for her hadn’t changed, it was still as strong as ever, perhaps even stronger.
Bella had to know that my heart beat only for her. That it would only ever beat for her. I climbed to my feet and Paige let me. The moment she stood, Will automatically wrapped her back in his arms. I couldn’t see them surviving without each other. I envied them, perhaps if I could explain to Bella, then one day we could be like that too.
“I should go.”
“Go to her.” Paige urged, a small smile lighting up her face as Will pressed a small kiss behind her ear.
“Thanks.”
I nodded in Paige’s direction and shot her a lopsided grin. If I could get Bella to understand how I felt then I would Paige a hell of a lot.
I pulled the door open and stepped out into the corridor. Will’s voice carried after me.
“I still need you to sign the papers. Come by and we’ll get it sorted.”
I waved over my shoulder in response and headed for the elevator. I hadn’t asked him what the papers were for, and as soon as I had the thought I turned back. The door shut behind me with a soft click and I let it go. I would find out soon enough what the papers were for and I had something far more important to deal with.
Standing outside Sarah’s door I waited for her to answer. During the jog across the city I had plenty of time to think of what I was going to say to Bella. I had the speech planned out in my head. But now that I was outside the door, I could feel my words catching in my throat.
Sarah pulled the door open, a frown on her face. The moment she realised it was me, her expression changed, a wide smile lighting her up.
“Aidan, I wasn’t expecting you.”
She stood aside and I moved past her into the small entryway. She moved past me, her body pressing against mine in the tight confines of the hall. Part of me couldn’t help but wonder if she had done it on purpose. She slinked from the hall into the living room and I followed her.
“Bella’s not in at the moment but you’re more than welcome to wait with me for her to come back.”
I started to shake my head but she grabbed my arm and dragged me further into the room.
“Please? I think there’s a lot we should talk about.”
“About Bella? Don’t you think we should wait for her to come back before we discuss anything to do with her?”
Sarah shook her blonde hair out as she made her way into the small kitchen. I listened as she opened the fridge and the sound of glasses could be heard clinking. She carried the bottle of wine back into the living room and set the two glasses down on the coffee table.
“Sit, have a drink. She won’t be long.”
I sat on the couch and she sat beside me, curling her legs up underneath her body as she poured a large glass of white wine for both of us. Wine wasn’t really something I liked to drink but it would have been rude of me to decline the offer.
I perched myself awkwardly on the edge of the couch, angling my body so I would be the first to see Bella when she came in the door.
“So, I’ve been wanting to talk to you about Bella now for a while but I’ve never really had the opportunity.”
I sipped at the wine, its bitter taste coating my tongue. Maybe it would help me tell Bella how I felt about her? Surely it couldn’t hinder me, I was already struggling to find the perfect words to describe my feelings. I had never really been a feelings type of guy.
“How do you think she is getting on?”
I shrugged. “I think she’s doing as well as can be expected.”
Sarah smiled and sipped at her drink thoughtfully.
“I know you care for her but has it ever crossed your mind that maybe Bella will never fully recover?”
Her question caught me off guard. It seemed like such a strange thing to ask. How could she believe that Bella wouldn’t fully recover?
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“Well I don’t mean physically. You heard the doctors, she’s fine physically but I’m talking mentally, emotionally.”
“I don’t think we should be talking about this without Bella here. I’m sorry, Sarah, it just doesn’t feel right.”
She sighed and set her glass down on the table before sliding across the couch towards me.
“You’re absolutely right. I’m just worried about you and her… I don’t want to see either of you getting hurt and I can see it happening.”
I shot her a thin lipped smile and took another, bigger mouthful of wine.
“You don’t need to worry about me.”
<
br /> “But I do. I didn’t realise it before but you’re such an amazing guy. Any woman would be lucky to have you. The way you’ve stuck by Bella through all of this. I don’t think any other guy would have done it and well I know Bella.”
There was something in the tone of her voice that made me curious.
“What do you mean, you know Bella?”
“She’s not ready for a relationship. I’m not even sure she’ll ever be ready for a relationship again. She’s been through so much, Aidan. The things that monster must have done to her. You have to see it… How will she ever cope with that? How will she ever be able to give herself wholly and completely to another man?”
“I think if you can say that, then you don’t really know your sister at all. She’s a fighter and she’s stronger than you think. I love Bella and I know she loves me.”
“Does she though? She told me today that she’s not sure how she feels about you. That she doesn’t want to hurt you but she doesn’t know if there’s a future for you two.”
Her words cut across my soul, ripping my heart into small little pieces that turned to ash inside my ribcage. How could Bella have said that? Wouldn’t she have told me?
“She wouldn’t say that.”
I stood and paced out toward the kitchen. I dumped the glass of wine down the sink before slamming the glass onto the counter. Is that how Bella really felt? Was I hear on a fools errand. Would I bare my soul to her, only to have her reject me? Had she truly changed that much?
Sarah’s hand on my arm had me spinning around.
“Aidan, I didn’t mean to upset you. I just thought you deserved to know the truth. I really don’t want to see her hurting you like that, it’s not right.”
I shook my head and closed my eyes in an attempt to block out her words. There had to be a different explanation for it. Bella wasn’t like that, she wasn’t the type to lead me on.
Sarah’s arms wrapped around my shoulders as she pressed her body into mine. Startled I opened my eyes as she crushed her mouth to mine. I could still taste the wine on her lips as her tongue slid across my closed mouth.
I pushed her, sending her across the kitchen. She collapsed against the opposite counter, her eyes narrowing with contempt.
“I thought it’s what you wanted.”
I shook my head and scrubbed my hand across my mouth. “No, God, no. I’d never want that. If Bella turns me away then it’s something I’ll have to live with… But I could never want this, not with you.”
The sound of the front door slamming drew my attention from Sarah. There was no sign of Bella. Had she walked in on us and assumed the worst? I couldn’t let her believe that I would betray her like that. I’d spent the last two years searching for her, I wouldn’t jeopardise it now, not when I was so close to getting Bella back.
I pushed away from the counter and headed for the door. Sarah’s hand closed around my arm as she tried to pull me back.
“Aidan, let her go. She had to know the truth… She had to know who you really were.”
I turned on her, anger sparking along my skin. She had planned this? She had set me up so Bella wouldn’t want me? What kind of a sister was she? How could she do this to her own flesh and blood? It didn’t make sense.
“Get you hand off me, Sarah.”
My voice was low and filled with all the venom I felt towards her in that moment. Rage threatened to flood my body with adrenaline and I knew I had to get away from this woman. The woman that had tried to ruin the relationship I had with Bella.
She let me go, whatever she saw in my face frightened her. She backed up until she hit the kitchen counter. Her body trembling. I knew what she saw in my face, I knew she saw the true face of the man I’d been forced to become. With Bella gone I’d truly embraced the violence inside me. It was the only thing that had kept me going. If I’d allowed myself to think of her alone and vulnerable then I wouldn’t have been able to drag my sorry ass out of bed in the mornings. But this way I could. I could do so much more when I gave into my rage. It fuelled me, numbed the pain of her loss and forced me to focus on what I knew. Forced me to focus on hunting down the man responsible until I could make him pay.
But that was over with now. I had no one left to hunt down. No one I needed to exact my revenge upon. Instead there was just me, the monster I had given myself over to become. And I couldn’t be that person anymore.
Stumbling away from Sarah I ran for the door, my legs pumping up and down as I raced after to Bella. The only thought that raced through my mind was how I needed her, I couldn’t be without her. Only she could forgive me. Only she could save me.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Bella
Watching the stylist put the finishing touches to my hair was like watching someone place some of the missing pieces of my life back together. Seeing the black disappear was to have a weight lifted from my shoulders. It didn’t get rid of the images from my mind. Nothing would shake them, I wasn’t naive enough to believe that a hair style could provide me with something therapy couldn’t. But it gave me back a piece of myself.
When I looked in the mirror I was no longer Christopher’s slave. I wasn’t a prisoner and he was well and truly gone. I belonged to myself once more.
Tears trickled down my cheeks and the stylist chewed her lip nervously.
“I’m so sorry I couldn’t take you any lighter. I really did try…”
I shook my head and tried to speak, my voice coming out in a choked half whisper.
“You have no idea what you’ve given me.”
I could see the confusion on her face and I wasn’t going to explain why I was crying. Instead I grinned at her and ran my fingers through my golden brown locks.
“I love it.”
She clapped her hands together and proceeded to hop up and down on the spot. She was like someone who had drank far too much caffeine and I wasn’t sure if it was really just her personality or if she was artificially hyper.
Once I’d paid I headed back onto the street, each time I passed a shop window my reflection caught my eye and I couldn’t help but stare. There was only one person I really wanted to share it with. One person I wanted to show it to, but I had no idea if he wanted to see me.
Pushing him away seemed cruel, for both of us. But I didn’t want him to know the truth, if he knew then he wouldn’t want me anymore. I’d spent the last two years so utterly certain that I would never see him again. Aidan had become the dream, my dream, I used him to escape from the hell my life had become.
Each night as I’d lain on my bed, hiding beneath the thin sheet I’d imagined him there with me. He was always there to wipe the tears from my cheeks, he was always there to whisper in my ear that everything would be fine. That I would survive it, that I couldn’t give up. And so I’d fought on, struggled through the pain and the emotional battles in the hopes that one day my dream would become a reality.
And now it was a reality I found myself afraid. What if something went wrong? What if he saw my scars… What if he found me repulsive because I wasn’t perfect anymore? Doubts and fears crowded my mind making it almost impossible to think. There was nowhere I could turn to, no one I could ask if it would all work out.
The Aidan from my dreams was gone and each night I went to bed alone, I really was utterly alone. I struggled to sift through the memories of what Christopher had done. How could I expect Aidan to understand? How could I explain to him what had happened to me? He wouldn’t understand.
I’d become so utterly sure of that fact. He wouldn’t understand, he couldn’t understand. It had become like a mantra I found myself repeating over and over inside my mind. To give him a chance to understand was to take a risk that I wasn’t sure I was ready for.
I paused in front of one shop window. I could just make out the deep dark circles beneath my eyes, my face was a little too gaunt and my clothes hung from my body. I’d picked out the most unattractive outfit I could find to wear out of the hospital. I looked like
a street urchin and yet none of that mattered.
I wasn’t in Christopher’s shadow anymore and I needed to accept it. He was gone, shot by the man Aidan had worked with. He wasn’t coming back. And yet, every so often as I walked along the street on my own I often found myself glancing from left to right. A man in a business suit across the street on a cell phone reminded me of Christopher. It was the way he stood, the gestures he made as he spoke.
I reached into my bag with trembling hands and drew my new cell phone from its depths. Sarah had picked it up for me and as I flipped the screen up I instantly began searching through the phone numbers. There was one name I searched for, one number I wanted. But it wasn’t in the cell phone. Aidan’s number was missing.
Closing my eyes I sucked in a deep breath and pushed the cell phone back into my bag. Once I had calmed down I started to move forward, it wasn’t far to Sarah’s apartment. All I needed to do was keep walking, keep moving and nothing would harm me.
Without thinking my legs carried me straight to Aidan’s apartment. I had no idea why I did it. He was going to think I was crazy but it was the one place I felt safe. It was stupid, Aidan’s apartment was the place I was taken from and yet I still felt as though it would be the safest place on earth.
Realisation hit me. It had nothing to do with the apartment. The feeling of safety wasn’t to do with four walls, it was what lay within the four walls. I felt safe because of Aidan. He helped me to feel protected, in his arms was the only place I wanted to be.
I climbed the steps to the building and pushed the door open. I didn’t hesitate as I climbed the stairs, in fact I’d never been more sure of anything in my life. It wasn’t until I reached Aidan’s door that I felt the first rush of apprehension. Would he turn me away?
