Page 56 of Room Service
I take her to the bedroom and put her down on the bed, before I say, “Get changed and get into bed.”
And she fucking laughs at me. Really laughs. Laughs so much that she’s holding her stomach and wiping tears from her eyes.
“What is so funny?” I ask after a few minutes.
“Just… everything,” she replies as she tries to catch her breath. Well, that really fucking narrows it down. She sees the confusion on my face, and she props herself against the headboard. “It’s just… if someone had told me that I was going to end up fucking my boss and that my husband was going to completely lose his shit and try to strangle me, I’d have told them to stay off the drugs. Oh, and not to mention how my parents pimped me out to said husband to ensure they were financially secure for the rest of their lives, only for it to all go up in smoke when the husband decided to become a lazy wanker and force me to give up my dreams of a career to scrub floors and make sure the upper class didn’t have a bloody crease in their bed sheets. I mean, it’s so fucking tragic that if I don’t laugh, I’ll most certainly cry, and I don’t want to cry anymore…” Her voice trails off as her eyes drop to look at the quilt that she starts to pick at, as if there is some kind of fluff she can’t get rid of.
“Elise—”
“Oh, and then there’s the part where I have no home, can’t go to work because I look like I got beaten the shit out of in a boxing match, and now I have to worry about the husband coming back, as well as dealing with the stress the divorce will cause. My mother hasn’t even spoken to me since you threw them out of here, and there’s still a part of me that can’t quite let go of wanting them to be fucking happy for me, proud of me, let me choose my own path without shoving a shitload of guilt down my throat.”
She’s breathing heavily by the time she’s done, and something aches inside of me from hearing her words and watching her putting on a brave face, when I know she just wants to break, even as she fights against it.
“Why do you even want me here, Dorien? Why do you even care what happens to me?” she whispers, and as I stand at her bedside, my hands balled into fists in my pockets from all she has been through, I know that now is the time to be honest. She needs it, and, hell, maybe I do too. I’ve never been a fan of it, but slowly, she’s changing me, and she has no fucking idea.
“Because you’re my light, Elise. I saw it the first time we met, and I still see it now.”
“There’s no light left in me, Dorien,” she says sadly, and even as she said she didn’t want to cry anymore, the tears come, and I go to her, wrapping her in my arms and letting her cry it out.
“You don’t have to be strong around me, buttercup,” I soothe, because even as I hate to see her swallowed by her grief and the guilt she still carries due to her parents, she needs to know she doesn’t need to be anything but her true self with me.
“I don’t want to be scared,” she croaks, and it makes me hold her a little tighter. And as I sit there with her, time ticks by, her sobs slowing down and her hold on me loosening as her eyelids flutter closed, but it’s her last words before sleep claims her that has me torn in two. “I think I like you, Dorien Dukes. More than I probably should.”
Fuck.
When I’m sure she’s passed out, I uncurl my arms from around her and cover her with a blanket on the end of the bed. I don’t want to move her to get the quilt, so the blanket will suffice for now.
I leave the bedroom, running my hands through my hair as I go to the kitchen and pour myself a glass of scotch. I’m going to fucking need it for the next phone call I have to make. It’s not one I ever planned on making, but then, fuck, I didn’t plan on meeting her and having my whole world turned upside down.
I step onto the balcony and pull my phone from my pocket, sipping the scotch as I look at the number on my phone.
Do I? Don’t I? What the hell will I be signing up for if I do? Should I wait a bit longer? But even as I ask myself these questions, I know I’m not going to wait. I know I would sign up for anything to make her safe and happy. And I know that I’ve done the very thing I vowed I never would… I’ve fallen in love. That in turn makes me vulnerable, something I never wanted to be again, not after my parents made me feel so fucking weak and pathetic, but she’s been treated the same way. She’s lived a life of pain and disappointment because of the very people that should have loved her. And here I am, just as damaged emotionally as she is, but it’s happened anyway. I’ve let her in, and now I don’t want to let her go.
And that tragic fucking hope in my chest tells me that I want her to feel the same way about me too.
I hate hope. It always leaves me disappointed, and it’s why I gave up on it years ago. And if she doesn’t feel the same for me, I know that nothing will ever bring me hope again, because I won’t fucking let it. I shouldn’t have let her in, but I did, and here I am, about to possibly sign my life away to give her some peace. I can’t do shit about her parents right now, but her husband? I can absolutely fucking deal with him, even if I did plan to wait until she’d divorced him so she wasn’t caught in the crossfire, but needs must. I just need to find the fucker first.
I hit the call button on my phone and put it to my ear, leaning on the balcony and looking across the city below.
It rings three times before the call is answered.
“Hello,” comes the deep voice of the most dangerous guy I’ve ever heard of. There’s ruthless, and then there’s this guy, who will fuck you up for putting a foot wrong.
“Nate Knowles?” I ask, the confidence in my voice not wavering in the slightest.
“Who wants to know?” he questions.
“Dorien Dukes.”
Silence ticks by for a moment, before he says, “And why would you be calling me, Dorien?”
“I need your help.” It pains me to ask for the help, but I can’t wait around for the guys I ordered to watch Derrick’s arse to find him. He could be fuck knows where by now.
“And how exactly did you get my number?” he asks.
“I’m pretty sure you know that money talks,” I inform him.
“It does, so enlighten me, Dorien.”
