Page 82 of Whispers of Fire

I’m a fuckin’ coward, trying to protect you from my darkness by pushing you away.

“What does it have to do with anything? Since the moment I met you, you cared for me and helped me, and now you’re just leaving like it meant nothing?”

She’s so fuckin’ right.

Her words sink into me like a dagger to the gut. I wanna tell her so fuckin’ bad that she’s everything to me. She matters, she’s the one I want. But telling her that won’t do any good for her. Whether I’m there or not on Sunday, I’ll make sure someone will get her out of there, and then she’ll have the freedom she wants but is afraid to admit. She won’t need me, I’ll keep an eye on her from afar, letting her have a chance at starting fresh.

Putting a strand of her hair behind her ear, I sense her body pulling away from me.

Ouch. But I can’t blame her.

“I want ya to be free, Angel, to go see the world without chains and fucked up ideas in your head,” I state, cause it is true; that’s what I truly want for her, even if the price to pay is to watch her from afar.

“What I do everyday for the club, it’s… I don’t want ya close from this shit.” Cause protectin’ her is all I care about, from her cult, from her parents, and even from me. I know I wouldn’t want to hide things from her if we were… well, more . And I know she wouldn’t accept what I do, and she’d be right to.

She’s been taught about right and wrong since she was a kid, why would she accept a twisted fucker like me to share her life?

“I know you’re fuckin’ strong and you’ll figure out a way to leave those people in the past and start fresh, and it can’t happened if I’m there with ya. I live in a dark world, Angel, and I’m not sure I'll survive ya pushin’ me away once you’ll know what I do.” She takes another sheet of paper, scribbling faster than I ever saw her do before.

“My world is as dark as yours, Vox. Just please, tell me what’s eating you up so much that you want to run away from me to the other side of the country!” Her brows furrow.

“It’s not, fuck, Angel, it’s an order from Ares, it isn’t a choice.”

“We all have choices. I took the risk to come here with you tonight and you chose to leave me. You don’t think I can handle your life, you don’t trust me enough.” Her blue pools get watery.

Am I not trustin’ her enough or am I too afraid the best thing I’ll ever get to have is gonna slip from my fingers?

“Don’t, Angel,” I say, sensing her body pulling away from mine.

“Take me back.” She pushes her hands on the ground to help her stand up.

“Angel, no, it’s not–” And fuck, what I was afraid of is hittin’ me back in the face. All I wanted was to free her from her life, but in the fuckin’ process, or maybe since day one, cause I acted like a fuckin’ asshole afraid of my feelings, I fell for her hard and now I’m just the bastard makin’ her cry when all I wanted in the first place was to protect her.

That’s it, Vox, wake the fuck up.

She’s it.

Don’t fuckin’ blow this off cause of some fuckin’ trauma from your past.

The next words burst out of me, catchin’ me off guard and yet they sound too fuckin’ good to stop them. “Come with me.”

“To Seattle?” she writes.

“Yeah.”

This could work, us, far away from here. She’d get a fresh start.

“So one minute you’re leaving me and now you want me to come with you?” she writes.

I swallow hard like the jackass I am.

“It’s not like that, Angel.”

I was afraid to break my walls until her, but she changed everythin’.

“I thought we were something, Vox, I thought there was an us .”

A tear falls on her cheek. She signs and for the first time, I wish I didn’t get what she told me.

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