Page 96 of Teach Me How To Fly

Her face was brightened up now that she had the talk she needed with Lysandre and I couldn’t be more happier to see her like this. She came closer to me, then sat on the edge of my bed and the moment she raised her eyes to me, her lips curled into a soft smile. Her eyes were gleaming with gratitude, or at least, that’s how it felt.

"You were saving children all this time, weren’t you?”

I smiled, nodding and closing my laptop. “Yes. I wanted to tell you more about this, but I just didn’t feel any moment as being the right one to do it.”

“I’m so dumb for believing, for even a second, that you could be an abuser too. The moment I saw Lysandre on my balcony, so scared and alone, I thought of her as me. I thought that she was abused, just like I’d been when I was a child and I thought that you…” she spoke fast, the words coming out of her mouth with such speed that she couldn’t even breathe.

I stood up from the bed as I saw her chest rising up, because I knew she was on the verge of bursting out crying. I didn’t want to see her like that again.

I sat beside her, pulling her to my chest and placing a kiss on her forehead. She sighed, wrapping my torso with her arms and even though I was sure that she was going to start crying now that she had me hugging her, she didn’t. She raised her gaze to me and her lips didn’t even move from the smile she had when she first came here.

“You know, Lydia told me that Sylvian escaped from the sanatorium when I saw her for the last time,” she whispered, as she started playing with her fingers in her lap.

“He escaped?”

That shocked me and angered me at the same time. How could have I missed this? Now I was thinking that all those threats were coming from him, but I couldn’t tell Anna this. I didn’t want to scare her even more.

“Yes, but that’s not what I want to talk about right now. I’m scared that he is free, but I’m more scared of myself. Because of what I was thinking in a moment of weakness.”

“What do you mean, Anna?” I asked, completely confused at her sudden change of words.

“I’m sorry for having these thoughts about you, Maksen. Deep down in my heart, I knew you weren’t an abuser, but therewere so many things happening to both of us that I didn’t even know what to believe anymore,” she explained, brushing my jawline with her fingers.

Her touch sent shivers down my spine and I hated myself that I had such teenager reactions when I was around her. It was like I was experiencing everything for the first time when it came to her.

“You don’t need to be sorry for it, Anna. It’s perfectly normal to have those thoughts when you were a victim yourself,” I whispered and gave her a comforting smile. “But now that the truth is out, I want you to know that I have a whole organization for saving children. Since I started going with Lukyan to those auctions, I knew it was wrong to sell and buy children like that and I knew that those billionaires that were trading them were going to make their life miserable. And I just couldn’t stand there and do nothing, so that’s how I put up the base of this.”

“And how do you save them? How does Lukyan not know anything about this?”

“In order to make him believe me, I had to buy some children for him and let him do what he wanted to them. It hurt me like hell to see them suffering, but it was the only way I could’ve saved more,” I lowered my eyes, seeing her eyes flinch with pain.

“So he really is hurting innocent children,”

“Yes.”

She buried her face into my t-shirt, and I felt how her arms gripped stronger around me. Her warm breath was hitting my chest, while the rhythm of her heart was vibrating through my entire body. We were just sitting there in silence, while she was probably digesting what she just found out. It wasn’t easy to accept that your so-called father was trafficking children.

“I’m happy that you’re saving them, Maksen.”

I chose not to say anything back because I knew she already had tears rolling down her cheeks. I was happy that she knewthe truth now, but I was happier that she was still in my arms, hugging me like I was the only person that mattered in her life.

5 MONTHS LATER

32

MAKSEN

Iwoke up three hours ago and I quietly left Annalise’s room to let her sleep for as long as she needed to. I didn’t want to disturb her.

She had enough on her shoulders and the wedding was already something that was making her feel bad every day. I had to make sure that all preparations for the event were proceeding according to the plan. The event hall, the band we had reserved for the night, and all the other things needed to be perfect.

There were only eleven days left until the wedding, and each time the thought crossed my mind, the image of Annalise gazing at me as I prepared to say “yes” to another woman was haunting me.

Even though she knew I had to do it so I could take down Lukyan, I knew it still hurt her. She didn’t want to show me how much it affected her, but I knew her well enough to notice when something was off with her.

I brushed my forehead to wipe off the sweat drops that were rolling down my face as I stepped up the stairs. The workout I did was much needed and as I got out of the basement, I took a deep breath in and moved my feet to my room.

The house was drowned in a deathly silence as I was making my way upstairs. Maybe the girls didn’t wake up yet so I needed to keep the silence.

---