Page 63 of Craving Dahlia

ALEK

My head is spinning as Dahlia stalks out of her office. As quickly as I can gather myself, I check to make sure I’m zipped up and decent, and walk out to the hall, closing the door behind me and running my hand through my hair.

The last two and a half hours feel like a fever dream. So many of my moments with her feel like that, like they’re barely even real, the product of some starving need that makes me temporarily lose my mind. Like an addiction—like being high.

I nearly fucked her in her ass on her office desk.And it’s not just that—not just the sex. Not just the way I can’t seem to control my desire around her, like she’s unleashed something in me that I kept caged for five years.

It’s the fact that I can feel us growing closer. I can feel her starting to chip away at the walls I’ve built. The first crack was her coming to me about the man in the bar, telling me the truth—and making me believe, for the first time, that the rest of what she’s said is the truth as well.

The next was that goddamned doctor’s appointment. I never thought black and white static on a screen could crack open something in my heart, and yet?—

Don’t you want to start a family with me, Alek? I could be pregnant with your child right now. Let’s go home. Come home with me.

Elia’s voice echoes through my head, that beautiful, musical sound that’s now laced with the discordant notes of betrayal, reminding me of another woman, another promise, another possibility. She was never pregnant, I know that now. There was never even a possibility of her carrying my child. It was a trap, a honeypot set for me, a long game that I willingly played without knowing it. And now, a different womanishaving my child.

So she says.The thought is automatic, but it doesn’t hold any weight now. I believe her—I have since that night that she came to me with the truth about that man. And then last night?—

Last night, I saw another man put his hands on her. Last night, I came inside of her for the first time. I felt closer to her than I have to anyone in a long time, and what did I do with that? Did I put up my walls again, push her away like I should?

No. I came to her fucking work, asked her about all the things she’s passionate about, and then fucked her on her desk. Like a lover. Like a husband. Like all the things I’m trying not to be.

No matter what you do, you’ll never be able to forget me.

Why the fuck did I say that to her?

I run my hand through my hair again as I stalk to the elevator, tugging at a handful of it in frustration. I know why I said it. I know what I was thinking of when I did—I said those same words to Elia, on the other side of the bars of a cell. I screamed them at her, raw with betrayal, pain, and blood in every word.

I meant them differently, when I said them to Dahlia just now. But I shouldn’t have.

Even if I thought I could trust her fully—even if I thought I could let go of the past enough to love her, she deserves someone whole. I’m shattered from the inside out, broken in every way, and the thought of letting her see me bare—physically and emotionally, makes both my skin and my soul crawl.

I can’t be a husband to her, and I don’t know how to love a wife like her any longer. That was carved out of me long ago. Now, all that’s left is lust, and this painful, driving hunger that makes me want to claim her, possess her, make her mine…even though I know I can’t keep her.

As I walk back out of the museum, down the street to the garage where I parked my motorcycle, I feel a prickling at the back of my neck. It’s a familiar feeling, one that I’ve grown used to a long time ago—a feeling like someone is watching me. I twist around, glancing over my shoulder, but there’s no one I can see.

I veer down a side road towards the garage, and that prickling feeling runs down my spine again. I glance over my shoulder again as I turn, once again seeing nothing, and duck into the garage as I head towards the space where my motorcycle is parked.

A dozen yards away, I see a bulky figure all in black walking quickly away from the spot where it is, hands shoved in his pockets, his head down. I grit my teeth, hanging back, and I watch to see if I can get a glimpse of his face as he walks away. He doesn’t turn, though, and I let out a sharp breath of frustration.

The thought of Dahlia out to lunch, on her own, makes my stomach tighten. I pull my phone out of my pocket, firing off a quick text.

Alek:You should go home after lunch. Call the driver. I’m worried about you going back to work.

Dahlia:Are you crazy? You come fuck me at work and then you think you can tell me to just go home? Fuck off.

Alek:I’m your husband. Just listen to me? I’m trying to make sure you’re safe.

There’sno response to that, which doesn’t surprise me at all. I press the back of my fist to my forehead, resisting the urge to try to track her phone to her location and throw her onto the back of my motorcycle. She’s not going to listen to me, though, and I’d have to lock her in her room to keep her from going to work. Which, right now, doesn’t sound like the worst idea.

Or, I could ask Dimitri to give her a bodyguard. I know he would, happily, but everything in me resists the idea the moment I think of it. Asking for that would mean that I’d have to admit to him what’s going on—the man at the bar, the fight at Sal’s, this man nosing around my bike. I’d have to open up to him about the past, explain to him that I think it might still be following me—and all of that makes me feel almost physically sick.

I don’t want to revisit any of it. And I don’t want to see his horror, or his pity, to hearhisguilt over my pain. I don’t want to involve him, to listen to him strategize about how to deal with my problems.

I escaped it the first time on my own. No one came for me, no one saved me. And I’ll deal with it this time on my own, too.If only Dahlia would fucking listen.

The thought repeats in my head as I stride towards my bike, even as I know that I haven’t given her enough information to make her think it’s worth listeningto. And yet, she sawwhat happened in the parking lot behind Sal’s. She was almost kidnapped.Shouldn’t that be enough?

My thoughts are chaos as I look over the bike, trying to make sure it wasn’t tampered with. No brake lines cut, nothing done to my fuel tank, no explosive slipped somewhere onto the machinery. It looks clean, and I look it over twice and then a third time before feeling satisfied that it’s safe. All the same, I feel my muscles tense as I start the engine, half expecting something to happen for several seconds, before nothing does and I relax slightly.

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