A Billion Broken Pieces (Incongruity Series Book 2)

by Thandiwe Mpofu

  Chapter 20

  Chloe

  YOU KNOW THAT BUZZING in your ears, in your head whenever you have left like a really loud place? Say a Goo Goo Dolls concert where the crowd is screaming the lyrics to ‘Iris’ or in the club where the same techno beats are being played on a loop. You get this kind of buzz when the noise dies down.

  That’s the buzz that I can only hear.

  I don’t know where I am, I don’t know what I’m feeling, honestly, I don’t know what happened.

  I just feel . . . lost. Lost and empty inside.

  “Talk to me.” Comes a deep demanding voice to the side of me.

  Are we still at the dinner? If we are that would just be embarrassing because I know, I can feel it, I know I blacked out.

  “Charlotte!”

  Gideon brings me back, demanding my attention using my first name. Slowly, I look up at him, searching for something, wanting, no, needing, something.

  “Are you okay?” He asks softly when he sees me looking at him.

  I nod my head, yes. I mean, I’m not hurt or anything, I’m fine. There is nothing wrong with me, I feel amazing hearing all the jokes about a younger Gideon.

  He looks at me seriously, the green orbs piercing me, cutting me open until I can’t hide anymore.

  “Stop it!” I start to which he doesn’t. “Stop it, damn you! Stop looking at me like that!” I shout in the car.

  I realize that we are moving, that we are in a car and we are going somewhere. The partition is up and I don’t know who is driving, nor do I know where we going.

  “Looking at you like what?” He demands softly, seriously, demanding me to answer his question.

  I don’t want to answer him. I don’t want him to look at me the way he is looking at me now. The way he has always looked at me. I hate it.

  “Answer me, Charlotte!” He demands, his voice clear, strong and brooking no argument from me.

  I always knew that Gideon was an alpha male. I mean, I could literally sense the unbridled power that oozes from him since the first time I met him.

  “You look at me like I’m broken.” I brokenly whisper, in the dark space of the night I confess the part that hurts me. The part that I’m able to confess.

  And then silence.

  I don’t look at him, I break his gaze and look blindly out the window. I don’t want to process it, I don’t want to think about it, let alone acknowledge what happened tonight. And I certainly don’t want to talk about it.

  So, I confess to him what I have been feeling since the first time I saw him. Since the first time I beheld the majesty that is Gideon Black.

  “At times, you look at me like I’m damaged goods, like I’m broken beyond repair.” I start slowly, quietly. “You look at me as if I hold all the grief in the world and you don’t know how to tiptoe around me.” I point out.

  I close my eyes and picture some random times when I would catch him dissecting me, analyzing me, studying me.

  “You look at me like I’m empty inside.” I finish.

  God knows there is much more I could say, a lot I could talk about. We could talk about Alexander and what he said tonight or the unfazed look on Gideon’s face. Evidence that he already knew about it all. He already knew that Alexander Hamilton was my mother’s father. A father she did not claim.

  “Look at me.” He demands, this time, his voice deep and hard. I can’t help but look.

  There are no tears running down my cheeks or sobs wreaking havoc to my body. I know that will eventually happen but right now, I’m empty,

  “Is that what you think of me?” He questions me, his icy gaze, turning molten in a space of mere seconds.

  “I don’t have to think about it, I see it in your beautiful eyes.” I confess again. “You have the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen in my life, Gideon.”

  The pair of eyes his father has, albeit George is older, his father’s shade of green are lighter. Not in pigmentation, but in emotion and brevity. Gideon has his own weight of responsibility and duty clouding his eyes. But I guess that is why I fell in love with them to begin with.

  “If the topic of conversation is our eyes, then you must know that you are the one who has enchanting, captivating eyes that bewitch me each time you cut me up, like you are doing now.” He states, “But I won’t sit around and have you dictate to me what I feel when I look at you” He grits out.

  And then, the car slows to a stop, turning out of the highway and onto a backroad of some sort. But Gideon and I are still staring at each other.

  “You have lied to me on a number of occasions, tonight was no exception.” I say sadly. I don’t even want to think about the promise he made to me tonight at his penthouse. I don’t want to examine it too closely because if I do, it will trigger other parts, huge parts that I don’t want to face.

  “I might have lied to you baby, but the way I see you? Now, that’s not a lie.”

  The car comes to a complete stop and I turn to look out the window and I notice we are at some kind of house.

  “Where are we?” I ask, honestly, I just want to get back to the familiar comfort that is my small apartment. “I want to go to my apartment tonight.” I inform him.

  “You can be mad at me all you want, but your safety is non-negotiable.” He is angry now, I can see the frustration on his face, as he tries to read me.

  He angrily opens his door then gets out, comes around my side to open my door. This time he doesn’t wait for me to take his extended hand, this time, he reaches in, his arms go around me and he lifts me out of the car and over his shoulder.

  “Put me down you, you, Neanderthal!” I gasp out, shocked at the way he manhandles me. Gideon is too tightly put together for him to actually do that.

  “Put me down!” I shout again but my demand falls on deaf ears. He strides, sexily might I add, towards the beautiful charismatic house.

  I can’t see a lot of the area or the house for that matter, obviously, because all I see is his ass, and his powerful strides. I think we enter the house as there is a change on my scenery.

  I frantically try to look around the foyer as we enter, everything is clean and shiny but I can’t see much from my position. Being upside down isn’t really fun as it would have been when I was, say, eight?

  “Gideon, I’m not joking with you! Put me down.” I shout again, unaware of Tom who walks right behind us. It’s a good thing I don’t notice because I would just die of embarrassment.

  “You may go, Tom. We’ll be leaving for the city in the morning.” Gideon says without stopping, his voice harsh and rough around the edges.

  “Yes sir. Goodnight.” Tom responds, and that’s when I realize that he was right behind us.

  As soon as Tom’s footsteps fade away, I slap Gideon’s firm bottom.

  “How dare you manhandle me in front of your men?”

  “Shut up, Chloe.” He grits out and goes up the stairs.

  All too soon, Gideon opens a door and flips on the light switch. The room is suddenly bathed in beautiful, soft muted light that I like. The kind of light that makes anything seem and feel relaxing and intimate. But Gideon doesn’t slow down, he strides over with purpose into the room and the next thing I know, I’m launched into the air. I take in a sharp breath, panicking, but I soon land flat on my back on the softest bed I have ever been on in my life.

  I don’t have time to look around or notice where I am because Gideon immediately follows after me, his large body pinning me to the bed. We look at each other for a split second then he swoops in and savagely kisses the life out of me.

  I die inside.

  All my pain, all my frustration, all my confusion, he demands every nuance and shape of it. And I? I do nothing but surrender, giving it all to him, asking for as much of him as I can get.

  He suddenly stops and wretches away from me, jumping from the bed and moving away from me. Leaving me gasping for breath, more than a little confused.

  “What was that?” I demand, un
able to bear the tense silence as I watch his rigid, broad shoulders roughly move up and down.

  “That was me controlling myself before I cross a line that I know damn well you are not ready for.” He grits out angrily.

  And that just angers me even further. I move to the edge of the bed and vigorously remove the beautiful pair of shoes that this sexy god bought for me. I remove them and stand up as soon as I know I’m free to move.

  “How dare you?!” I seethe. “How dare you think you can dictate my life or that you know me and my needs! Who do you think you are?” I demand, not holding back in the slightest.

  “You just learnt who your Grandfather is for Christ’s sake and you stand there with your sassy mouth telling me that I don’t know you?” He counters, looking at me heatedly.

  “You think just because you have been holding it in all this time, and you really know how to use your words to gut a man to death, that you can hide who you are. Well newsflash Charlotte, I see you!” He informs, spreading his arms out.

  I hate that I can feel my tears fall down my cheeks. But he isn’t done cutting me insides, spilling them out for the world to see.

  “Yes, I see that you are broken inside. Yes, I see that there is an emptiness in you. Yes, to all of that. But you know what else I know about you, Chloe? You are a fraud!”

  “I’m a fraud? Rich words coming from you, Mr. Black. A man who has more secrets than anyone else in this room. Who is Tabitha, huh?” I demand, getting really hot and flustered. I don’t even know what’s happening to me.

  “You want to know why I don’t tell you anything, Charlotte? Do you really want to know?” He questions softly, as he stalks closer to where I stand.

  I don’t know where this is going but my heart, my sweet heart is beating much to slow for this kind of situation. My brain is fried at his nearness.

  “You don’t know how to process things. You haven’t processed your parent’s death. You haven’t processed the experiences you have been through while growing up. Hell, you literally refuse to process what just happened less than a half hour ago!” He informs with frustration dripping from each word, each syllable.

  Tears. I can’t stop the flow any more than I can stop looking at him or stop the way his eyes are piercing me. My grief is mine alone and I will deal with it whichever way I want to.

  “Just take me back to my apartment Gideon. I don’t want anything to do with you anymore.” I tell him softly, looking around for my shoes. I can’t deal with all of this anymore. I can’t. . .

  “Like hell, I will.” Gideon roughly bursts out making me take a step back from him. If he wasn’t angry before, now he is livid.

  “This is clearly not going anywhere Gideon. Not the ‘plan’, not with all the lies and the backstabbing.” Not even us.

  I try to explain, looking at his eyes that have completely clouded over with anger and something. Something else I don’t want to touch.

  “So, you what? Give up?” He says, this time, grabbing me by my wrist, easily positioning my body where he wants it.

  “You are good at it you know, the whole running thing. But baby, if running away from me, from us, is what you want to do, fine. But know that if you run, I catch you. I will always find you because you are mine!” He sternly states.

  I’m riveted. I can’t move. I can’t do anything but feel his large erection pressed into my abdomen.

  “I will force you to stay and take it. Take it all. Take all of me.” He informs, beginning to walk backwards, back to the large, high bed. “And you will beg for more.”

  Tremors of heat run through my body excitedly at his words. I know these are not the words any girl would want to hear before she gives herself to the guy that makes her lose her breath. I mean, Gideon’s words are menacing, rough and definitely not a declaration of undying love.

  But it’s exactly what I need in this moment. As perverse and twisted this might be, I need this from him. I want to be his—desperately.

  I surrender to him in every way he commands of me.

  I was already his long before we reached this boiling, combustive point.

  Chapter 21

  Chloe

  Gideon made love to me that night. He took me to the heights of ecstasy, totally commanding my body in every way that he wanted. In ways that pleasured him. And why not, I got off, several times, just from the look of agonized pleasure on his face.

  Gideon introduced me to a world that I’d only heard of and read in books, but never really aware of until the day I met him. Delicately easing me into it at first, because it was my first time, and then at free will as soon as I got acclimated to his girth.

  Christ, he made so hot and feverish for him, I couldn’t help but scream. True to his word, he stopped me from running and forced to stay and take all of him in. Not in a twisted physical sense, but in a mental, psychological way.

  “I run because that’s all I know how to do.” I quietly confess, as I rest my head on his hard, muscled chest with a sprinkling of hair that makes him even more masculine and sexier than ever.

  He is silent, allowing me to speak after a rough but oh so tender round of lovemaking where I think he tapped into the core of my being. Directly into my soul. He runs a lone finger down my spine. He likes doing that, I’m gathering. He likes to keep some form of physical contact, touching me like he actually has to, as if I keep him grounded in some way.

  “When I was eleven, I remember we were in this foster home. A nice, elderly couple wanted to adopt me. I remember thinking they were not my parents, but it was better than living in a mass children’s prison. Because that’s what it feels like you know.” I start recounting.

  I don’t want him to see the pain and anguish that I feel, so I’m grateful for this intimate position.

  “And then what happened?” He asks softly.

  I take a deep breath, dreading to go on with the story, but knowing that particular story, and all of them before it and after, shaped who I am today. I close my eyes, maybe I will be easier then.

  “I was excited really, but I didn’t have any friends to talk to about this. I knew the other kids my age and older were jealous because once you get past ten, it’s really hard to get adopted. Worse still for teens.” I start rambling, trying to stall. But Gideon, without looking at me, just judging the tenseness in my body knows what I’m doing.

  “What happened then, Charlotte.” He demands.

  Whenever it’s just the two of us, he refers to me by my first name. I have to admit, it sounds really good coming from him. A fluttering in my chest happens whenever he uses that name.

  “On the night before I was due to be picked up, the foster dad, I forgot his name because I blocked it out a long time ago; he came in to bathroom where I was you know, getting ready and checking if I took everything.”

  God, I don’t want to talk about this, as I feel Gideon’s entire body freeze. Then we totally shift in one swift motion. All of a sudden, I’m laying on my back, looking up at his large hovering body.

  “Your next words better not be that the motherfucker touched you.” He spits out, making me gasp. His gorgeous eyes now screaming bloody murder. I sense danger radiating from him again, it’s slowly unleashing the longer he looks down at me.

  “Answer me, Charlotte.” he demands. Oh, God.

  “No, he didn’t.” I automatically burst out.

  “Explain.” He grits out.

  “I saw the way he was looking at me at times and by that time, I was well versed in what foster homes are like when you are unlucky. You could say, I knew it was coming. So, I was prepared.” I rush to explain.

  I remember the small blade I always kept tucked under my belt. I always wore pants, not because I didn’t have dresses, but I knew that with pants, I could avoid certain attention. At that time, my body was developing much faster and in weird ways, as a result of my mixed genes I guess.

  “What happened, I’m not going to ask you again.” He demands.

&nbs
p; “I stabbed him in the chest with a small blade I kept on me, after kicking him in the nuts as hard as I could anyway. And then I ran.” I explain on one breath. “I didn’t look back, I just ran.”

  And have been running from any and everything since then.

  “Good.” Gideon grits out after a long drawn out pause, “That’s good baby.” He says.

  “Why do I have a feeling that you were going to do something irrational?” I question him skeptically.

  “Because I was going to hunt him down. What happened to him?” He questions, and I shrug.

  “I know for certain that he didn’t bleed out and die like I had hoped because he tried following me. But I was really good at track, so I ran to the other side of town.” I explain, seeing that night flash right in front of my eyes.

  I slept under a bridge that night and several nights later. Until the police found me and took me to another shelter. I never asked about the man from the other home, and they didn’t ask. But I knew that they knew about it.

  “So, you see, girls like me don’t get to decide what we process or not. Why we run or where to. We just do, Gideon because that’s all we know.” I softly explain.

  I don’t notice that I’m crying until he leans in and wipes my tears away with his tongue.

  “I killed a man.”

  Chapter 22

  Gideon

  As soon as the words come out, I feel her tense body go rigid.

  She looks up at me with shock, and really why not. I’m the monster that she accused me of being. I’m the danger that she fears, that she runs away from.

  “What?” she screeches, looking up at me.

  I move away from her, giving her the space that I know she needs right now. I know she feels disgusted by me at the moment, regretting having opened up not just her body but her inner thoughts to a man like me.

  “Gideon. . .”

  “I killed a man, Charlotte and if your next question is do I regret it, then I’ll save us both time and tell you now; no, I don’t.” I grit out, agitated.