“Why?” My voice cracked, startling me as I took one step toward her, only to halt at the recollection of why I didn’t go to her. I teetered until my back knocked against the wall. Only her whimpers and my heart pounding penetrated the silence. The answer never came. I lingered, I don’t know for how long, for half a minute, or half an eternity maybe. I had to get out of there, but not before I said what was goodbye to the love of my life, the same one who ruined me and shattered our love.
“I would have given you the world and more. But now, I leave you in this room where the beginning of our forever ended.”
The door rattled behind me, and not even her weeping, which once would have made me fly to her in a heartbeat, reined me in. I stumbled to my black Aston Martin as the keys jingled in my hand. I sank into my seat and slammed my fists into the wheel, wailing while my heart split at once.
When I arrived at one of our stores, I bought not one but four whiskey bottles.
For the next six months, I knew only numbness, emptiness, hollowness, and alcohol until the day I drank away the final memory of the last eighteen years. I was reborn. Bria ceased to be the reason for my new existence because she buried who I was in that fateful hotel room.
After all this time, this one memory still has the power to bring me to my knees. Only when my sister frees my fingers and brings me back to the here and now, do I realize my hands are balled into fists.
“Why are you here?” my sister asks, placating.
Fuck me if I have the answer, so I keep my mouth shut and press it in a tight line.
“Don’t you think it is odd that after seven years, she throws a party? Look around you, and tell me what you see, because to me it looks like a goodbye.”
As I glance around me, I recognize the truth in what Sophia has said. Yes, leave it to Bria to throw a party and then go. But if I don’t give a damn anymore, why does my heart constrict in pain all over again? A thin layer of sweat covers my body.
I focus on my sister again, but like me, she seems lost down memory lane and shuffles away, leaving me here cemented to the floor and thinking of her. She’s probably in a private room as some things never change, like her desire for privacy and her taste in wine, Château Mouton Rothschild being her favorite. I grow even more annoyed with myself as I still remember her preferences. Torn between leaving and finding her, I demand my senses to lead me to her.
I slide through the door as dark paneled walls enclose me. Like everywhere here, the room is suffused into yellow, faint light, which is fine by me. In Bria’s absence from my life, darkness became my companion. She doesn’t notice me from her place at the polished bar where Alexander is right beside her, a fool in love as his dilated eyes drink her in. Been there, done that. In the beginning, I felt grudging compassion for him, but now, if he is that stupid, he deserves what the ice queen throws at him. I call to mind they never were together—what the fuck do I care? I shake my head in frustration as I take a seat at the opposite end of the bar and order a glass of Macallan, thinking of the last time I drowned my pain in it because of her destructive presence. Well, this is my second glass for the evening, and it won’t be the last. All these contradictory feelings will end up ripping me apart.
My fingers turn white as I grasp the whisky glass and drink to the thought of how beautiful she is. Her head dips down, and her long golden-brown hair surrounds her like a halo. She taps her finger on her crossed legs, and I recall the feel of them wrapped around me. I toss this thought aside as she looks somewhat vulnerable, the contrast to how sexy she appears. Her clothes hug her slim curves, and at those slender but toned legs saliva gathers in my mouth. I grunt in frustration and adjust my black slacks. She clutches that damn microphone in her hands as if it has the power to hold her together and fidgets on the black leather barstool.
Meanwhile, my eyes fix on her as she nibbles on her full lips, and the desire to do it myself makes me want to bash my head against something. I question if I have ever had an ounce of self-preservation when it comes to her. I should have stayed away. I haven’t seen her in twelve months, and still, all it takes is one glance at her, and I’m screwed once again. A muffled grunt exits my throat at the unfairness of it all.
BRIA
After the whole Sophia fiasco, I shake off my bewildered state of mind, jostle my strained muscles into action, and head toward the private area in search of Alex. The timeless ambiance of rich black leather, golden lights, and intricate dark paneled walls surround him as he sits at the opulent bar with his usual glass of cognac and a glass of wine ready for me. He babbles about showing and telling me something as if we haven’t talked for days, but I dismiss him with a hand gesture. Something simmers inside me, but I can’t grasp what. It’s not helping that dots of uncertainty cloud his eyes as his left leg bounces, and instead of savoring the amber liquid, he swallows it as if it were water.
I squirm at this side of Alex and I clasp the microphone, holding it to my chest. One of the staff gives a thumbs up, and the five-minute video of my life in photos flashes on the screen. I wish them to memorialize me as I used to be. Everyone here tonight is in the photos, my way of saying thank you and goodbye. A pain jolts my body as my eyes bore into the screen.
“From the bottom of my heart, thank you all for joining me tonight.” I want to punch Alex in the face when he leans in and mouths the words, ‘What heart, sweetie?’
Leave it to him to find the best moments for being . . . well, himself. And here I thought something was out of place with him. I guess my senses are dulled tonight.
“We’re here to celebrate my twenty-fifth birthday party, but tonight is not only about my birthday or me. Tonight is about all of us.
“The theme of the party is Oblivion. I’m sure every one of you has something you’d like to change, forget, or erase. We all know life doesn’t always unfold as we would wish, so we do what we are most capable of doing . . . we adapt, even though we are torn, lost, and want to give up. But tonight, my friends, for a few hours, I ask you all to allow yourselves to take a break, breathe, drink and let yourselves dive into . . . oblivion!”
I pause and end my speech saying, “The moment the video ends, party as if there is no tomorrow, for we can never be sure.” Some guests are about to applaud, but I promptly nod to signal for the video to start. Everything hushes as my life in pictures emerges, as I watch through the tainted window to the ballroom.
It’s strange to see myself in this video. People hold their breath as they recognize themselves. These are memories of happier times before I lost everything. I haven’t seen the video myself until now. So much for being a control freak, but I trusted Sarah with it. We met in Barcelona in a coffee shop when she knocked into me and made my white shirt a brown, iced coffee mess. She didn’t see me as I tilted my head to notice two widened eyes gazing at me and a blush covering her round cheeks.
We met on a trip Quinn, Alex, and I took two weeks after leaving the hospital. It was not the apologies she offered me, but the determination to make up for her “idiotic clumsiness,” her words, not mine. And so, the next day, we met for coffee. I could tell she noticed something was off with me as I caught her probing stare more than once, but I tried my best to act normal. I smiled when she cracked a joke. I mirrored her posture and nodded at what she said. She beamed when telling me her plans to start a catering business. I could tell by the way she held herself, shoulders high and a fierce resolve set in her green-brown eyes that she would achieve everything she set her mind on. Dressed in casual jeans and an elegant white jacket, a perfectly styled auburn bun on top of her head, upturned nose, raised chin with a little bump in it, she appeared so passionate, so vivid, so everything I ceased to be. She fascinated me. Sarah said she didn’t believe in coincidences, and the fact we were both from the same city made it hard not to give in and start a rather on and off friendship, both being busy women trying to succeed. Occasionally, I seek her company to pretend I am normal and forget about the deadline hanging over my
head. To just breathe.
Sarah owns the catering company that organized everything. Give her a theme, and she creates an unforgettable event. With her talent, determination, and hard work, she established a name for herself. I am proud of her. She has been there for me in the only way that matters. She let me be me—private. After years, I’m sure she settled and accepted the idea I am different in my professional and personal life.
Over the years, Sarah must have overheard stories about me. The woman in the corner, always in the company of Alex, with a smile smeared on my lips. Tidbits of information had to slip about how my personality changed into an aloof manner. I keep everyone at arm’s length distance, including my family. She must have witnessed at least one uncomfortable situation when Damien and I were in the same space, and everyone tried too hard to overplay it behind faux laughing sounds and loudly clinking crystal champagne glasses.
Every sensitive person would have remarked at his snarl at my nearness, his flared nostrils, pursed lips, and failed attempt to hide the line between his brows and clenched jaw. How often did I want to shout to him to stop balling his palms into fists because he made it harder for me to play off nothing was wrong between us? Instead, I had to balance the apparent riff so no one could recognize the war raging between us. I pleaded with my eyes to keep the farce. He relented, rubbed his neck, gritted his teeth, but played along every time someone trapped us to congratulate us for yet another thriving store opening.
How often did I crane just an inch more toward him as he sensed it, leaned in even though his upper body strained behind his jacket as if it might tear, and pierced me with a look full of conflict? A war brewed within him, and if I were honest, he was not the only one affected. There was also a crack he opened a little wider every time we would meet.
But Sarah never snooped. Another reason I’m sure she’s successful in her business. I gave her a stick with all the pictures I had so she could pick the most appropriate ones. Maybe everything will look different now.
My hopes die the moment photos of Damien and me flash by, and I freeze on the stool. Alex grabs my hand, but it doesn’t calm me. So many are of us together, smiling, playing, and kissing.
Sarah, what did you do?
Is this why you declined the invitation to my birthday party?
My mouth hangs open. Then photos of the four of us, me, Damien, Filip and Sophia, and our families together. It breaks me all over again. I had forgotten how many pictures there were. All those images scream at me—you ruined everything! Are you happy now? The other snapshots of the guests and Monica’s frown in all of them fade in comparison. Photos of my trips with Alex and Quinn follow. It’s like someone divided my life between before that night and after—happy and cheerful, and then earnest and cordial.
When the last photo blooms on the screen, it leaves me immobile, and my eyes swim in tears. It’s Damien and me on his eighteenth birthday, holding hands and smiling at the camera over our shoulders, doing what we knew best how to do—be in love. Some guests stare at the picture with sad expressions on their faces asking themselves what happened to us. I happened. But there are also ones who shake their heads and scrunch up their faces. I’m sure it has everything to do with his engagement to my cousin. Tonight, I don’t care what others find appropriate anymore. Damien was my life for sixteen incredible years. I can’t erase that just for social acceptance. He once was mine, and these innocent photographs are the only evidence left to prove that he and I happened.
I clutch my fingers around the necklace as the gold metal digs into my skin and utter, “I hope you enjoyed it. Now let the party begin. Welcome to Oblivion!” I set the microphone on the bar as the music blares. It’s my party for them and numbness for me. Welcome to my world.
DAMIEN
My half-drunk whiskey glass cracks under my grip, and I rise to stride over and shake some sense into her. How does she allow herself such blasphemy? But the moment I catch her holding the gold barn owl necklace I gifted her, her face twisted, tears brimming in her eyes, I halt. I keep asking the same questions in my mind. What do you want to forget so badly, Bria? Our love, our past, me, or the night you slept with someone else? Hearing her speak and seeing the video, she’s telling us all goodbye, and anger surges from within me. She has no right to abandon me. No, she must endure it like me, every single fucking day. Bria doesn’t get to bail on me because I will ruin the empire I built for her if this woman leaves. She owes me that. Her pain and darkness and emptiness fuel me. She has to see me marry her cousin, and I will make her believe I love Monica as I loved her. Making Bria feel like nothing allows me to survive the darkness she put me in when she cheated and discarded me like I was nothing to her.
I am furious with her, me, the video, and the damn world. My body trembles with fury, and I count to ten. All this anger will blind me one day, but I am incapable of feeling anything else. I tried but failed the moment she returned.
In these seven years, I can count the times I have seen her. It is always on the same dates—family gatherings, the annual Christmas party, our parents’ birthdays, and the birthday parties for Filip and Sophia. There are also the other times when the universe plots against me and randomly puts her in front of me, but the latter I will never acknowledge. Those times are a mirage, nothing more. And her twenty-fourth birthday, which I would do anything to change the outcome but can’t. She never had the decency to show herself at my birthday parties and declined all other social invitations.
In these last years, we have spoken only a handful of times directly. We did our share of conversation with my fiery eyes and her pacifying ones. I gave her my mind with body language more times than I can count. She got the message every time, as I intended. It amused me, her pleas to make me behave, and the calmness she tried to infuse in me to keep everyone satisfied with our civil and professional manner. The irony you have to love as the condemner tries to take the place of the mender.
Except at that one event, the first time, and it was damn fascinating. I ranted, and she listened as she craned her neck, her face transforming into a defying expression that said, Do you think I’ll react, or care what you say or feel? She mocked me with her head and shoulders held high. It infuriated the hell out of me because it was the first time I’d seen her after everything went down. The woman I adored had turned into a robot.
Bria was still the most beautiful woman in the world, but she had once been like an angel—warm and innocent—not frozen hazel eyes and stiff body movements. Seeing her, I have to fight the urge to either strangle or forgive her and move on. I don’t succeed in either, so I quit speaking to her, and she never tried to approach me.
It was easy for her to throw away sixteen years of memories along with me. She deserves nothing from me. I gave and gave until she took the last pieces of my life and heart. So why am I wrecked after seeing the pictures and her in such a state? Only Bria can break me, and twice in just this one evening, for what we could have had but never will. Everything I have accomplished feels shallow in comparison. I would give everything away to forget that day and live with this woman, who feels more like a stranger now but is still the love of my life. With my eyes locked on her, I acknowledge she is also the only love of my life. She burned me to my bones. I have nothing more to offer anyway. Everything I have and everything I achieve will never satisfy me as this woman can with just one smile, one caress, one kiss, or three little words.
I wasn’t transformed seven years ago when I caught her with someone else in bed. No, the former I tethered to her. I emerged as the ghost I am today—a wealthy, successful, and unhappy ghost of a man, soon to marry a woman I have never loved to make the woman to whom I gave my heart react. Her response to my wedding invitation came in the post, addressed in her immaculate and curvy handwriting. I didn’t expect her response or what she wrote:
To the one who found love again. Congratulations, Damien.
Bria du Mont
I thought I had the upper hand, but then s
he laughed at me with her reply and emphasis on her last name in thicker writing and left me feeling like the idiot I am. I stare at her—my love and hatred, my happiness and downfall, my everything and nothing, my best friend and a stranger, my lover and tormenter, my light and darkness, my forever and never again, my angel and the demon in charge of my darkness—all in this beautiful woman. She was my sunshine once, and now she’s holding hands with another man. As I did the first time I saw them together, my vision shifts to red. And as I coped with it over time, I bury my jealousy deep inside me. She is not mine anymore, and she never will be again.
Cheers to my idiocy and for those who are a glutton for punishment. I raise my glass to my mouth and gulp.
BRIA
With the night flying by, the tension in my muscles ebbs until I tilt my head to Alex. He stiffens, his expression closed, and my relief turns out to be short-lived. On autopilot, my line of protection rattles in response to his behavior. I peer through my lashes as he cups my face, rests his forehead on mine, and sighs.
“I can’t give you back what you lost, neither your heart, your past, nor your life, but I can offer you closure.”
There is something in his gaze . . . a fear that clouds his features, it rocks through me.
“What are you talking about? What’s wrong with you? You’re acting so strange.”
“I have to show you something.”
He runs his palm over his face as his eyes hold a certain caution, deciding how to proceed. My shoulders once again weigh me down while his body spins toward me.
“I can’t lose you.”
“Alex, we went through this.”
“I still have time. You still have time.”
I lift my glass to my quivering lips and swallow its contents. No, I do not. It’s how he copes with my situation, though. He blames everything else and Damien instead of accepting that some things are beyond salvageable.
Shattered Love : A Billionaire Romance (Forever Us Book 1) Page 4