Isabelle sobbed softly into his shoulder, clinging tightly to him. She couldn’t imagine such loneliness, such pain. She ached everywhere for what he had gone through, for what he had lived through. She hated herself for the words that she had uttered the other night, the hurt that she had inflicted upon him. There was no way that she could take the words back, no way that she could erase his past, but she vowed that his future would be better, that she would make sure it was better.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry for everything. I didn’t mean it. I love you Stefan. I love you more than anything. Please forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” he whispered softly, gently stroking her hair.
“There is!” she sobbed. “What I said to you the other night, the way that I reacted was completely unforgivable. I should have listened to you; I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions. I should have known.”
“Isabelle, you were angry and upset, I understand that.”
His forgiveness, and caring words, didn’t help to ease the anguish that she felt. They only made her feel worse. She wouldn’t have forgiven him so easily if it had been the other way around, but he readily did. It made her hate herself even more. Her hands dug into his neck as she clung to him, crying softly as waves of self hatred washed through her. She truly was an awful person.
“How can you be so understanding?” she sobbed.
“Easily,” he said, laughing softly. “I know you Isabelle, you’re quick to anger, quick to judge, and very quick to lose your temper. But you’re also strong, proud, determined, loving, and one of the most loyal people that I have ever met. I love you for all of those reasons, the good, as well as the bad. I wouldn’t change a thing.”
He really wasn’t making her feel any better; he was just making her feel worse as she wept into his shoulder. “I’m sorry that you lost your family,” she whispered. “I wish that it had never happened.”
He sighed softly as he hugged her tighter against him, his hands running along her back. “It was a long time ago Isabelle. It may have taken me awhile to come to terms with it, but I have. It is the past, and the two of us are going to have a wonderful future.”
“Yes we are,” she vowed fervently. “I promise we will.”
He laughed softly as he dropped a soft kiss on her neck. “Stop crying Isabelle. I hate it when you cry.”
She tried to stifle her sobs, but she couldn’t stop the tears that continued to flow. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispered.
He sighed as his hands stopped stroking her back. He reached around and gently pulled her head out of his shoulder. He turned her toward him, tenderly wiping the tears from her cheeks. Her eyes were filled with misery, and sadness, as she hesitantly met his gaze. Her lower lip trembled slightly as she valiantly tried to hold back her sobs.
“When Brian and I first met David, I was surprised about the way that he talked about his friends. For the last hundred and fifty years all I’d had was Brian, and death. David had an air of freshness and innocence that shocked me. When he talked about how none of his friends had ever killed, nor ever wanted too, and how amazingly close they all were, I wondered what it was like to be that innocent, and naive. He had a vague idea of what our kind could be capable of, but he had never witnessed it.
“When I came here, you were so naive, and so beautifully innocent that the last thing I wanted was for anything dark to touch you. Until that night at the club, you had no idea what the world could be like, how cruel and vicious it can be. I didn’t want you to know Isabelle; I didn’t want you tainted by it, tainted by what I was. I wanted to keep you protected from it, and I had mistakenly thought that the past was over with. You gave me a reason to live, to feel, and I never wanted to take anything away from you. I was not about to let darkness into your world Isabelle.”
Tears slipped free as she stared into his dark, warm eyes. There was so much tenderness, so much love radiating from him that it shook her very core. She stroked his cheek lightly, extremely grateful that somehow fate had managed to throw them together. That it had managed to give her someone as wonderful as he was. She truly realized just how lucky she was to have him in her life.
“You told my mom all of this.”
He frowned. “I didn’t tell your mom any of this. You and Brian are the only two that know.”
Isabelle stared at him in confusion. “She said that she had asked you why you had killed our kind, and that you had told her.”
“She asked me if I had a good reason for killing our kind, I told her yes, and that was all.”
Isabelle closed her eyes, dropped her head to his shoulder, and moaned softly as she realized the full extent of her stupidity, and foolishness. It made her feel even worse that her mother had put such blind faith in him, when she hadn’t been able too. “I’m such an idiot,” she mumbled.
He laughed as he rolled her over, pinning her to the mattress with his hard body. “You are anything but an idiot Isabelle, you’re just stubborn. Your mother knows that.”
Isabelle opened her eyes to look up at his twinkling black ones. “We don’t have to leave,” she whispered softly. “Ethan and I are a lot alike, he didn’t mean what he said, and he will come around.”
He grinned down at her as he brushed a light kiss across her mouth. “I know that, trust me, I know.”
Isabelle frowned at him as he smiled happily down at her. “What is Europe like?” she asked softly.
“It’s beautiful.”
“Do you want to go?”
His smile faded away as he stroked her cheek. “We can stay here Isabelle. I like it here, your family is here, and I know that this is where you’re happy.”
“Yes, but I’ve decided that I want to see the world, and I want you to show it to me. We’ll always be welcome here, always be able to come back, but I would like to go, if you want too.”
He smiled softly as he bent and placed a feather light kiss against her lips. “I would love to show you everything Isabelle,” he whispered.
She smiled brightly as he brushed her drying tears away. Seizing hold of his hand, she brought it slowly to her mouth. Drawing one of his fingers inside, she began to suck and lick on it, savoring in the taste of him. His eyes clouded with passion as he watched her with fascination. She released his finger, smiling softly as she wrapped her hands around the back of his head
“First things first though,” she whispered.
“What’s that?” His voice was deep and husky as she felt him harden and lengthen against her thigh.
Her smile turned sly and seductive as she brought his head down. “I need to show you just how sorry I am, and how much I do love you.”
He grinned down at her, his eyebrows raised in amusement. “That might take a lot of persuasion.”
By the end of the day, she had completely managed to convince him.
Destined (Vampire Awakenings) Page 32