by Amaya Black
I rolled my eyes and gave a hard and heavy sigh. It looked as though I absolutely wasn’t going to leave this house at all. Darien tended to Alex including giving him a bath and rocking him to sleep. I made myself comfortable on the couch and turned on a movie. Something in black and white was playing and got comfortable.
I checked a few messages here and there on my phone. Nothing of importance had come through, and I hadn’t even heard from Cindy since she had returned home. I figured she had gotten busy and forgotten about us.
Forty-five minutes later, Darien cautiously approached the couch. I gestured for him to sit down and I pulled my legs up to get comfortable. He seemed unsure but finally sat down. He had unbuttoned the top of shirt, and a five o’clock shadow was coming in on his face. He looked like hell.
“When I saw that man on the camera in my office, I didn’t recognize him at first. Just knew that you might be in some sort of danger.” He started and his voice cracked. “I should have set up security. That was my mistake in the first place.”
“And then your dirty little secret wouldn’t have come out,” I spoke.
His head whipped in my direction. Pain contorted behind his eyes at the mention of what he had never told me. “Everyone has a past, Allanah.”
That was rich coming from someone who didn’t tell you a damn thing. A stranger from off the street had to barge in and tell you that the man you were fucking had killed his fiancé.
“Not like that they don’t” I replied. Was my blood pressure about to go through the roof. I wanted to scream my ass off. I wanted to tell him that I thought I hated him. I wanted to hit him for not telling me something like this.
“I assume that he told you?”
“You keep saying that this man told me something. Spit it the fuck out.”
My voice had went up a little louder than I wanted. Alex didn’t need to hear this bullshit, even though he was asleep and the nursery door was closed. I need wine. Why didn’t we have any fucking wine in this house. Or maybe, I needed a nice phat blunt! I hadn’t smoked in years but my God the smell of a Swisher being cut open would have been love right at this moment.
He took a deep breath. “Kikiyo.”
“Go on…”
He stood and started pacing then. I swear he’d broken out into a sweat as he dabbed at his forehead. “Okay….Kikiyo. I met her my sophomore year of college. She was a foreign exchange student. She introduced me to….I learned about…”
He kept pausing and mumbling. I had never been more frustrated with a situation in my life. I wanted to stop him. He actually seemed to be in some sort of pain but I wouldn’t take any pity on him.
“It’s how I learned about Kinbaku…”
“Huh?”
“Japanese bondage..kinbaku,” he didn’t want to look at me but he did. Those exquisite blue eyes that I had learned to love, they now seemed haunted. The shit that he had done with me in bed he had learned from another woman who had suffocated on film.
“Jesus H. Christ, you are really kind of fucked up aren’t you? Were you planning to ask me if I wanted a hood on my head as well. Glad we didn’t film our fucking.”
I face palmed myself and the words I had said reduced our sexual relationship down to nothing. How had he had sex with me for all these months and failed to mention any of this shit.
“Lana, I fucked up. I’m taking responsibility. I should have told you about all of this stuff but I didn’t so now we’re here. It doesn’t change that I love you. That I’ve loved you since I first saw you. I was cleared of all the charges with Kikiyo…what happened to her was an accident. Her brother never saw it that way.”
“Who is her brother?”
“Tenchi Kobiyashi…the man who came here. Cassie stirred all this shit up with trying to buy the company and then I succeeded. She knew there was a history there but the company was tanking so I decided to buy it…fucking Cassie!”
“Yeah fucking Cassie! She has been the driving force behind a lot of shit….not to mention the company had ties to Mikos and Dana.”
He paused. “That was a reason behind me wanting to buy it. I knew that Dana had worked for them…it was in some of the research I had procured on Mikos’ credit card bills that he wracked up. I knew that they had started to see each other outside of the cam room job she started up under the Kobiyashi Tech umbrella.”
I shook my head in disbelief. “Cassie clearly knew about this company’s connection to both of us.”
“But still, I won’t lay this all on Cassie. There was always the chance that this would stir things back up. I was young and dumb when all of that happened with Kikiyo. I dumb for not telling you.”
“So why didn’t you? Why didn’t you tell me before something like that came out…”
He came over and got down on his knees in front of me. It was so sudden, I let out a gasp. His blue eyes were pleading with me for some sort of forgiveness. He lay his head down in my lap and I stayed still for a moment before my hands threaded themselves through his hair. I couldn’t help how natural it felt to do this for this man.
“I didn’t want you to look at me the way you have…”
I took in his words as they managed to overpower me. Emotions came bubbling up to the surface and overtook me. Darien had been afraid to tell me his deepest secret.
“I hate that a stranger told me. I hate that I got scared and angry.”
He looked up into my face then and my hands dropped into my lap. He took them into his own hands.
“Afraid of me?”
“I don’t know. Afraid there might be more lies. Afraid I can’t handle shit like this. My mother retreated into drugs and let addiction take over her entire life because she couldn’t handle life.”
His fingers traced the insides of my palms. It tickled and the feeling traveled all the way up my arm until I wriggled my hand free.
“You are not your mother,” he stated.
“No.”
“And I’m not that idiot from over ten years ago, either. Allanah, I want to spend the rest of my life being a good man and hopefully a good husband to you.”
“Whoa…”
“If you want that. I know that I need both you and Alex in my life. Had no idea what was missing until I found the two of you. I’ll do whatever it is to keep you and him….”
He finally got out of the floor and sat back down beside me. I had this urge to suddenly pray. We had never been a religious family but my mom on occasion had gotten us dressed and taken us to a small church near our apartment. She had often told Dana and I that if she had prayed more to God then maybe she wouldn’t have had so many problems. We had never believed her because we had prayed a lot and still woke up everyday with an addict for a mother.
“Will you pray with me?” I took his hands into mines and he nodded that he would.
“Haven’t in a long time,” he said.
“Me either.”
We both bowed our heads and sat there for a few moments. I prayed silently that God would give us both direction and heal us from our pasts. That he would watch over Alex and guide him all his life. When we had both finished, Darien pulled me in close.
“I know that we’ve done intimate things…but I’ve never prayed with anyone before. That is how I know this is different from all the other times before. How I know that you are supposed to be in my life.”
“Maybe.”
He kissed the side of my cheek. “I never sought therapy, Allanah. I think we could both benefit from it.”
“I think we should try it. I think we should continue to try…”
He stood then. “I feel…”
I watched as he searched for the words to say, knowing that there was no human being on Earth that was innocent. We all made mistakes; sometimes, we all had the intentions to do right things would go wrong.
“Freed?” I asked.
“Yes…Lana, I think that might be what I’m feeling.”
He took a deep breath and held it. I watched his chest bl
oom out under the botton up shirt he wore. Slowly he released it.
“It’s getting late, I’ll cook dinner. And we can keep talking. I want to keep talking,” he said with a half smile.
He offered a quick peck on my cheek and then made his way into the kitchen. After a while the sound of pots and pans banging around became background noise. I pulled a blanket that was on the back of the couch over onto me and snuggled into it. I turned the movie up just a little bit and let my thoughts wander as the heroine of the black and white film danced with her lower in some jazz bar. It began to bore me and I switched channels and settled on the news.
My thoughts drifted and I found myself trying to figure out what I wanted form this relationship. Darien had apologized for the shit in his past but my own past was always coming into play as well. I had tried to bolt on him when shit had hit the fan. I would not be my mother; I would not run ever again when things got tough. Alex needed someone that he could rely on. He had only been on this spinning blue orb for a short while, for a year and his first set of parents hadn’t exactly set the bar very high.
The smell of the homemade pizza began to stir my senses. I had heard the oven click in the kitchen and knew that Darien had slid that bad boy into the oven. My stomach rumbled and I clearly couldn’t wait to eat.
The news anchor was speaking in English as I came back to reality. She was dressed in a mustard yellow top and had curls for days. Focusing not on her but that picture they always brought up to the side of their heads, I gasped so loudly that Darien flew into the living room.
“What, what’s a matter?”
“He’s dead! Apparently, it was a hit and run!”
“Who? Whose dead?”
I turned to Darien, a feeling settling into my stomach. I didn’t know if it was relief or worry but it was there and it didn’t want to leave.
“Tenchi Kobiyashi.”
Chapter 12
I knew it was wrong to speak ill of the dead, but well, Cassie had been a psychopath in life. Pretty sure nothing would have changed in death. Since the police’s search and rescue team hadn’t recovered a body after the kidnapping, her mother was holding a memorial service. Darien and I, had been invited to attend. Alexander was spending the night with Jocasta so we had the entire day to ourselves.
“We don’t have to go,” he had said to me. “We could do anything else but this.”
We were in the back of a town car headed towards the farthest side of Athens. Cassie and her mother whose name was Sarah had apart of a small Catholic church that from Darien had told me had probably fewer than twenty members.
“No, let’s do this.” I gave him a weak smile. “It will be how we get her out of our lives forever.”
In truth I had no idea why I wanted to go to this funeral so bad. Maybe I just wanted to see if crazy ran in the family. We reached the church in record time and took our seats in the back. Everyone was dressed in black and by everyone, I counted about ten people in the pews in front of us.
The priest was old and missing teeth; it was as though they were rotting out what few he had left in his mouth. Bile hit the back of my throat and I nearly vomited as I imagined what his breath smelled like. The entire service was performed in Greek, so I hardly understood a word of what was being said. Finally, it was over and me and Darien stood and tried not to be noticed. We were just about in the car when a voice called out.
“Mr. Kiriakis, please wait! Mr. Kiriakis!”
We turned to find a woman who looked a lot like Cassie but older and more grey hair calling out to Darien in English. It was going white like a fine snow covering concrete. She looked tired and seemed to be caving in on herself. Her skin seemed to hang to loosely; worry had probably eaten her up from the inside.
“Mrs. Petrakas,” Darien shook her hand and gave the old woman a kiss on the cheek.
Smiling weakly, “Thank you for coming. Both of you.”
I let them talk and soon the conversation switched into full blown Greek and I could no longer follow it. Slipping into the car, I simply waited. Darien would tell me what they talked about but I really didn’t care. My curiosity had been sated. Even in death, this girl hadn’t been loved. No one had wept heavily for her lost soul. It seemed evil but Cassie hadn’t deserved a funeral. What she deserved was that watery grave she now resided in.
The door opened and Darien slid in next to me and the driver drove us back into the city. This time we were stopping at a little café and having lunch. Thoughts of what I wanted to eat danced through my head when Darien spoke.
“Sarah is regretful of all the terrible things Cassie did to us,” his voice sounded controlled.
I examined my nails in a bored fashion not giving two shits about Sarah or her poor ass daughter. Remembering all to well that Sarah wasn’t so innocent after going after Darien’s married uncle.
“Hey,” he reached over and captured my hand in his and brought it to his lips. They felt smooth and cool as they caressed over my brown flesh. “I think she’s genuine. She wants us to come over and have tea with her.”
Snatching my hand back like someone had tried to stab me with a hot poker, my eyes turned to slits. I was sure I looked like a pit viper but I didn’t care. Darien had lost his ever loving mind if he thought I was ever going to go near the mother of the woman who had caused me the greatest heart attack this century.
“Crack. You’re smoking that crack rock, aren’t you ?”
He sighed deeply. “I thought it would be a healing force, for us.”
“Darien….you didn’t even want to go to that long as funeral to begin with. Now you want to have tea with this woman.”
“And no, I’m not on crack rock as you put it!”
I threw my hands up in the air because I was two seconds from getting physical with him. Honestly, I didn’t want to ruin the mood. I didn’t want to argue with him. We had been doing a lot of that the last few days because of Cassie. I had vowed to let it go…until I hadn’t let it go. We’d recover from the arguments and make love like rabid dogs, and argue some more. I needed a break from him.
“You should go,” I looked at him.
His eyes sparked with wonder, maybe he thought I was being generous. “Really?”
“Really,” I stated.
“Is this a trap?”
I gave a laugh. “No. You should go, visit with her. She’s probably deeply depressed and could use the company.”
“Are you absolutely sure?”
“Yes.”
I rolled down the partition and Darien directed him in Greek to take us home. Twenty minutes later we were both exiting the car as he had decided to drive himself to Sarah’s house. He had said it was back in the direction of the little church but that he would be home soon. I checked the horizon and a storm seemed to be brewing.
“Be careful, looks like a storm,” I kissed his lips as he leaned through the window.
“Don’t worry,” he said softly. “I love you, Lana.”
“I love you too, Mr. Kiriakis.”
Watching him drive away, I stood in the drive for a few moments until he was out of sight. I began to plan what I would do with a kid free day. Secretly, I wanted to go and pick up Alex but decided against it. Jocasta had begged us to let her watch him while we attended the funeral.
I closed the door behind me and locked it into place. The nude colored heels I had worn to the funeral found themselves being chucked near the steps that led up to the bedrooms. Starting forward and into the living room I stepped in a puddle.
“Ugh,” I yelped and immediately began looking at the ceiling believing that a leak had sprung from somewhere. There was nothing there, but I leaned down to inspect the water and found that it appeared to be wet footprints.
I kept myself from gasping….there was someone in my fucking house! I had to get out of here but just as I was about to get up, I felt something crash over my skull and everything went dark.
Clearly, someone had knocked a bitch out from be
hind.
Chapter 13
My head was pounding like someone had turned on Megatron by Nicki Minaj inside of my brain. Trying to lift my head, I was nodding in and out until I felt something wet splash my face. Failing to focus my blurry as hell vision, the room spun.
“Poor American bitch,” a voice sneered. It was harsh and hard but there was a feminine quality about it.
Americans weren’t safe in the Dominican Republic or Greece these days. Trying to place the voice and focus my vision was causing nausea. I forced my stomach contents, that had consisted of eggs and bacon for breakfast, to say down.
The familiar burn of ropes biting into my flesh caught my attention as I tried not to struggle. Whoever, had used me like a pinata, didn’t need to know I was trying to work the knots to my hand loose.
“You did exactly what I thought you would do,” the voice spat again.
I could feel them pacing the floor in a harsh dance. Oh, they was mad, mad. Vanilla filled my senses and told me that I was still in the house. We were still in my house that I knew every single inch. On the countertop, there were five knives in a butcher block. My taser was located in the kitchen on top of the refrigerator.
“And what was that?”
My vision was clearing up but the room still seemed to move like a Van Gogh painting. My hair had come loose from the messy bun I had piled on top of my head earlier; it swung from side to side like those old glass beads people use to hang from their doors. Something cold come into contact with my temple and fear ran rampant through my body. Steel was caressing my face and finally, the voice matched the face as I realized that it was none other than Cassie who had tied me up.
“I knew you wouldn’t go see my mother with Darien. Told her that you’re a selfish cunt.”
WAP!
The butt of the gun chewed into my face, fast and furious like. I was going to have a bruise, but the pain stopped me from contemplating it too much. A howl escaped my red-painted lips. Moments passed before I regained my senses. I took note of the popcorn ceiling and how they angled. The walls of the living room had been painted a seafoam green color. I remembered telling Darien that I loved the color and that it made me feel happy for some reason.