Irresistible Invitation: Love comes after Hate

by S. S. Sahoo

  “Please don’t give up on my Udolf,” he asked and that broke my heart. When there is no hope in our relation how could ever have any faith upon Zachary?

  Nonetheless, I nodded to keep his words and he smiled.

  “Take care,” he said and replied the same and watched as they got into the car and drove away.

  Sighing, I closed the door and went back to the bedroom. Nobody except me and Hilda was in the house today. I went to the balcony and looked out to find the bodyguards guarding the house perimeter. Zachary went to his office, for work. He didn’t join fo which I’m really glad because I didn’t want Julia or grandpa talking to him about anything that I didn’t want him to listen. Even Kiara went them. It will good if she maintained the distance from him else she would end up spilling everything before him.

  It was already afternoon when I had my lunch and I walked back into my room. Unlike the other days, I felt really hot today. The temperature was high and I chose to wear a black short pant and blue stripped boyfriend shirt to ease my body temperature. I was just about to turn the Tv on when there was loud noise which came from the outside. I jumped on my toes and looked towards the balcony thinking what just happened.

  Then I heard gunshots and people yelling and screaming. I felt the bile rising up as I walked to the balcony door and looked out of the glass door peeping through the curtains.

  A gasp escaped my mouth when I witnessed a man killing our guards. But the fact was there was not only one man but many as they shoot and killed every guard as they made their way towards the house.

  “Nicholas?” I said and clamped my mouth using my hand when I noticed him from one of those men.

  “Ma’am” I heard the door opening and walked in a worried Hilda. Her face was pale and she huffed out air as if she just ran a marathon.

  “We have been attacked,” she cried and ran up to me.

  “Hurry! You need to hide!” she cried and pulled me with her.

  “No, wait!”

  “Don’t argue!” she snapped at me.

  “I have already informed sir and he is in his way, now hurry you need to hide. Sir told me to hide you,” she said and looked around thinking where must take me in order to save me.

  “Bu-”

  “Please! Don’t say anything! Let me think! Oh, my goodness! What should I do?” she cried and then dragged me out of the room. Gun shots were heard everywhere and people screaming and yelling at each other was clearly heard as we made it up to the third floor and towards a room.

  “Where are you taking me?” I pulled her to stop.

  “It’s not the time to argue. Please trust me and cooperate with me,” she said and pulled me into a room.

  “You will stay inside this room, make sure you lock up from inside!” she said and turned around to leave but I stopped her.

  “Where are you going?” I asked and stopped her from going out.

  “I need to stop them from reaching up her,” she said as she tried to free herself from my grasp.

  “No! Are you mad? Stay here! It’s dangerous! You will die!”

  She pried my hands away and shoved me backward. I stumbled on my own foot and fell on my back on the ground.

  “Please forgive me, I am just fulfilling my duty,” she said and ran out of the old and dirty storeroom closing the door behind her.

  “No-” I coughed and tried to get up “Wait!” tears blinded my vision as I stood up n my feet and walked towards the small open window and looked out. The window was facing the backside of the house and luckily I found no one under the window. But I could hear the gun shots and the scream of people. Guessing from the pitch of the scream I assumed that, people were dying. It was the scream of their plea and I placed my hands over my ears and closed my eyes pleading the Almighty to help and save the people and to stop it.

  Twenty minutes later, everything stopped. I could no longer hear the scream or any gunshots. As a ray of hope lit inside my heart thinking that it was over, but then it shattered into pieces when I heard rumbling and footsteps from outside my door. Clamping my hand over my mouth I looked around frantically searching for a place to hide.

  “Did you find her?” I heard Nicholas’s voice and that made me even more frightened than I already was.

  They have reached me!

  “No, we checked every room even his study room for any type of secret passage but found none!” another man spoke.

  “Did that woman open her mouth?” Nicholas asked and a gasp escaped my mouth when I thought about Hilda being captured.

  “No! she isn’t opening her mouth. Your father is handling her!” the man said and as if it wasn’t enough the mention of his father made my heart pound against my chest.

  Vito was also here?

  “Go! Check that room, I will check this room,” I heard Nicholas and then heard his footsteps nearing the room where I was hiding. I looked here and there frantically when my eyes fell on the window. I made a run for the window and looked out. The only thing that I found was a narrow beam beside the window. The beam looked as the only support for my life and I struggled to get out of the small window and carefully took baby steps as I walked towards the side with my back facing the wall and my front facing the front open area. I did a mistake to look down and that knocked the sense out of me. I was standing in a narrow beam, three floors up from the ground with no help but the walls to be held as I took small sidesteps in order to get away from the damn window.

  No! Don’t look down.

  You can do it, Juliette!

  God, please help me.

  As seconds went by I realized that I was going to die soon. Either in the hands of Nicholas or by falling off from a three floor high. If I lost my balance and managed to fell, the chances of me surviving with broken limbs and hands waved before my eyes and I shook my head even thinking about letting go and jump in order to escape them.

  As I waited for my death to cocoon me, I heard gunshots again and that came from inside the room from where I had taken the beam for support. Guessing it as Nicholas firing the bullets in thin air for frightening me, I closed my eyes and waited for him to come and kill him. Prayers left my mouth as I chanted in a low voice praying to the almighties to save me. But then I heard the voice, which I thought as Nicholas’s turned out to be of Zachary.

  What? Am I imagining Zachary at a time like this?

  I cursed myself for being so weak and felt as beads of sweat formed on my forehead. It was like a slow motion, I felt sweat trickling down my forehead, I could even hear my own pounding heartbeat, heard the shuffling sounds in the background when my eyes jerked open hearing the particular man’s voice.

  “Juliette! You idiot!” he screamed and slowly when I turned my head towards the window I found him.

  Half of his upper body was out of the window and he was looking at me with what I thought I would never witness in my life but worry filled in his eyes. Tears rolled down my face when I saw him as his words went past my ear and I watched as he forwarded his hand asking me to take it. As I cried, I shook my head no because I was too scared to move now. I thought I would lose my balance and end my life but then he encouraged me to take his hand.

  “Juliette! Juliette! Look into my eyes. Just look into my eyes! Listen! Nothing will happen to you- No! No! don’t close your eyes. Look into my eyes and just hear my voice. Come to me, Juliette! Yes, Come here! Take my hand! Just a few steps more. Yes, you are here. You ar-” he grabbed my hand and pulled me to him. He went in first and then pulled me in. Once I was in, I was pulled into a tight hug.

  I was still in shock. I was petrified. As I looked behind him, there I saw him. Nicholas on the ground, with blood oozing out of his leg with Willie pointing a gun above his head warning him not to move.

  “It’s okay! You are safe now,” I heard Zachary’s voice and felt him caress the back of my head.

  “I am here. It’s okay now,” he said softly into my ears as he embraced me tightly and soothingly caressed my hair. But I sto
od their limp with my arms on my side in his arms as I tears continued to roll down my face as I looked at a captured Nicholas and the gun.

  Both Nicholas and Vito were finally caught. They had come to kill me and to get my money. Zachary found out that one of our guards was one of his man who gave them information about everything that was going on inside the house. Vito and Nicholas were just looking for the right time to get to me alone in the house with no shield or protection and as soon as everyone left they made it to me.

  Not a single guard of Zachary survived but still, he managed to reach me on time with his men and took the charge. Max was also present there captivating Vito while both Zachary and Willie ran up to save me, or should I say to get Nicholas.

  I was still traumatized by the event that took place with me being alone in the house. Hilda was safe and she sat gave me a glass of water as I felt my mom caressing the side of my face constantly saying me that they were here now and everything was okay. It turned out, my family including mom, dad, Jace, Kiara and even Kristian returned back as soon as Zachary informed them about my condition. It’s already been four hours to the incident but yet I am feeling the same anxiety inside me thinking as if I was going to die any soon.

  Zachary took Vito and Nicholas to his study room followed by Max and Willie and some other men and they didn’t come out of the room the whole four hours.

  “Juliette, my baby. Everything is fine. Talk to me!” dad said as he knelt on his knees before me on the ground.

  Jace was standing behind me, while mom sat on the left side on the sofa while Kiara sat on the other side holding my arm.

  “Juliette baby girl look at me!” my dad begged and even though I could hear everything they said I just couldn’t move from my place.

  “Mr. Sullivan,” I heard my dad as Zachary finally came out of his study room and walked to our direction. I didn’t look at him but I knew he was coming.

  “Take them!” I heard Zachary and the guessing from the curse and scream voices I assumed he wanted Vito and Nicholas to be taken somewhere away from where he could handle them all alone. It was good though. Just take them away from me.

  “How is sh-” I cut Zachary in the middle as I finally made an effort talk and I looked up towards my dad saying “Dad?”

  He looked relieved and he turned around and paid me his whole attention smiling at me as he waited for me to speak.

  “Let’s go back home!” I said and watched his eyes filled up with joy and he took a step forward encircling me in his arms he said a loud ‘yes.’

  50

  Juliette

  People went past me as I walked down the five-foot way towards the bus stop. Out in Melbourne, I inhaled in the air as I walked towards the stop hoping to catch a bus to the State Library of Victoria. Catching the glimpse of the bus that was going to stop in the stop, I hurried my pace and thankfully I became the second person to climb the bus stair out of all those people who crowded behind me for the bus. I took the second-row seat of the bus as it looked it was the only vacant seat and slipped to the window side looking out of the running bus.

  Four months has passed since I moved back with Dad to New York and then just in two weeks I ended up deciding that I would be shifting to Melbourne, Australia with Kiara away from all those painful and stinging memories of both the man whom I dedicated my heart. I still don’t blame them but myself because I knew I was the only one to be blamed for all those things that happened in my life.

  Firstly, I still can’t believe how could I ever fell in love with a fake person and secondly, I was dumb enough to fall in love once again with a person who looked at me because I was only one of his responsibility or should I say a deal to which he was bound to look after. But foolishly enough, even though I knew that I managed to get my already broken heart into pieces when I could have taken some time and mend it back but curse my fate for making me fall head over heels over a man who never really thought of me more than a deal.

  I pressed the bell of the bus when I saw my destination and as the bus came to a halt I walked down the stairs and walked towards the library. It turns out that moving to Melbourne with Kiara turned out to be the best decision that I have ever taken in my life. Away from my home, away from my relatives sympathetic glances because they still think I was the victim in that marriage and most importantly away from those memories of where I met both of them for the first time in my life. Though the second one was more dramatic and convincing of how my life has turned out after all that.

  Kiara and my mom have been supporting me whilst dad still keeps on ranting that his decision to bring me back away from all those criminals was correct. He has decided that he won’t ever put his foot back in that dark world for it brought nothing but pain to his beloved. That is the reason when I first told him that I wanted to move with Kiara to Melbourne, he was the first one to support me in my decision and he helped me shift. Even though it’s been four months but still I just can’t forget anything. His face, smile, eyes has just plastered in my mind and it’s like no matter how much I tried to forget him but it always happens the opposite.

  Averting my mind to books and research relaxed my brain and made me forget about all that has happened to me. I made my way towards the library hall and walked to the lady in the counter for reissuing the book that I have reading recently. The book was ‘Beyond Good and Evil’ by Friedrich Nietzsche. It was a philosophical book and it kept me busy from my chaotic world. As the lady reissued the book and gave it back to me I walked towards the center of the hall to sit on reading it. I have already reached the last pages of the book and I wanted to finish it badly. As I reached the end of the book, I heard my phone beeping. Embarrassed as the readers near me looked at me with an annoying look, I mutter a quiet sorry and fished the phone out of the bag to find a text message from Kiara. What does she want when she clearly knows I’m in the library?

  Kiara: “Come back home as first as you can!”

  “Why? What happened?”

  I turned the sound off and kept the phone next to me on the table continuing with my book but then the lights of my phone blinked indicating a text message.

  “Just come back straight home, after you are done with your book.”

  “Fine! I’ll be there in an hour though!”

  “Okay.”

  After that, I kept the phone back in the bag hoping nobody to disturb me until I finish the book. It took me twenty minutes to finally finish the book. As I was done, I couldn’t help but think how the author of the book wanted his readers to know about noble. The ending weak poem though pulled me completely into it which referred to how a noble soul sitting on a mountaintop wishing he had more friends. Unknowingly the book brought back sour memories. It somehow indicated the situation I was in. Even though I had Kiara as my friend but still I found myself lonely. It even gave me that daunt feeling where I constantly found myself in a place where I kept on imagining I’ll be left alone for the rest of my life. As much it looks scary it is the truth.

  Someday, Kiara will be moving on with her life wanting to create her own beautiful and happy life with her husband, kids, her family. I’m just her friend and as she is my only friend I shall be left alone with nothing but rusty memories. But then I slap my forehead thinking I was just being melodramatic, pulling myself into an ocean of weird thoughts which people named it as philosophy.

  After I returned the book, I made my way out of the library and back towards the road. I wanted to walk back just spending some time with myself even though I have been doing the same things from these past few months. It was only me with myself. Catching a bus back home, as I reached the place which I have been calling home for this past few months. Kiara and I took a house in rent in Melbourne. It was a four bedroom house and had spacious rooms that I liked but the reason we chose to rent the house was that the house was surrounded by boundaries which gave space to roam inside the house perimeter. I loved to roam until late night in the garden and sit near the glass door
which faced the garden. And it was even more comfortable because the police station was near and the police officers continued patrolling the area late nights. It made us feel safe and our neighbors were Kiara’s friends.