Twist Of Fate

Chapter 25 Eve

I have been politely requested to steer clear of Sirus tonight.

Mikyda is spending some time talking to him in detail and if all goes well I will have their blessing, without having to sneak out anymore, or outright go against them.

Darius skulks around like he has sucked a lemon. He is the only one not on board. He sits out on the back deck drinking beer, refusing to talk to us. He isn't just angry he is furious.

By the time we go to bed and the men's breathing has evened out with sleep, he still hasn't joined us. I watch the LED clock switch through the minutes. Then when the minutes turn to hours, I decide enough is enough and sneak out of bed.

He is still sitting on the back deck. His back stiffens as he senses my approach.

"I don't want to talk about it." He says, voice rough with his wolf sitting so close to the surface.

"Good, neither do I," I reply and plonk myself in his lap, snuggling into him. Let's see him try and ignore me now! He gives a loud sigh, but wraps his arms around me and tucks his nose to my neck, scenting me.

I commandeer his drink and take several gulps. His shoulders shake and I grin, pleased I can make him laugh. But then the scent of salt hits me and I realize he isn't laughing.

I quickly place the drink down on the side table and swivel to straddle him, cradling his head to my chest. His arms reposition around my waist and he pulls me tightly to him, his shoulders shaking harder, and then the sobs start.

I had broken my giant and I didn't know how. I hug him tighter with one arm and start stroking his broad back slowly, in what I hope is a soothing manner, with the other.

I'm not sure how long we sit like that, but eventually, the sobs subside and his face moves from my chest back up to tuck his nose into the crook of my neck. I let him stay there for a while before I pull back to look at his sad eyes.

I wipe his tears away with my thumbs, in awe that this man who terrified so many with his size and demeanor, had allowed me to see him so raw and emotional, so vulnerable. I press my forehead to his.

"I love you, Darius and I'll always love you. You know that right?" He nods slightly, his eyes not leaving mine. "Did you want to talk about what has you so upset?"

"Soon." He says. "I just want to hold you some more first." I nod and pop back into my original snuggle position and hand him back his beer.

We sit there in silence staring out at the shadowed forest in the distance. We share the beer and he strokes my hair in a relaxing manner with his free hand, while I draw circles on his ribs. I'm just about to doze off when he starts to finally speak.

"When you were taken, I had dreams about you. Bad ones. My mind kept coming up with all the different ways they could hurt you. As time passed, I began to wonder if I would ever find you, if you would still be alive. Especially when Reece felt the rest of your family's links die. It felt like we were on borrowed time. When we did find you, I realized the things my mind had been imagining, didn't even come close to what they had done. You were so fragile, so broken, hanging to life by a thread. Did you know Sirus's brother kept a diary? He documented everything he did in it." I stiffen and he holds me closer. "I didn't tell the others. It would have destroyed them. But I did read it, Eve. My dreams got worse after that. I would be standing there frozen unable to move, while they did terrible things to you, and there wasn't a thing I could do to stop it. The day we rescued you, we saw Sirus race out of that cave and vomit, before he took off. I'm guessing that's when he found out the truth about who you were. But the real truth is - if you weren't his and he saw you in that broken state, he would have still gone through with it and he would have taken you from us forever. He may not have been there through it all, but it was his order that took you away from us, it was on his order your family is gone and your pack suffered. He is the cause of everything that happened to you. If we had been there one hour longer, we would have lost you for real. You died on that operating table several times. Your body struggled to support itself. Your will to live was gone. He was the cause of that. Please? I am begging you. Do not make me let you return to him. It's tearing me apart."

Darius had never really spoken about it before. I didn't realize how badly it had affected him, or how it haunted him still. He had kept all of this bottled up and boiling inside him. I was ashamed it had never occurred to me to check on them about everything that had happened. Once I got Darius the help he needed, I would need to have a chat with the other two.

I didn't know about the diary, or that he knew absolutely everything in sickening detail. The thought made me nauseous and for a moment I imagined Fang Boy, gleefully scribbling his sickening thoughts and actions into his diary. But he was long dead, he couldn't hurt me anymore.

Instead, I told him what wouldn't have been in the diary. What it did to my mind. How it felt being trapped, having the hallucinations, and how hard it was to distinguish friend from foe, even when I was safe.

The hopelessness, the despair, the loneliness, the hate. How hard it was to re-find myself, how warped my mind became, how close to true madness I had been. How desperately I wanted to have back control over my life.

I bared my soul to him and told him everything that would never be found in a diary. The true battles in my mind, including the battles I still fought, while Darius held me tight.

"Darius I want you to know what you are feeling is valid. It is real and yes those things happened to me and affected all of us. It was a horrible, shitty thing that we all went through and we all suffered in different ways. But that happened to me over just a few months. During that time, I was trapped in my own personal hell, I never thought I would be free of it. Now imagine if it was two and a half decades. What shape would you have found me in then? What state would my mind have been in?" My giant shivers at the thought and shakes his head. He has no words. "Because, my love, that is what Sirus went through. But he didn't have three amazing people looking for him, he didn't have stubborn loving people who fought to ground him and patiently brought him back from the brink. He had no one to soothe him when his nightmares woke him screaming. He came back to a world where no one cared he was missing, where he returned to just being used by his father, as an angry twisted weapon to help start a war. He was nothing but a pawn. I'm not asking you to forget what he's done or forgive him. All I'm asking is for you to understand why he is the way he is and understand that he is trying to come back from the brink. I get him and where he's at. I need you to understand that, as my father by blood, I am curious about him and despite everything, I want to know him. Do you think maybe you could maybe understand him? Could you maybe understand why I want to talk to him?"

"Can I reserve making a decision until after Mikyda finishes with him? Give me a little time to process everything and then get his take on it too?" He says tiredly.

"Of course, you can. There is no pressure. No time limit. Right, bedtime, you're exhausted." Darius slowly stands and takes my hand.

"Kitten, you were going to continue seeing him regardless of what we said and the guys, well majority rules, they are all for it. What does it matter what I think?" He asks curiously.

"Because you matter, your opinion matters. Everything about you matters to me. I just wanted you to stop a moment and look at things from all sides and make sure you had all the information to make a calm rational choice. If you still choose to not agree with what I'm doing, then that's ok, that's your choice to make and I will understand. Because I do, I get where you're coming from and I can respect your decision. But I love you and I would rather have your blessing and understanding. If it came down to it and you told me him or you, it would always be you. I want you to know that. I just hope you don't choose to do that to me." I tug his hand and lead him inside, but detour to a guest room. He raises his eyebrow. "Just you and me tonight Hulk, no one else, I think we could both use it."

"I'd like that." He says, a genuine smile gracing his face.

I tow him into the guest room, strip him down and myself and then snuggle up with him in the bed. He lets out a sigh of contentment. The circles he's making with his fingers on my back, slow down and stop as he goes under. I allow myself to drift off too and hope his nightmares let him have this night of peace.