Phantom Rider - The Aftermath | Book 1

Unbreakable Promises

Sudden shouting from Tom interrupted Bill. He dropped the wine bottle on the ground. "I will finish you later!" he said, looking at Matt, still hesitating, but another scream made him run.

He ran towards the sound and found Tom alone, fighting three armed men. He jumped right into the fight, and soon enough, Georg and Gustav joined. Together they managed to kill all three of attackers.

"Did you get what you were looking for?" Bill looked at Tom.

"Yes, let's go!" Tom held a box in his hands.

They ran through the halls, and Tom passed Bill a gun. "Go, get your princess! We will get the cars to the house, but hurry up, it's only a matter of time until we are surrounded."

Bill ran from room to room searching for her, but she was nowhere to be found. He was out of breath. He went downstairs to the hall and took a brief second to catch his breath, sitting next to the table. No one was there. Then he looked up at the stairs, and his breath stopped again.

He paused. His eyes sunk.

You know the feeling when someone lives in your head every day and night. You remember every strain of hair, every mole, every wrinkle, every scar and bump, every crease of body, the smell of skin and the way it changes colour from words you say or your touch. From pale white, to red, to beige, to pink blush.

But then, you finally meet that person.

And all you thought you remember about them becomes a blur. Because nothing could have prepared you for how beautiful this person is outside your head. As if you could never create something this magical in your mind, because that beauty goes beyond your imagination.

He covered his face with hands. Tears burned his eyes from pressure of him not letting them flow.

He tried to look like a man she must have waited for. Like strong, confident saviour that came to rescue his princess.

But truth was - he felt like she had saved him instead.

She was the hero who doesn't know it yet, the main character of his story. Just like first time he saw her, she carried herself with such fierce and power, making him want to kneel if front of her.

Instead he raised an empty glass from table and gave her a mock toast, you know, the one that made her fall for him the first time.

She came slowly downstairs towards him and leaned against the table revealing a bit too much of cleavage. This time he did look, and smiled at her.

But her face was same as first time he met her - cold and empty.

"I am here to take you home! I won't let this happen again, and next time they try to take you I will be ready." This time he was sure of his promises, because he had full gang with him. With Tom by his side, he was invincible.

"No, I am not coming with you! I don't want to be with you. I don't love you, never did!" Mila rejected him.

He stopped himself. 

Yet again. 

As always.

Her words cut him, but there wasn't much left to destroy anymore. He thought for a second, then brushed with his fingertips over the ring on her finger. She looked at him with empty eyes but didn't move her hand away.

He slowly pulled the ring off her finger. "No one is ruling over you anymore."

She looked up at him as he tossed the ring away. "Bill, I am sorry, but that changes nothing. I still won't be with you."

He felt so weak and hurt, he was about to beg her. But he was so sick of walking on eggshells around her. For the first time, he got really annoyed at her.

He was done begging.

He was done running after her.

He was done trying to make sense of the chaos.

He was done with all of it.

He got up from the chair and turned away from her.

As he walked towards exit, he looked back one more time in search of emotions in her, but there were none. Empty, cold, ice-blue eyes.

"Fuck it!" He turned back and ran to her. He looked in her eyes, grabbed her by the waist, and tossed her over his shoulder. She instinctively held onto his shoulders. He gripped her legs right under her butt. She was stiff and resistant.

He didn't give a fuck anymore. "You are coming home with me!"

"Let me go!" She kicked with her feet.

"No, I am taking you whether you want it or not!" He commanded in a voice that made Mila stop kicking him. He held her forcefully by the legs and walked toward the hall exit.

"You are hurting me!" She whined, but it sounded like a moan to him.

"For all the hurt you made me feel, this is nothing. You will be okay with this!" He replied angrily.

"Bill, no, really, please, let me down!" She screamed at him.

"Hold on, we are almost at the car," he said, much gentler than before.

Tom, Georg, and Gustav were already standing next to the cars. Tom burst out laughing at the comical view of Mila's desperate kicks.

"Got your princess after all?" He said, still smiling.

Bill opened the passenger door and put Mila inside, jumping into the front seat and locking the car doors.

"You can't force me to go with you!" Her voice was shaking and full of breath.

"If everyone else can, why wouldn't I?" He hissed at her, filled with adrenaline.

"Why do you act like this?" Mila asked.

"Because I love you, and I promised to marry you, and I will keep my promise!"

"Stop lying, you never said that!" She shouted at him.

He leaned toward the front glove compartment of the car, opened it, and tossed her two toys: a bunny rabbit and a fox.

"I did, Mila! A long time ago! It was always you!" He said sharply.

She froze in shock, holding both toys in her hands.

"I am here now because I am not the one to break promises!"

She held the toys close to her heart and looked at his dark brown eyes in the front mirror, remembering those very same eyes from her childhood. And the ice in her melted into an ocean of tears.