Areston thinks he can shield me from his past, but what he doesn't realize is I'm already part of it.
The darkness that haunts him? It's the same one that's been chasing me for years.
I've given him everything-my body, my heart, my soul-and still...
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If you were Areston's psychiatrist, what's one thing you'd advice him to do?
If you were Juliette's best friend, what's one thing you'd advice her to do?
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"I couldn't stop myself. I saw her and I knew I had to go for her. I hate her with every fiber of my being, Areston," I manage in croaked breath.
He pulls back his head, his eyes glazed with incandescent rage, but his expressions remain tight. "So you waltz into the hole of a viper? That is not what I gave you permission for. You should have stayed out of it completely."
My skin prickles under the tangible force of his rage, his gaze is so cold it can freeze the sun. "I have dealt with people like her. She doesn't scare me."
"You still don't get it, do you? You naively enough risked your existence for so long dealing with people like her because your life was your own. You were free to do whatever the fuck you pleased with it. That's not the case anymore. Your life isn't yours anymore. It's fucking mine!" He finally ends up shedding his supreme cool with a snap that hits me like a barrage of bullets.
"Ares—"
His thumb strokes my pulse point before licking it and sinking his teeth into it like an animal. "This pulse fluttering like a butterfly trapped in your throat is mine. This air you breathe is main. This body is mine. Your soul is mine. YOU. ARE. MINE. How dare you go out there with such sheer recklessness and endanger what's mine?"
I should be frightened by his rage and I am to a deeper extent, but I remind myself that he's burning because he loves me so much. People are frightened of the harm a human rage can cause, but this man can never hurt me, even if he were to turn out into a real monster who survives on human blood and I'm the last human to exist. He'll decimate the earth before letting any harm touch me and that's why he's furious. He knows I was safe with his team of security and I will forever be safe because he's always protecting me, but he knows that filthy woman and the lengths she can go to. He isn't worried she'll hurt me. He is angry that I put myself out there in front of her when he clearly wanted me far away.
I cup his cheek. That doesn't affect him on the surface, but the way I see him slightly lean into the touch, just slightly, as if needing my warmth deep inside, makes me smile.
"I will happily sacrifice myself for you and not shed a tear, Areston. I am not saying just for the sake of it. I don't care how furious this declaration makes you. It's just as much the truth as I am yours." He glares at me, the all-consuming ferocity that seemed to have melted for a couple of seconds returning with vehemence. It doesn't scare me though. "It's you who doesn't get it, baby. What happens to you is not just limited to you. You're an extension of me. If someone has done you so much wrong, I feel every bit of it and make it personal. I always will and nothing can stop me. My skin crawls when I think of what that whore put you through. Of what kind of mental torture you had to live in that brought out the monster that had always existed within you but remained trapped in a corner of your heart."
