Dominated (Obsessed II)

39.

Bianca Dawson
The Moment I Waited For

I had been waiting for forty-three minutes when I started convincing myself that he wasn't coming. I felt so weird being back in Madrid after being gone for so long. I had nothing but a small bag and big hopes of seeing the love of my life again.

I knew exactly how long it had been because I had checked the time so many times that the numbers had stopped meaning anything. Every few minutes, I would glance toward the road beyond the gates, expecting to see headlights appearing between the trees, only to find an empty stretch of asphalt disappearing into the distance.  With every minute that passed, the certainty I'd carried with me since sending Jude the location began to unravel.

Maybe he'd changed his mind. Maybe he'd read my message and decided that whatever existed between us belonged in the past. Maybe he'd finally listened to everyone who had spent years telling him I was dangerous.

I wrapped my arms around myself and looked down at my phone again. The last message I'd sent him was still there.

I'm here.

Nothing had come after it.

I hated that I was nervous. I had spent so long imagining this moment that I had never imagined what it would feel like to actually stand inside it. In my head, Jude had always arrived exactly as I pictured him. He would see me, and everything else would disappear. There would be no questions, no explanations, no Richard, no Dominik, nothing between us. There would only be him and me, finally standing in the same place again.

But standing there alone, with the breeze moving through the trees and the silence stretching around me, I suddenly understood how much of this depended on him. For once, I couldn't force the moment to happen. I couldn't make him come. I could only wait. I glanced toward the road again.

Nothing.

My throat tightened.

"Please," I whispered, though I wasn't sure whether I was speaking to him or to myself.

Then I saw the car.

It appeared in the distance so suddenly that for a second I thought I'd imagined it. My heart stopped before beginning again so violently that I felt the beat in my throat. I took a step forward, squinting through the fading light as the car approached.

I knew it! I knew that car. My breath caught.

Jude.

The car slowed as it reached the property, and before it had even come to a complete stop, I was already moving. I didn't think about what I would say. I didn't think about whether I should wait for him to get out properly or whether I should try to act calm and composed.

The door opened, and Jude stepped out. For one suspended second, neither of us moved.

He looked exactly like him and completely different at the same time. Older than the last version of him I'd held in my memories, broader through the shoulders. But his eyes were still the same.

My Jude.

He looked at me. And then he ran toward me.
I barely had time to breathe before I threw myself into him. His arms caught me around the waist, lifting me off the ground as I wrapped my arms around his neck. I buried my face against him, laughing and crying at the same time, and the sound that escaped me didn't even feel like my own. It was every night I'd spent imagining this exact embrace finally breaking apart inside me.