My Akuma (Book One of The Yakuza Series) (✔️)

二十五 (Twenty-Five)

(Ryu's POV)

I got back home and found Aria passed out on the couch wearing one of my shirts and one of my knives in her hand.

I walked over and carefully pulled the knife from her grasp, but she woke up anyway. Her eyes opened and she blinked up at me. Then she started to tear up.

"No, no. None of that." I said, crouching down to her level.

"You were gone a long time." She cried.

"I know and I'm sorry."

That's when she took notice of the wound above my eyebrow.

"What happened?"

I sighed and explained what happened.

"That's horrible."

"I know. I'm sorry I broke our promise."

She shook her head and gave me a small grin. "Don't be. I said you couldn't come back with your blood on you. This has stopped bleeding and I don't see any blood anywhere."

"It might scar."

She shrugged. "Might. Might not. Time will tell."

I lifted her up and carried her over to the bed. As I laid her down, I kissed her forehead.

"Go back to sleep. I'm going to shower."

"I'll come with you." She said starting to stand.

I pushed her back down onto the bed and shook my head. "Go to sleep."

Her eyes scanned mine before she nodded. That's when she knew I needed a moment to myself.

I walked into the bathroom and stripped off my clothes as I climbed into the shower. I turned the water ice-cold and just stood there. I've always preferred cold showers over warm ones. There's just something about the freezing cold that I enjoy. When Aria showers with me the water has to be hot enough to almost burn your skin off.

I stood in the shower for a minute or two before I lost it. All the built up anger and fury I had left exploded out and I punched the wall. Hard. The blood from my now busted up knuckles turned the water a light pink color.

The thing was though, I didn't feel a thing. I didn't feel that pain. I didn't feel the pain from the wound on my head.

The only pain I felt was that that was caused knowing Aria's buyer was still out there and I had no idea who he was or when/if he'd try to get her again.

~~~~~~~~~~
(Aria's POV)

I heard a thump and I knew he punched the wall. I knew it was that because I'd heard it many times before, usually after a nightmare.

He was in pain.

Not physically though.

In all our years of being together, I'd learned that Ryu wasn't affected by pain as much other people were. He never suffered physically. He suffered mentally.

As much as he could with his personality that is.

It's not that he didn't feel the pain. He was....immune to it in a way. The way his father trained him was so brutal that he eventually got used to the pain. He accepted it. Became one with it.

The mental pain.....

He was immune to that as well.

Until I came back into his life. I knew I was the cause of it. Always have been. He was afraid that he couldn't protect me. Afraid that something would happen to me or to him and that one of us would be left alone.