6. Garden Of Roses.

CARA

Of course I am not alright.

I feel like I am about to experience a full blown panic attack.

How can I be alright when there are plenty chances of me stumbling into Dane in here of all fucking people and of all fucking places!?

But I do not want to trouble Rhia with my anxiety. So, she does not need to know the truth.

“I am fine. I just need to use the restroom.” I smile, being careful not to make my fake expression look exaggerated. Rhia has this invisible dexterity of sniffing out exaggerations.

“Alright. Take your time. Meanwhile….” she suddenly appears to my front, winking mischievously at me. “Don’t fuck around in there.”

I laugh. Rhia's brazen mouth never lacks the nastiest statements. I am still surprised that her V card still exists after all these years.

“I am coming.” I turn around, heading straight for the exit. The restroom is the least place I want to be in right now….

I need to go somewhere far away from here. Somewhere I do not want to see him.

Why the hell is he back!? He should have fucking stayed in that White Moon pack where he ran off to.

I finally reach outside. With the fading sun hanging low in the orange purple clouded sky, I decide to escape to the rose garden just behind the banquet hall.

Everyone is busy enjoying themselves inside. No one will notice me gone. And I really want to be alone right now.

I begin to make my way to the garden.

The nearer I get, the more I feel at ease with the tantalizing scents of the roses and the little chirpings of the garden birds preventing my mind a bit from wandering around too much.

There is this large marble water fountain right in the center of the rose garden that I love so much. Just a few paces ahead.

Watching the reflection of the dusky evening sky on the spouting water has always been my lovely sight to behold.

A mesmerizing sight I pray will help distract me from my haunting thoughts today.

I hurry my footsteps and round the corner leading to the fountain.

Just as I enter the wide open space where the fountain is, I gasp, shock rattling my bones from my head down to my very toes.

He is right there.

Alone.

Sitting on a bench near the water fountain with his back turned to me, his face bent towards his knees.

I must have gasped out loudly earlier, because he lifts up his head and slowly turns around.

Immediately, our eyes lock, and the entire garden feels like it is suspended in time. Like we are in some sort of dreamscape where only the two of us exist.

A dreamscape I want to burn to ashes.

My entire body feels like it is paralyzed, and yet, pain and anger surges up my veins. My throat. My eyes.

And it burns me without mercy.

I think of taking a step back. To run away from here…

But wait a minute…. do I have to? Why should I?

I scoff at myself. Between the both of us, Dane is the expert at running away. The expert in treating people's feelings like trash.

Between the both of us, he is the stranger here. He should be the wretched one to leave this beautiful garden. Not me.

“What are you doing here?” I spit out the question bitterly at him as I begin to walk towards the water fountain, my anger fueling me.

He rises from the bench, his eyes never leaving me all the while. There is something about his body language. Something about his reaction to my fuming presence now standing before him.

“Cara….” He says my name slowly. Quietly. For the first time in two years, like he is caught up in some hazy maze.

Hazy maze my fucking foot.

“Wow, I really can't believe this.” I fold my arms. “Is this really you, Dane, or am I staring at an illusion right now?”

I am fighting not to rake. Not to lash out my annoyance. He does not say anything, which only irritates me the more.

“Can't you speak? Or did they teach you in White Moon not to speak to the people you so callously abandoned?”

A fiery glare sparks instantly in his eyes like I just struck a chord I shouldn't have.

He raises his chin, jaw clenched, his forest green orbs glowering and searing into me like fire. “They are good people, Cara. Watch what you say about them.”

Even his voice sounds deeper now. Hearing it this clearly and closely after all these years sends a ripple thrumming through my veins. 

I ignore the feeling.

“I know they are good people Dane. It is you that I don't know anymore.”

And I really, really feel like I do not know him anymore.

His glare at me disappears from his gaze, replaced with something a little bit warm.

“Why are you back?” I ask. My question resurfaces that glare again.

“It is none of your concern.”

My chest tightens painfully at his emotionless words. “Really? Please Dane, do enlighten me on why it is none of my concern, because if I can remember correctly, which I still do, I was there that night, right in front of you. I was there when you ran away from me. I was the only one you shut out for years like I meant nothing to you!”

“Why are you still like this?”

“And why the hell did you have to come back!? You should have stayed and languished in White Moon for all I care!” I lash out, unable to hold it in anymore, my anger rocking my muscles with tremors.

He sighs, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose.

He opens his eyes. That glare is still there. “My mother forced me to come back.” He  says, tone devoid of any emotion. His rigid frame shows no sign of empathy from being bothered by my outburst.

I was right.

Two years was more than enough to change him. And it changed him into this total stranger that I do not know anymore.

Even the aura around him is different. Cold. Harsh. Guarded.

I take a step closer to his face, and I allow my eyes to assess him. The whole of him. From face to neck to chest to torso, down to his feet and then back up to his face again.

“You really changed a lot, Dane.” I chuckle sadly. “ I never thought you’d be the one to hurt me.”

“Cara, stop this.”

“Why should I? You cut me out of your mind for years. Out of everything that existed between us. Did you even stop, for a single moment, to even think how fucked up that made me feel? I was torn apart, and I felt so fucking betrayed when Al and the others told me the lies you cooked up through the mind link messages you responded to each and everyone of them just to cover up the reason behind your absence.”

“There was no other option, Cara. I had to give them something when they asked. I had to say those lies to protect you. I suspected there would be tons of questions—”

“Fuck you Dane!” I cry out. “Even if you had to lie, does that also explain why you ignored all my mind link messages all these years!? I know you received all of them. I felt it. But you never responded. Not even for once!”

“I wouldn’t have been able to resist the urge to come back to you if I had responded!”

“So where did all that running get you!?” I blast back at him, fighting with all my willpower not to punch him in the chest. “Huh? Tell me! Because from what I am seeing right now, you are standing right in my very presence.”

His eyes twitch at my words, and his body stills for a moment.

“Yes. I am right in your presence,” he says quietly, “but I do not regret not responding to your messages. I do not regret what I did that night. It was….” his throat bobs hard as he swallows. “It was the right thing to do.”

The merciless strike of his words chokes me harder than the cold silence that settles between us.

The pain from that night two years ago that I have struggled to keep buried climbs up to the surface. 

And it wrecks every cell and muscle in my body.

The originator of that pain is standing in front of me. Heartless. Unremorseful as I silently fight with my mind to keep the pain locked down.

Pain is like a lethal migraine. It twists, bites, and tries to do everything in its wicked power to suck out the life force from anything it touches.

But the pain caused by someone you love, someone you thought loved you…. the lethal impact of that kind of pain is way beyond words.

Dane caused my pain. And now, he is back. And he does not even feel a little shred of guilt towards what he did to me. To us.

There is no piece—of the Dane that I used to know—left to hold onto. The Dane that I fell in love with died that night two years ago.

I gather some strength within my weak bones as I back away slowly from the stranger before me. “Well, I guess you are right. Now that you are back, kindly do me a favour…”

My eyes sink their claws into his, my tone venomous with all my rage, “Stay away from me.”

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Enjoy the super long chapter darlings! ♡