SPECIE OF LOVE

AVA I'M SORRY

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*Chapter 6: I'M SORRY AVA

*Part 1: Damien’s POV*

Damien tasted her before he understood her.

Ava’s lips were soft, hesitant, then urgent. Her confusion matched his own. Five years of watching her from a distance, and now she was in his arms, shaking.

Then the door crashed open.

Josh.

Both of them froze. Ava’s tab slipped from her hands and clattered on the floor. Her face went white. She didn’t look at Damien. Didn’t look at Josh. She just ran. Out the door, down the hall, gone in seconds.

Silence filled the office like smoke.

Josh leaned against the doorframe and smirked. “I see you aren’t through with that girl yet.”

Damien didn’t answer. He walked back to his seat slowly. Adjusted his tie. His fingers moved on autopilot while his mind raced. He smiled to himself, but it wasn’t amusement. It was recognition. Ava ruined the moment. Not Josh. Not timing. Ava. Her conscience was louder than his desire.

“Who would have thought,” he said aloud, voice flat, “that me and my own PA would end up in a... situationship.”

“What is funny, dude?” Josh snapped. He was annoyed. The kind of annoyed that comes from watching a plan go off-script.

Damien finally looked up. His eyes were cold.

Josh started pacing. “First of all, it was Isabella.”

Damien cut him off. “I didn’t pick Isabella. My mother did.”

“Oh, and let me guess,” Josh threw his hands up, “your mother also initiated the first kiss that led to this pregnancy? Damien, make good use of your brain, please.”

He stopped pacing and pointed a finger. “First Isabella, now Ava. Why do you keep raising these girls’ hopes? You’re using her, Damien. Don’t pretend you don’t see it.”

Damien didn’t answer. He just stared at Josh. Anger burned behind his eyes, but underneath it was something else. Something he didn’t have a name for yet.

Josh kept going. “You can get angry all you want, but you can’t deny the truth. All you want is her body. Not her love. You don’t love her, Damien. You feel lust toward her. If you loved her, you wouldn’t have set up a camera and made me watch it live. If you loved her, you would have made things clear from the start instead of playing games.”

The word “camera” hit the air like a bullet.

Damien’s jaw tightened. He opened his mouth to lie, to deflect, to snap back to business. “Bro, let’s talk business,” he said instead. His voice was a wall.

Right then, the door opened again.

Ava. She was breathless. Eyes red. She’d forgotten her tab. She picked it up from the floor without looking at either of them. “Sorry,” she whispered. Then she left. Fast. Too fast.

Damien watched her go. His chest felt strange. Tight.

He turned back to Josh. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. But I feel something for this girl. And it’s not lust.”

Josh laughed, but it was bitter. “Sure, bro. Business.”

Damien picked up his pen. But his hand wouldn’t move.

Because for the first time, he wasn’t sure who he was lying to. Josh... or himself.

*Part 2: Ava’s POV*

Ava got home and the silence hit her like a wave.

She hadn’t worked overtime. Her body wasn’t tired. Her heart was. It felt like it had run a marathon and lost.

She threw herself on the bed. Stared at the ceiling. Then reached for her tab to start tomorrow’s schedule. Her fingers moved on their own.

The screen lit up.

_Recording: 00:58:32_

Her blood went cold.

“It might be from when I was with Damien,” she whispered. Her thumb hovered over “delete”. One press and the shame would be gone. One press and she could pretend it never happened.

But something stopped her. A nudge. A warning.

She pressed play instead.

Josh’s voice filled the room first. Sharp. Accusing. Then Damien’s voice. Low. Defensive. Then Josh again, dropping the word that broke her: “camera.”

“...set up a camera and made me watch it live...”

The tab slipped from her hands. Tears came before she could breathe.

“I’m just a tool,” she whispered to the empty room. “He wants to use me to kill his arousal.” The tears kept rolling. Hot. Bitter.

Her chest caved in. Not from heartbreak. From humiliation. Five years of love, reduced to a live show for Josh.

She didn’t know what asked her to, but she did it anyway. She clipped the recording. Attached it to an email. Typed three lines:

_Mr. Black,_

_Effective immediately, I resign from my position as your Personal Assistant._

_Ava Williams._

She hit send.

Then she sat in the dark and waited for her world to end.

Thirty minutes later, her door started knocking. Hard. Urgent.

Ava shot up. Heart pounding. “Could he be here? Did he listen to the voice note? What is he doing here?” Questions crashed into each other.

She walked to the door on shaky legs. Looked through the small peephole.

Damien. Drenched. Rain dripping from his suit, his hair, his face. He looked like a man who had lost everything and was begging for one thing back.

“Ava, it’s not like that,” his voice came through the door, muffled but desperate. “Let me explain. Please open the door. The part where I told Josh that I felt something for you didn’t record. Please don’t do this. You can’t leave the company now. The company needs you... but I need you more. Ava, please open up.”

He was shivering. Not from cold. From fear.

Ava’s hand hovered over the knob. Her mind screamed _don’t_. Her heart whispered _listen_.

The knob turned.

She opened the door.

He was on his knees before she could speak. Rainwater pooled at his feet. He looked up at her like a man drowning. Like someone who finally understood the weight of what he’d done.

“Ava, I swear to you,” he said, voice breaking. “I don’t know what I feel yet. But it’s not lust. Not anymore. If it was lust, I would have let you walk away five minutes ago. Lust doesn’t stand in the rain for thirty minutes. Lust doesn’t come here with nothing to offer except the truth.”

Ava stared at him. The man who confused her. The man who broke her. The man kneeling in the rain for her.

Something inside her loosened. Not forgiveness. Not yet. But the grip of hate slipped a little.

She stepped back. Held the door open.

The rain kept falling.

And Damien stood up, slow, like he didn’t trust the ground under him.

He walked in.

Door shut behind them.

But this time, the door didn’t mean surrender. It meant a conversation long overdue.

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