Chapter 12 - Afraid to Open Up
1827 Words
The room was dark and still, even at only nine o’clock in the evening.
Alexa, who had slept through most of the day, was suddenly awoken by a harsh wave of nausea as it began to wash over her powerfully.
Sitting upright in the bed, she panicked at the feeling as it emerged from deep down within her stomach.
Cupping her hand over her mouth, she jumped off the bed and ran into the nearby ensuite faster than she had ever run before.
Kneeling beside the white porcelain toilet bowl, Alexa had just made it in time and proceeded to throw up everything left in her stomach down into the bowl.
Deciding to have a shower and brush her teeth, just to feel clean again, Alexa got herself dressed into a cute looking night gown and threw on a long silk robe over the top.
Tying it into a bow at the front she headed towards the bedroom door in search of Dante.
For some strange reason she felt alone and abandoned right now. A desperate need to be with him surfaced as she stepped out into the hallway and began her search.
She needed to have his scent surrounding her.
To feel his warm touch against her soft skin.
To hear that voice, the only voice that made her weak at the knees.
-
Most of the house was fairly dark and quiet, but Alexa knew exactly where to go to find Dante at this time of the evening.
If he wasn’t with her in their room, there was only ever one other place she might find him.
His office.
At least, Alexa felt fairly confident in her beliefs.
Stopping at his sleek wooden door, she lifted her fist and knocked twice against its smooth, hard surface, and then waited for a response.
‘Knock, knock.’
Standing in silence, she heard his voice soon afterwards, speaking in Italian. He must have thought she was one of his men.
Dante only ever spoke in Italian when he was addressing them, but never when he spoke to her.
“Entra.” (Come in.) Dante called out from the other side.
She felt her skin tingling at the harsh tone of his voice. He sounded annoyed at something and she wondered what it was this time.
What else could have possibly have happened in a single day?
Pursing her lips together nervously, she reached out for the handle and turned it, opening the door and stepping into the dimly-lit room inside, her eyes scanning the room in search of him.
“Alexa?”
Dante sounded confused as he noticed her standing in the doorway, staring back at him hesitantly after finally catching sight of him.
“Bella, what are you doing up this late?” he asked, coming to stand from the sofa he had been seated on only seconds earlier.
Before he could say anything else, Alexa ran straight into his arms, her body crashing hard into his as she wrapped both arms around his large shoulders and held onto him for dear life.
The force of her embrace had caused them both to collapse down onto the sofa.
Burrowing her face into his chest, she felt him wrapping his strong and powerful arms around her, holding onto her with such love and concern.
They remained like this for a moment before Alexa finally spoke, her voice sounding tarnished and broken as she expressed her thoughts aloud, for his better understanding.
“I didn’t want to be alone.”
His eyes closed and he furrowed his brows in obvious pain and disappointment with himself for what had happened to her today.
He let out an angered sigh before resting his chin down on top of her head.
Dante had seen the surveillance footage of what happened to her in the change room today.
He had witnessed what that fucker Alonzo did to her, and it had caused his blood to boil.
“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…”
Dante panted the words out as something unthinkable happened.
The fearless Reaper began to… cry?
Only a few tears and a sniff, of course, but enough to show Alexa in this sudden and intimate moment between them that he was in fact just a man.
That he did hurt, just like any other man.
Hearing the obvious pain in his voice, Alexa pulled back and watched as he tried to turn his face away, to hide his emotions in embarrassment, but she was having none of that!
“Hey, look at me. Please…” she spoke softly, yet sternly enough for him to obey her for once.
Grabbing the side of his face, she pulled against it, forcing him to turn his head to look her in the eyes.
Dante Romano, the all-powerful CEO and infamous Reaper had never felt so helpless and vulnerable in his entire life than he did right here and now, bared before this wonderful woman who now owned him… body, mind, heart and soul.
Alexa on the other hand was astonished. Dante’s usually bright green eyes were now stained red and filled to the brim with tears.
Tears for her!
“Dante…” she whispered, unsure of what else to say.
“I saw it… what he did to you… every single f*****g second of it.” Dante admitted, his voice barely a whisper as he went on.
“I watched… I watched and I couldn’t-”
Lowering his head, and scrunching up his face in contorted anger, Dante shook his head, unable to finish his sentence.
His anger was consuming him again.
Even though it was her who had experienced the assault in question, Alexa’s heart ached for him as she reached her arms around his waist and held him, closing her eyes.
Dante Romano clearly did not know how to experience or understand true pain. And not the kind of pain you get from a bullet wound or stab from a knife mind you…
True pain, pain that came directly from the heart.
“That son-of-a-b***h will pay for what he did to you. I swear it.”
Dante’s voice had lowered to come across much deeper now, causing her to pull away from him as if he were possessed.
“I will make every single one of those stronzo’s (assholes) pay!”
Although she wasn’t happy with what had happened to her, Alexa certainly didn’t want anyone to be killed over it.
She wasn’t from his world; she couldn’t convene something as insidious as killing someone, not for any reason!
“Dante, no.”
She tried to reason with him, but he was already moving to stand up again, adjusting his jacket suit as he made his way towards the door to his office.
“Please, just listen to me…” she called out after him.
Opening the door, Dante turned around and held it open for her, an obvious gesture for her to leave.
Her heart ached at the unfamiliar coldness reflecting back at her through his eyes. Eyes that only a minute ago had shown such warmth and compassion towards her.
Where had that warmth gone now?
Apparently, Dante had made up his mind.
There would be no convincing him otherwise now.
“So that’s it then? You’ll just kill them all, solve your problem like that?”
She snapped at him, becoming angry herself at his black and white view on solving life’s problems.
“Whenever the great Dante Romano has a problem, he just kills whoever’s in his way. Is that it? Is that how our life’s gonna be?” she queried angrily; her eyes narrowed in at him.
“I am what I am.” he spoke coldly, shrugging carelessly.
“Nothing will ever change me. Not even you.”
Again, his words were like cold knives to her heart as her brows furrowed inwards at him.
Trying one last attempt to get through to him, to convince him to stop all this pointless bloodshed, Alexa stepped up to stand before him, staring him directly in the eyes as she spoke.
Most other people would have packed themselves having to stand up against such a terrible man, but Alexa saw a different side to him than anyone else ever had.
One that she was determined to get him to open up to, no matter how hard he fought her in the process.
“I would never want to change you Dante Romano. Not a single thing about you...” she announced softly but with obvious courage hidden behind each of her spoken words.
“I just wish you could see what I see.”
“And what is it that you see?” Dante queried, his left brow lifting as if this conversation was somehow amusing to him.
Alexa remained serious as she spoke her reply.
“I see a man hiding behind several masks, one of them soaked with blood. I see him struggling, fighting to free himself from the mask’s powerful hold on him…”
She lifted her hand, placing it onto his chest, right over where his heart thudded away beneath his ribcage.
Keeping her eyes locked onto his, she spoke one last time.
“I see the heart you hide, Dante Romano… even if you, yourself refuse to.”
The two shared a moment of complete silence, staring into one another’s eyes as Dante allowed her words to properly sink in.
She saw him.
The real him.
Not his whole Reaper persona he had built up over the years, nor his billionaire label as CEO.
Alexa saw him for him, for who he was on the inside.
Swallowing away his unease at feeling so raw and vulnerable, Dante cleared his throat and spoke, his new tone apparently void of emotion.
He now found himself unable to look her in the eye.
“It’s late, Alexa. You should probably get some rest.”
Lowering her eyes in defeat, Alexa nodded her head and then proceeded to move around him.
Dante tried not to watch her as she headed out through the open doorway and into the hall, even though he wanted to meet her eyes again more than anything.
A part of him wanted to stop her in her tracks. To tell her how much he loved her, and that he wanted to change his ways, just to make her happy.
But this was the real world. It wasn’t a beautiful fairy tale. Things like that didn’t happen in the real world.
They couldn’t.
He was who he was, there was no way of escaping it.
What she was asking of him… it was virtually impossible!
As she left, Dante closed his eyes for a moment and inhaled her lingering scent.
Closing the door behind her with a soft ‘click’, he forced himself to focus on the task at hand, pushing thoughts of her from his mind.
He had work to do.
- Writer
