Vandal (Ashes & Embers 2)

All I see is pain and regret.

Tabitha

He looks shattered and I have to admit, a part of me likes it. I want to see him suffer. Maybe not a lot, but a little. He can’t walk away from this unscathed. I can’t let him. I won’t get out of this without scars, so neither will he.

“Just because I haven’t said it doesn’t mean I don’t feel it, Tabi. It matters to me that I feel it because I’ve never loved a woman before. They’ve always just been objects for me, and I couldn’t control that about myself. It was just who I was and how I felt.” Taking a deep breath, he moves in front of me so I have to look at him. “Love came easy for you; you told me that yourself. You and Nick had a happy, easy relationship with rainbows and unicorns without any fucking pain and lies and struggles.” He swallows hard. “I’ve never had that, and I never will. I’m not an easy person. And you’re not either, anymore, whether you like it or not. We changed each other. You made me better and I guess I made you worse, but I do love you in the only way that I know how to right now.” He lowers his voice and touches my cheek. “I’ve never said that to anyone except Katie. Please don’t take it away from me.”

My God, I hate how he can just turn me upside-down. As fast as I put the walls around my heart to protect myself against him, he was already breaking through, baring his soul to me, forcing me to see the man I love, ugly flaws and all.

My entire body sighs and I touch his hand at my cheek and let it stay there for a moment before pulling his hand away.

“I don’t know what you did to me, Vandal,” I say, my voice softer, void of the hatred it held earlier. “How can I even separate this all in my head and figure out what was love and what was control? That’s what you do: you control, and manipulate, and dominate, and it’s all wrapped up in this … this matrix that is you. You controlled my body, and my thoughts. You made me want you, and you made me need you. I don’t know if all of that made me love you, too.” My voice cracks and I choke back the lump in my throat. “How do I know if it’s real love? Maybe my head is just fucked up from being your sub. I gave every part of myself to you and was totally focused on you in every way. I’m not denying that I didn’t want it, or that I didn’t enjoy it. I went into this willingly,” I say, looking up into his pained gaze. “That lifestyle called to me and once you introduced me to it, I wanted it. But now I’m questioning if I really loved you or not. Don’t you see that? I don’t know if I can trust my feelings.”

He looks panicked, eyes wide, grabbing my hands. “Of course you can trust your feelings. Your heart never lies. Gram told me that and she’s right about every-fucking-thing. I never manipulated your heart, Tabi. You know that. If anything, I tried to keep that out of it.”

“I know, and that hurts even more. You didn’t want my love. You didn’t want to love me.”

He shakes his head, his hair falling into his face. “You’re right. And that should tell you something right fucking there. We loved each other, even though neither one of us wanted it. That’s real, Tabi. We can’t deny that.”

I cross my arms, holding myself. “I was depressed and suicidal when I met you in that cemetery. I was there that day, saying goodbye. I planned to kill myself that weekend. I know that sounds dramatic, but that’s where my head was.” I’m embarrassed now, admitting how low I had sunk at that point in my depression. “Then you showed up and I just said fuck it, maybe this scary-looking guy will murder me and save me the trouble.”

“Tabi …”

“But then I became fascinated with you, and I liked how you made me feel. I loved how dangerous you felt. When you touched me, you woke something up inside me. I don’t know how to explain it. It all just happened so quickly, like a switch being flipped, and it seemed better than being dead.”

He puts his hands on my shoulders, forcing me to look at him. I don’t want to, but I have no choice but to gaze up into his eyes.

“Baby, I didn’t plan on any of that. I didn’t think I’d ever actually see you in person, and when I did, I just wanted to hear your voice, see your smile, feel your touch. And when I brought you here I could feel that you would be everything I wanted and I knew I could make you forget all that shit and make you happy, even if only for a little while.” He bends down a little to make sure I’m looking him in the eye. “I never meant to hurt you. All I’ve wanted was for you to be happy and safe and to fucking love me.”

I’m falling into his eyes again, being swept into him with his words, but I don’t want it now. I push his hands off me and put space between us again.

“Let me ask you something, Vandal. Was it all out of guilt? Because I can’t stop thinking that. Like being with me was just something to make you feel better.”

He follows me across the room, cornering me so there’s nowhere else for me to go.

“Tabi … no.” He shakes his head and slams his fist against the wall. “I felt guilty, yeah, but you want to know the honest truth? I felt more jealous than anything else. I told you that. I could see how much you loved him. I saw your profile online, the happy posts, the pictures, all that shit … and then I saw you agonizing over his grave and I felt terrible for you, and I felt like it was all my fucking fault and I wanted to make it better for you somehow, but yeah, I felt jealous too. And if that makes me sick, then I don’t fucking care.” He puts his hands on my face, forcing me to look at him. “But most of all, I just wanted you. Just for me. That’s all. I just wanted you and me together.” Tears form in his eyes, his face so full of defiant pain that it physically hurts me to see him this way. My heart is cracking, breaking open with every word, and I don’t know if it will ever go back together again. “I still want that, Tabi,” he whispers. “I want us.”

“I don’t know what us is.” Saying those words to him nearly rips what’s left of my heart to shreds, but it’s true. I’m more lost and confused now than I was when I met him. I can’t deal with the games anymore.

“We’re what we always were. Nothing has to change. You’re still you and I’m still me. I want everything we talked about.”

I pull his hands off my face. “You’re the one that killed my husband,” I say lowly. “That’s who you are to me. How the hell am I supposed to live with that? How can I look at you?”

More pain shrouds his eyes. I want to comfort him but I’m rooted where I am. I can’t move, or touch him. I cannot even meet his eyes.

“I know I did. I killed my friend too, and I killed my daughter. The most precious thing ever to be in my life. I live with that every day. I can barely look at myself.” He closes his eyes and hangs his head. “I can’t apologize enough, Tabitha. They’re gone. If I could take it back or change it, or let them live and let myself die, I would do it in a heartbeat.”

I blink back the tears that threaten to come again. I don’t want to cry, or feel pain anymore. I am overwhelmed once again with grief, and now regret on top of that, and I’m not sure I can get through this a second time. Not without him: my rock.

“Vandal …”

“Without you, I wouldn’t want to live, Tabitha. That’s where I was when we met. I wanted to die, just like you did. I was slowly trying to kill myself. I was drinking all the time, and taking pills, cutting myself, torturing myself. I got kicked out of the band. My life was destroyed, and I didn’t give a shit about any of it.”

He puts his finger under my chin, forcing me to look into his eyes again. “My daughter was the sun in my life. She brightened my days. And I lost her. But you … you became the moon and stars in my dark nights. Your love is like a fire that seeps into my soul. I can’t lose you, too.”

I reach for his hand and link our fingers together. “I do love you, Vandal. You became my world. I just can’t live with this guilt right now. I need some time. Please. I really need to get out of here. I’m taking your car so I can get myself home. You can come get it tomorrow.” I drop his hand and quickly move away from him.

“What? No.” He grabs my arm. “Don’t go.”

/>

I pull away from him and grab my purse, his car keys and my cell phone. Everything has gotten out of control and gone too far, and it’s my fault just as much as it is his.

“Tabitha, this is your home,” he says desperately. “You don’t leave. We have an agreement. Did you forget?”

I stare up at him, knowing full well what card he’s trying to play. “You always said I could leave whenever I wanted if I had to,” I remind him. “Do you need the safe word to get this through to you? Red. Okay?” I say, my voice controlled. “Everything stops now. All of this.”

His mouth falls open and his eyes widen. “Don’t do this.” He stands and paces the room, eyes wild like a caged animal, pushing his hands through his hair. “You don’t know what you’re doing. Just stay here and calm down and we’ll talk.”

“No. I can’t do this. I’m leaving. Do you want the necklace back? Give me the key and I’ll take it off.”

He looks horrified at the mention of me doing such a thing. “Tabi, this isn’t like a regular break-up. A lot of emotional damage can be done when a Dom-and-sub relationship is severed. You know that, right? We have a responsibility to each other, and the commitment we made when we started this.” He halts pacing and stops in front of me. “Please don’t take the necklace off. You have to understand how much you wearing it means to me. Once you take that off, you’re telling me we’re over for good.”

“Just stop!” I yell, startling both of us. “I’m leaving. Please, if you do love me, let me go. I have to get away from you. You don’t understand what this is doing to me. I need to go think.”

He falls onto the couch and puts his head in his hands in defeat. “I love you, Tabi. If you need to leave, then go. Just fucking go.”

I head for the door with Sterling chasing after me, and my heart snaps again as he stops next to me and tilts his head up. I bend down and rub the soft fur under his chin. “Goodbye, little guy. I’ll miss you and your cuddles so much.” He rubs his head into my palm, his purr echoing right through me.

“Then don’t leave us,” Vandal mumbles from the couch, his head still down.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I run out the door, slamming it behind me. I don’t look back.

As I throw open the garage door and get into the car, the tears start in full force. As I throttle the car down the street, I know that Vandal is still sitting on the couch, fighting the urge to drink.

I’ve lost everything. Again.

Vandal

My heart’s pounding double time, my head is throbbing, and my hands are shaking as I stumble to the bathroom and find my bottle of Valium and down a few before taking out the pack of razor blades I bought a while ago. Holding one between my teeth I yank my jeans off and then start the slow slice on my thigh. My eyes close and I exhale slowly as the blood drips down my leg and onto the tiled floor. The scent of her perfume and shampoo seep into me as I revel in the swarm of emotions that are assaulting me.

I dig my cellphone out of my jeans pocket and call her. I’ve never called her before, but I’m glad I took her phone when she was sleeping weeks ago so I could get her number and program mine in hers. Just in case something like this happened.

It rings and rings. Voicemail.

I redial.

Rings. Rings. Rings. Rings. Voicemail.

Fuck!

I send a text.

Answer your phone. You are still mine.

I bandage my leg and clean the blood off the floor. Crashing back on the couch, I redial again. Rings. Rings. Rings. Rings. Voicemail.

Fuck! I need to hear her voice. Her real voice, not this fake, happy voicemail voice.

I hit redial nonstop for an hour. I’m drowsy from the Valium but I fight falling asleep. I should go after her but she’s got my car, and I can’t ride my bike on these dark roads, especially all fucked up on Valium. I could have Lukas drive me to her house, though. I quickly call Lukas.