Chapter 16: The Illness

The first thing Vara felt was heaviness. His body will not talk to him, as if his bones were filled with stones and his skin has become very tight to enter. Her eyelids trembled against the light pressed on her, and a soft groan survived her throat, before she felt that she was awake.

The room fainted for lavender and antiseptic. He confused him. She remembered Diana's smile, the way her words wrapped like poison around Raymond, and she tried to fight against it when she was sharp in her head. After that - only blackness.

Now she was again in her room, lying in bed. Silk sheets were cold against her fever skin. She swallowed, pained with drying in the neck, and only then saw the figure sitting next to it.

Raymond.

He was not reading or typing on his laptop as usual. He was not ordering the floor or barking on the phone. He was just sitting. Her hands were resting on her knees, her back leaning a little towards her, as she was waiting.

His eyes were found, and Vera's chest tightened. His face was calm, but was not empty - something soft was hovering under his normal facade. He saw unconscious shadows under his eyes, as if he was not sleeping.

"You fainted," he finally said, his voice less. "The doctor said that it was stressful."

He licked his dry lips. "Stress," he repeated, bitter words on his tongue. "It seems about right."

There is a break between them. The wind looked thick. She hated weakness in her body, the way she could not sit without the inclination of the room. She hated that Diana had seen her collapse, perhaps enjoyed it. But above all, she hated that Raymond was here - to close her presence in every breath to close her enough - and she did not know if she had to push her away or let herself bend towards her.

He suddenly stood up, restless, then put water in a glass and brought it to him. He placed her near her lips, but Vera shook her head.

"I can manage."

"do not be stubborn."

His pride broke out, but his hands trembled very much to prove him wrong. He directed the glass gently, and he let her go, although her eyes never left her. Cold water slipped around his neck, reducing drying, but it was a calm care in his movement that bothered him the most.

When he set the glass down, he whispered, "Why are you here?"

His gaze fell. "Where else should I be?"

That answer should have been cold, but it was not. It increased weight, as he himself does not know why he cannot leave his side.

Vera came back to the pillow, closing her eyes for a moment. "You don't want to see me this way."

"I know," he said. His voice had become soft, just barely. "But I want to."

His eyes flew again. He quickly looked away, as if he was not to accept it. His jaw was tight, his hands were flexing on his sides. Raymond was a person made of walls, and he saw just one crack.

There was some pain in him. She wanted to ask her why. She wanted to ask for what she expects from her hope, gratitude, obedience? But his strength stumbled, and his anger gave way to something more delicate: how empty he felt when he punished him with silence, how much his memory hated him and he needed him in the same breath.

"Raymond," she mumbled, her voice barely audible.

He looked at him, and for a heartbeat he did not see a cruel billionaire, who had chained him on this contract, but a man who was fighting with ignorance, something heavy that was behind his eyes.

The door opened before she would say anything else.

Diana.

His heels clicked on the floor, his perfume was moving ahead of him as a declaration. She took a tray with soup, smiling sweetly.

"Oh, Vera," he said, "You scared all of us. I felt that my poor brother was going to lose his mind with anxiety."

Raymond's shoulders became tight. Vera removed her face, bile was rising around her neck. Diana set the tray on the nightstand and bent close, brushing hair with false tenderness from Vera's forehead.

"You must relax," Diana whispered, her smile sharp. "Don't bother yourself with anything else. We will take care of you."

Vera's skin crawled. He forced himself not to recur, but his pulse intensified. She could feel the poison under Diana's honey tone.

Raymond finally spoke. "This is enough, Diana."

Her sister looked at her, her eyes were wide with innocence. "I'm only helping."

"I said a lot." His voice bites through the room, less but uncontrolled.

Before he masked again, something slipped on Diana's face. He squeezed Vera's hand slightly, then straightened with a beautiful shrug. "Very well. I will leave you two."

When she left, the silence was heavier than before. Raymond's jaw was tight, his hands entered the fist. Vera could see the storm inside her, but she did not say anything.

Her chest was dreaded and tightened with a mixture of clarity. Diana was working against her - Vera felt her in her bones. And now, more than ever, he needed to be careful.

"Raymond," he whispered again, his voice unstable. "Don't ... don't let him be foolish."

His eyes closed on his, fast and unplan. For a long time, he did not speak. Then he sat back, until he could see unconscious lines on the corner of his eyes.

"I know what my sister is able to do," he said softly. "But don't think that if you do not trust me, I will not protect you."

The words cut, but under them Vera felt something else: a warning arose not only with doubt, but of fear. As if faith was dangerous for him.

His eyelids became heavy again, tiredness was pulling him down. But when she moved towards sleep, an idea came to her mind - Diana was not just planning, she was plotting something deep. And if Vera did not find evidence, Raymond's delicate care can be shattered.

She slept with her presence next to her, confusing her heart even more.

The room was quiet, very calm. The kind of calm that is cool, it presses on your chest and works like breathing. I lay there in a wide bed, my body still weak, my mind restless, playing again and again in the last few days. The unconscious lamp in the corner threw a yellow cycle of light, but most of the rooms drowned in the shade. I could listen to the stable of the night out of the night - the chirp of cricket, sometimes a car going away from the car - but inside, the silence felt heavy.

I felt that Raymond went to his study. He stayed on my side for hours, quietly, his face was unpatented, although at once, I caught some flicker through him. It was not anger, not the way I knew him. It was soft, almost like anxiety, but whenever our eyes were found, he quickly buried it. When he left, I felt both relief and a vision that I did not want to accept.

I closed my eyes, when the voice came, I was trying to drown in sleep. A soft click. Door.