Chapter 129 Trauma
Verena
Daxton rose slowly to his feet, guilt dancing across his face and in the blue of his eyes. “What are you doing outside?” His voice was low and held a tiny hint of surprise.
A knot of emotion tightened inside of me as I took in the face of the man whose eyes were heavy with exhaustion. Josh had said he barely slept at all, staying by my side through the night while holding my hands.
How did everything twist so badly? One moment I was getting ready for the fundraiser, and the next I was found in Kian’s house—drugged and completely wasted.
Kian…
I should have known that pathetic fool was the one behind the email. If I could remember clearly, back when we were still in Spain, he would always hum the name Tamara whenever he lurked around me. To an annoying point where I had to block that grating voice with my earbuds.
Irritation rolled down my spine and If I could turn back the hands of time and take a trip to the past, I would have never gotten involved with Kian. Or, I should have listened to Atlas and stood behind him when he wanted to stop the wedding.
I shoved those infuriating mix of thoughts and regrets to the back of my mind, fixing my gaze on the one that mattered alone—Daxton.
His body grew taut as he inched closer to me. “You were waiting for me?”
The first name I whispered when I opened my eyes was his. When nurses and doctors surrounded me and confusion flickered through my mind, he was the only person I asked about.
So, where was this coming from?
“Yes…” I nodded. “I was waiting for you to walk through the door,”
Daxton’s eyes softened like warm honey, a soft smile slipping onto his face and in microseconds, he’d crossed over to me in a stride, grabbing the back of my head and pulling me into his chest.
He wrapped his other hand around me, warmth enveloping me as I breathed in his perfume and drowned in it.
“You don’t hate me?”
My heart stopped for a moment. When I read the details in that email, I’d been shocked and at a loss for words. It was totally normal for me to react that way. Human.
But what I felt in that moment was far from hate.
I wrapped my own hands around him. “No. I don’t,”
I would only believe the word that left Daxton’s mouth, not Kian—an unapologetic liar—whose aim in life was to drive us apart.
Daxton’s heart picked up its beat and I smiled at the rhythm. “When you left home, I thought…” he dragged in a breath and released it slowly.
I pulled out of his embrace. “I’m not leaving Daxton. I only left because it was too much for me to process and I needed space to think,”
A slow smile tugged at his mouth as he gripped my face, and kissed me.
Silence ensconced our walk back inside as rain poured down from the sky. Daxton stiffened next to me, his jaw sharp and tightened as he stared ahead.
“About that email…your mum,” I paused as he turned his head to me. “Is it true?”
For a heartbeat, I wondered if I should’ve asked.
But at the same time, it was the absence of the truth that gave Kian the freedom to run with his bullshit narrative.
He closed his eyes briefly. “I had a very chaotic childhood. There’s a lot I still need to unpack,” he said quietly. “When I tell the whole story, I want that idiot and Neil to be there too,”
“I know this might sound unusual, but I started cooking when I was barely ten. My mum taught me everything I knew. That day, she was starving and I had to do something. She was heavily pregnant and was too weak to stand,”
“We weren’t allowed to leave the house so when I saw there were none of those bodyguards around—scary men— I stepped outside for a moment… and completely forgot about what I’d left on the stove. By the time I came back, the house was already in flames.”
His voice lowered.
“My mom was in the basement. She didn’t make it out. I still hear those screams…” his breathing became ragged. “They haunt me every night,” Daxton’s voice broke at the end.
“I’m the reason it happened. She died because of me,”
My heart softened with pity and even if I didn’t know the details, I reached out to touch his arms and opened out my arms for him to crash into.
So much guilt.
So much trauma and Kian had the audacity to take advantage of it?
It all ended now. The moment I’m discharged from the hospital, I would be going straight to the police station to press charges against him. For spiking my drink and taking me to his house—no, abduction.
I didn’t care if I was found in a day. It didn’t change the fact that he abducted me.
For kissing me with those filthy lips while I was unconscious. Disgusting. For deleting my vlog and the stunt he pulled with my social media account.
It was over for him.
At this point, Daxton and I would only have peace if Kian completely disappeared. This would only end when he was locked behind bars and I would see to that.
Daxton jabbed the straw into the strawberry milk as I took it from him and sipped. He gazed at me with affection in his eyes, a slow flush of pink creeping up my cheeks.
I cleared my throat. “I plan on pressing charges against your nephew,”
The light in his eyes faded. “No,” he said firmly.
My mind swirled with confusion as I raised a brow. “What do you mean no?”
“It is a waste of time. The cops will do nothing. Remember what he did during the divorce, how almost all the law firms turned you down because he pulled some strings? He will do it again,”
My stomach tightened as the memories came back to me.
“Yeah…so would he just get away with it?”
Daxton reached for my hand and pulled me into his lap. “Do you trust me, Verena?”
I stared into his eyes and nodded.
“Then don’t do anything. Leave everything to me,”
I pushed down the doubt that crawled up at me. “Kian wouldn’t bother us anymore?”
He brushed the hair away from my face and tucked it behind my ear. “You won’t even see him again. Just trust me, Verena,”
Daxton ran his thumb over my lips, down the elegant line of my jaw. “And in the meantime, I’ve a good news,”
My eyes perked up. “Good news?”
“Perhaps you were mistaken about everything. I spoke with the doctor, and she mentioned something about uterine scarring. There is still a uterus intact, and if we begin treatment, maybe we can have children soon or in the future.”