Chapter 3

It was the damn Luke again. Grayson hated him with every fiber of his being. He was so angry that he could burst. His thoughts were interrupted by the hiss coming from behind him. He stopped and realized that he was still holding onto Iris’s hand in a tight grip. He immediately let go of her hand as if the touch burned him. Iris was looking at him with wide eyes, which were grey in color and so big. Her hair was flowing across her face, small bangs framing her round face. She was still staring at him like she was scared. He realized that her eyes were not focused on his scar, rather they were fixed on his eyes as if she could see through him. He quickly looked away, suddenly feeling vulnerable.

They reached his car and the driver quickly came out to open the door. Iris was standing outside looking confused and nervous, fidgeting with her hands and looking around.

“Are you going to stand there forever?” Grayson grumbled under his breath, his deep voice making it difficult for Iris to understand what he was saying.

“What?” she asked him, still looking around.

“Are you not going to get in?” he spoke louder this time.

“Y-yes”, Iris stuttered before getting in behind him.

The atmosphere inside the car was quiet and heavy. Iris was uncomfortable, curled into herself. She peeked at Grayson from the corner of her eyes. The man seemed lost in his thoughts. Iris took this moment to see him properly for the first time. His face looked older than his age, the scars making him look more serious and intense. His brown eyes were sharp and his nose was straight while his jaw was clenched. Iris was lost in her thoughts when the man turned his head towards her making her look away in alarm. Her heart was suddenly beating faster and she subconsciously put a hand over her chest to calm down her raging heartbeat.

Grayson felt her gaze before he saw it. She was observing him, closely and intently probably judging his scar. He felt vulnerable in front of her. As soon as she turned away, he was lost in his thoughts again. His thoughts were interrupted when he felt her presence.

She was here. He closed his eyes as soon as he felt her fingers tracing his scar, touching it softly and gently. He felt her breath on his face while her eyelashes almost touched his. Her fingers moved along the slope of his nose before they stopped at his lips, gently tracing the shape. His breath hitched and he almost sobbed at the familiar feeling, making its way into his wounded heart and giving it a new life every time. He was so lost in the feeling that he forgot to breathe and he felt like he was falling deeper into the pit of darkness when two hands reached out to him.

He was having a panic attack. Iris heard heaving sounds and immediately turned to Grayson. His eyes were closed and he was hyperventilating. She tried to call his name and shake his shoulders but in vain.

“Hey, calm down. G-god what d-do I do?” Iris panicked. She took her seat belt off and moved closer to him.

His eyes were still tightly shut and he was clutching his chest. Iris had no experience dealing with panic attacks and she felt useless right now. She shook him again.

“Please, open your eyes. Grayson. Open your eyes”, she was now begging him to open his eyes.

She tried to get the driver’s attention but there was a divider between them. She did the only thing she felt was right. She hugged him and started stroking his back.

“You’re okay. Please. Please”, she kept on murmuring in his hair.

Grayson opened his eyes and saw a body clinging to him. His heart was still beating rapidly and he was still panting but the warmth coming from the body that clung to him felt so familiar that it physically hurt him. He was about to hug back when he came to his senses. It wasn’t her. It was Iris. He pushed her back and looked at her in shock.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Grayson shouted at her.

“I was ... you weren’t breathing so I ... I am sorry”, the poor girl was stuttering. He felt like an idiot for scaring her but he never let anyone this close to him. He wanted to apologize but he didn’t know how to. It was awkward for him. His breathing had calmed down. He was about to reach Iris when the car came to a halt abruptly making Iris fall back as she was still on the floor of the car. He reached out to help her but pulled back at the last moment.

“Are you okay?”, he asked her. She was still on the floor sitting on her ass while looking up at him.

“Yes”, she said before moving to sit on the seat. The rest of the car ride was awkward and Iris didn’t dare look at him again.

He left the car as soon as they reached the mansion. Iris’s eyes were huge as she looked at the biggest house she had ever seen in her life. It was huge. The mansion had a huge fountain, right next to which was a pool. The house looked like a castle, with white walls and huge windows. It was a mixture of both traditional and modern and Iris immediately fell in love. It was the first time in NYC that he felt a bit at home. The mansion gave her a strange feeling of tranquility and calmness. She closed her eyes to feel the wind across her face and felt sheltered and guarded. It was a weird feeling.

Grayson was in his room. It had been a while since he came here. It was his special place, the one he shared only with her. The place where they spent special moments when they weren’t fooling around in his old apartment. The room had her scent all over it. The air in the room smelled like her. He touched the surface of her favorite table and his hands trembled. Grayson looked around his room and saw the vase on the table with fake sunflowers in it as she was allergic to the real ones. She loved sunflowers and even had a tattoo of them on her neck where he loved to leave marks. He took out the flowers from the vase and went out of his room. Standing in front of the storage room door, he contemplated for a moment. He wanted to throw them away but something was nagging at the back of his mind. Closing his eyes, he heard something.

Her.

“These are fake ones, baby”, her giggling voice reached his ears. “Yeah, I can see but I don’t understand why you love them so much”, he wondered. She left the vase on the table and came towards him where he was sitting on the bed and sat on his lap, his hands encircling her waist naturally. She hooked his arms around his neck and leaned in to peck him.

“When I was very young, my father and I went to a flower shop. He wanted to get them for my mom. I didn’t know about my allergies back then and I saw the sunflower for the first time and I pointed it towards it and my dad bought one for me. As soon as I held it up my nose to smell it, I realized two things. First, it didn’t smell as good as I expected. And second, that I was sneezing, vigorously. My dad quickly took the flower and threw it away. Thankfully, my allergy was a mild one which involved sneezing and a little rash but my father was so protective of me that he forbade me from touching the flower. I cried on my way back home. I didn’t talk to him for a whole week. The next week, we got the news that my father passed away in a car accident, and when we went to collect his belongings, there was a fake sunflower now painted with his blood. The doctors said that he was clutching the flower in his hand hard and only let go when he breathed his last breath”, she had tears in her eyes as she finished talking about it. Grayson hugged her tight to her chest.

“I still have that flower. I am never going to let it go either until my last breath”, she cried and he gently soothed her, kissing her on her head occasionally.

Grayson came out of his thoughts and realized he was clutching the fake flowers in his hand. He unclenched his hand and threw the flower into the storage room before walking away.

Iris was in the room that the butler said was supposed to be hers, looking around. The room was bigger than the house that she lived in and was well-furnished and modern. There was a bed in the left corner of the room where a window opened into the back of the mansion. The door beside the bed opened into a balcony that overlooked a huge pool. She came inside the room after locking the balcony door behind her. The interior of the room was dark and gloomy like the rest of the mansion. The walls were gray and black, and the room had no other color. The silk sheets on the bed were black and the room gave her chills. Even though she had always lived in a small house but her room was filled with colors and paintings. This looked sad. She was grateful to find a well-paid job but she had her doubts as to why she was chosen when Grayson could have the best chefs in the world. She wasn’t that great. She was lost in thought when someone knocked on the door. She turned around and asked them to come in. It was the butler.

“Ms. Smith”, he called.

“Call me Iris, please”, she said, embarrassed.

“It’s fine, Ms. Smith”, he said and she felt her cheeks burn at the awkwardness. “Umm ... is there something that you wanted to talk about?”, she asked him. “Oh indeed. We need to start the preparations for the dinner, Ms. Smith”, he said and Iris was confused for a moment because it was so late at night. “Isn’t it too late now?”, she voiced her thoughts.

“These are Mr. Valor’s orders”, he said almost robotically. “Y-yes, of course”, she stuttered a little before nodding.

The butler turned around before Iris called him. He turned around to look at her expectantly.

“Yes, Ms. Smith”, he responded.

“Um, what’s your name?”, she asked him.

“You can call me Mr. Davis”, he nodded before swiftly walking away.

Weird.

Iris washed up and changed her clothes before leaving the room to go to the kitchen. She was rightfully lost as the mansion was huge. She asked one of the staff members that was cleaning one of the rooms and she directed her to a lift and asked her to go and cook in the kitchen on the other side of the mansion where Mr. Valor lived. She must have looked confused as the woman sighed and gestured for her to walk.

They crossed a hallway that led to an elevator. They entered the elevator and realized that her room was on the ground floor while they rode up to the fifth floor.

“This floor is Mr. Valor’s floor. It has a personal kitchen specifically for him. The other chefs usually cook in the kitchen on the ground floor but he has specially ordered you to cook here”, the woman whose name Iris didn’t know pressed the number for the ground floor and the doors closed before Iris could utter another word.

“Why is everyone so robotic here?”, she whispered to herself.

“That’s called professionalism”, a voice said from behind her and Iris yelped before turning around.

“Mr. Valor. H-hello”, she said and Grayson only nodded.

“Get to work. The kitchen is to your left. I am hungry”, he said before walking away.

After preparing the food, she knocked on his door multiple times but no one answered. She hesitatingly opened the door and went to it after looking around. She didn’t see him anywhere but the wind coming from the opened door of the balcony told her where he was. She put the tray next to his bed and was about to leave when she thought that she should at least inform him.

She saw his back as she reached the balcony door. It was a little chilly outside but he was sitting on the floor, shirtless staring at something in his hand. His muscles were clenching as though he was extremely tense. There were tattoos on his arms and back but what caught her attention were the huge scars. His back was littered with them and the skin was burned and almost deformed. She gasped out loud and he suddenly turned around. As soon as he saw her, his face grew tenser.

“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?” he shouted and she almost stepped back.

“F-food”, she pointed towards the room with a shaky finger.

“LEAVE, NOW”, he screamed and she immediately ran out of the room on shaky legs.

Iris ran to the elevator and shakily pressed the buttons. She had tears in her eyes not only because he shouted at her but also because of what she saw. On his back and in his eyes. Even though he was screaming there was fear in his eyes. Fear of being seen and probably made fun of. It broke her heart to see that a proud man like him was so scared of being looked at. Of being ridiculed. She had heard stories about the scar on his face but she didn’t know the extent of his injuries. No one did. She was still shaking when she reached her room. She sat down next to the door and wept for a man she knew nothing about.