Page 69 of Downfall

“I expect peace.” Darius says more forcefully.

I can’t stand here. I can’t process this. And yet I’m trapped. Surrounded. I can’t escape because my family as always are blocking my way.

Darius dismisses us all but he calls me back so I’m forced to stand as everyone filters past. I don’t look. I shut my eyes, barely keeping my composure until the room falls to silence and I know we’re alone.

“Rose.” He says softly. I jump at the proximity of his voice. At how close he is to me. He’s right in front of me, practically nose to nose with me.

I look up at him and he’s frowning with concern.

“I wanted to see you.” He says. “I wanted to check on you.”

“I’m fine.” I murmur.

“No you’re not.” He says. “I can see you’re anything but.”

“Why did you do It?” I ask, my voice more angry than I meant.

“You mean Roman?”

“No.” I snap. “The inquest. I know that was you. I know you got the coroner to ask all those things about Paris. About us.”

He sighs, his thumb brushes against my cheek, and I jerk like I’ve been shocked. He keeps doing that I realise, he keeps touching me in ways that could easily be mistaken for loving gestures.

Except I don’t find it loving, I don’t want it to be.

“I did it for you Rose.” He states. “I wanted people to realise what you’ve gone through. I didn’t want you to pretend any longer, to be burdened by it.”

I shake my head as my anger unfurls more. “It wasn’t your secret to spill.”

“Perhaps not.” He replies. “But it was necessary nonetheless.”

I shut my eyes. How dare he make that call? How dare he think he can tell the world my private life without even consulting me?

“If you let me I would take care of you.” He murmurs.

“I don’t need that.” I reply. I’m done being everyone else’s plaything. Done being viewed as simply a puppet to manipulate and control.

He sighs. “Fine.”

I step away to the refuge of the door but at the last minute I turn back. “Do you know what you’re doing?” I ask him.

“With Roman?” He says.

I nod.

“I do.” He smiles with no doubt what he thinks is meant to be reassurance.

I shake my head. There’s no reply to that. None whatsoever.

Roman

Icouldn’t look at her. Not then. Not in front of all of them.

So I let my eyes skim over her existence like she meant nothing when all I wanted to do was pull her in, check her for hurts, and never let her go.

Except that’s my heart talking not my head.

I can’t do that. Even if we were alone, even if it were just us in that room, I couldn’t touch her. I couldn’t do anything until she fixed the chasm between us. This chasm she created.

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