‘The sob stories, tears … games … vulnerability … fear. I saw the person I thought you were, your
reputation—Nothing else. I saw someone trying to manipulate me, Cam … You wouldn’t be the first
woman to use abuse as a way to make a man soften towards her.’ He looks away, almost as though
he’s ashamed to utter the words to me, and it kicks me in the gut like a mule. His words slice at me like
a dull knife straight through my soul, and I flinch in rage as I get exactly what he means.
He thought I was playing him, and all those times he broke me to pieces, was all an act to get under his
skin.
‘Believe that I was abused, or that I was traumatised by what you did to me? Fuck you! … You have no
idea what I have lived through. What men have done to me. How dare you!! HOW FUCKING DARE
YOU!! And you’re a liar! If you ever really cared about me, then why did you keep pushing me until you
broke me, and then stood there and let me break my heart at your feet? Why did you leave me in that
hospital to rot when you thought I almost died, and try to pay me to go away, to get out of your life?’ I
yell at him, enraged, overwrought and emotionally unstable all at the same time. I unclip my belt as
soon as I realise we are pulling into the car park of the club already, no longer able to stand to breathe
the same air as him. It must have only been minutes from here to the restaurant.
I don’t wait for him to stop either, just push open the door to jump out, not waiting for answers to my
ranting when I cannot conceal the sizzling energy coursing through me. He slams on the breaks so I
don’t roll out of a moving vehicle with the rapid exit I make, and we screech to a halt as my feet hit the
tarmac.
‘Cam!’ Alexi yells after me, but I am already out of his car, walking off at speed, bubbling like a volcano
and hating him with every single part of my soul; Tears running down my face and wounded to my core.
Nothing he could have said would take away the depth of heartache I feel at his hands.
‘Cam?’ Alexi calls after me and then is drowned out by the roar of his car as he parks it at speed in the
nearest space and I spin in alarm. Fear gripping me instinctively with the violent sound his engine
makes and know he just sped across the park in anger.
‘WATCH OUT FOR FERAL!’ I screech, eyes scanning the lot hysterically, thoughts of him running him
over and killing my little scruffy beast hit me hard, and then almost crumble as I sigh thankfully when I
catch sight of a little ball of ginger fur curled up beside his food bowls from earlier; where I left him. It’s
like a wash of cold water as the sheer relief sweeps through my blood.
Automatically I move to him, to protect him from the insane psycho and his overly expensive machine
and pause in sixth sense terror as something grips me coldly with how he looks.
Feral is where we left him, curled up peacefully like a small ginger ball of fluff, right beside his food …
except … he’s napping.
Out in the open, in daylight, exposed—something he never does.
My heart skips a beat and I completely pause. Mind numbing over as my breathing hitches in terror.
‘Cam?’ Alexi crosses the park towards me, still agitated and has that same angry tone as he catches
up to me, but I hold up a hand in desperation to silence him as I edge forward and move closer to
Feral. Something deep inside me telling me that this is wrong … something isn’t right. I can barely find
the strength to take the steps forward. He doesn’t move or lift his head as I approach.
Alexi obeys—Falling still and quiet as he moves to me much less aggressively and comes level with
me, turning to look at what I am.
Feral always senses you coming.
He always runs and hides before you get within five-feet, but he’s not doing anything except laying
there as still as a statue. Nothing at all is moving, not even the little rise of his body as he breathes.
My heart starts beating out of my chest painfully, blood rushing through my ears deafeningly. All
previous rage forgotten as a cold icy panic grips me inside and I move even closer, crouching slowly,
slightly afraid to touch the soft ginger fur. My hands are trembling noticeably.
Alexi stops me with a hand on my upper arm that pulls me back gently, steps in front of me a little and
leans in swiftly past me as he nudges him softly with outstretched fingertips, a tad roughly as though
sensing what it is I think I see.
Feral doesn’t move, and somewhere inside I already know what that means. I knew the second I got
near him … That eerie coldness around him that only comes with death; that same quiet aura of
sucking the warmth out of the air around a body that I felt when my mother died at my feet.
My head doesn’t want to say it but my heart knows as it breaks in two, and I burst into instant heartfelt
tears.
Feral’s dead … his affection this morning was his way of saying goodbye—For giving him a better end
to his days where he was fed and cared for in a small way. He knew he was leaving me.
I fall apart. Tears hitting hard and my body sags weakly as I completely crumble and lose the ability to
stand.
Alexi straightens fast and pulls me against him, wraps his arms around my fragile frame and tugs my
face in against his throat as he consoles me and becomes my stability. Hands keeping me locked tight
to that massive body, and even though we are fighting, and I hate him, he gives me what I need but
didn’t know I did. He cradles me, cuddles me in, wrapping me up tight, sheltering me as though I’m a
small child in need of protection, and holds my skull against his neck with a strong hand in the back of
my hair—Wrapping around me fully.
‘He was old … it was his time. He died knowing you cared, Cam.’ he hushes me against my temple,
enveloping me in his solid embrace, and I can do nothing but cling to him hopelessly—burying my face
against his chest as I cry my heart out—completely broken over such a stupid thing. My arms lacing
around his wide torso and I screw my eyes shut to stop the tears flowing free. I can’t do anything
except sob like a broken child while my body is wracked with a pain bigger than me.
Alexi holds me tight and says nothing more, just lets me crumble for the first few minutes before the
calm of shock grips me and I start to softly whimper instead; Still held against him, trembling and
inhaling his smell, his aftershave, as it gives me a sense of calm. The feel of his clothes and muscles
tight against me as he grips onto me in a non-sexual embrace that holds me up. He’s being my
support, even if minutes ago we were yelling at one another. It all adds to that sense that it’s going to
be okay. It hurts but it’s bearable when I’m held safe like this.
We are so screwed up.
‘I’ll have Jackson and Mico come out and take him to be cremated. You can have his ashes if you want
them.’ Alexi sounds like he always does, unemotional and just cold, but his suggestion isn’t so. He’s
offering me some sort of console in a way he knows how. Maybe he doesn’t feel anything about Feral
dying, or even know how to sound like he has any empathy, but I do, and he’s trying to be what I need
him to be right now. He’s acting as if I matter. He’s trying to show he can care, in his own way.
It’s not the man I know … It’s the man who took care of me when I was in shock that night Santagato’s
man tried to take me—the man who took care of sick Camilla when she spiked a fever. It’s the man
who climbed into my heart, despite myself, showed me hints of someone else and enabled the sadistic
in him to ruin me.
I tip my chin up, feeling him move back, so I can look at him and try to dry my tears as I swallow down
the mess going off inside of me.
‘He was just a stupid cat … it doesn’t matter.’ I have to force the words out, through garbled sniffs as I
try to push him away, ashamed at my heart-wrenching reaction to losing something that wasn’t even
mine. He just catches my hands and pulls me into his arm once more as he slides it about my
shoulders, turns us, and starts guiding me to the building carefully. Treating me like fragile china as he
makes sure I’m steady on my feet and leads me to the door without letting me go.
I give in and let him, needing his strength right now as my heart bleeds out of my body, and I cannot
bear to look back and see Feral lying there alone.
‘Don’t leave him like that!!’ I jerk my face up in alarm, voice crushed with the depth of pain I am in,
panic slicing through me at that thought, and he turns to me swiftly. Complete exhaustion swimming
over me with the torrent of feelings I cannot control.
‘I won’t … Soon as you are inside and settled I’ll get them out here. I won’t leave him here. I promise.’
Softly spoken, Alexi traces a tear from my cheek and wipes it away before it drips from my chin to meet
the dampness on my bodice from the rest. Just adding to how broken and vulnerable I feel. I can’t bear
to look back and see Feral once more … left curled up in the sunshine as though he’s merely asleep.
Another slicing stab to my heart bites me and I clutch onto Alexi with my arms as though he holds the
key to making it stop consuming me darkly.
It’s easy to forget who he is when he’s being like this and I lean in against him and bury my face in his
chest once more, pulling his arm around me to blot out how much this hurts. I’m not akin to this kind of
grief, not even when my mother died, and I don’t know how to handle it. It’s thrown my whole mind and
soul into chaos.
Alexi gets me inside, the sun changing to dark gloom and I have to blink to adjust to the change. Still
attached to him and needy, even though my self-preservation is kicking in and telling me to let him go. I
shouldn’t be wrapped in his hold like this. It only confuses things, and I was the one who told him to
never touch me. Even though, here I am, holding on for dear life like he is an anchor to the shore and
all because of a bloody cat.
The visual of that little stupid furball in my head sets me off again and he just pulls my face against him
once more, cradling me from sight as he takes me to the lift, past milling security, and finally deposits
me inside. He stands me in the corner, so I can prop up against the wall, and gently strokes back my
hair away from my soaked cheeks and uses the hem of his t-shirt to dry my face. Exposing muscled
abdomen as he does so and it stops me crying for a moment to make me giggle absurdly—such a
weird thing to do or use as a hanky and definitely not an Alexi thing. He strokes a thumb across my
cheek tenderly and tilts my face to look at him. There isn’t much in that face, but a softness in his eyes
and a slight hint of gentle in his manner.
The loss of him around me is sobering and I blink around at my surroundings as it comes into view;
tiredness rising up with the overwhelming emotions that hit me all at once. I feel like I have been body-
slammed by a brick wall.
‘I’ll just be a minute.’ He lets me go, turns around and pushes the door button so it opens again and
disappears for a moment, leaving me here alone. I lean back against the internal wall and try to bring
some calm back to my frazzled heart. Wiping my still damp face and sniffing back the dumb tears that
just keep falling.
I push Feral’s little one-eyed face out of my brain as another buckling pain hits me in the chest and
shove it down with all that has ever hurt me in life. Bringing back a little composure and wrapping my
own arms snuggly around me to give myself the comfort he has removed. I feel cold and start
shivering, unsure how to combat all these crazy bodily reactions I am having. I just feel so
disconnected.
Alexi reappears as the doors start to slide shut, catching it with his palm, seconds before closing, and
pushes it back to come inside. He looks me over for a second before hitting the fourth-floor button and
hesitates about coming close again. Seems he is coming upstairs with me anyway and I’m not sure if I
want him to come back and cuddle me. I shouldn’t be letting him console me this way.
He doesn’t attempt to touch me this time, standing facing me, maybe second-guessing the likelihood I
need another hug and leans against the wall, mirroring my pose. I just stare at the ground between us
and take long heaving breaths to silence my own sobbing. Calming even while my soul fills up with icy
emptiness and my head moves into the surreal state of dreamlike quiet that follows shock. I have
suffered it many times, so I know the expected aftereffects like the back of my hand.
‘You must think I’m really dumb … crying over a stray animal I barely knew,’ I utter at him, unable to
look up and a little ashamed that I showed this side of me to anyone, let alone him. This is not how I
react to things in life. I never cried over my own mother so why would I cry over a back-alley moggy
that was about as pleasant to me as toothache? There is something wrong with me. The only time I
ever had this type of extreme over reaction and heartbreak was the night Alexi broke me.
I am starting to feel detached as the numbness overtakes me and instead a sweeping sense of
complete tiredness moves in. It douses all else out and makes me so heavy I just want to lie down. I
know this is normal after something shocking you, and maybe I need to take a nap and let the surreal
exhausted phase pass. Fighting the fatigue as it weightily falls over me like a fog.
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