A Dominant Fallen (A Dominant Series Book 2) (2 page)

I feel a bit of relief flood me.

“And no one knows where she is?” I inquire with a cocked, inquisitive brow.

“No one’s been able to get in contact with her. We keep texting, but we’ve only received one back from her. That was yesterday. It said to leave her alone, and she would contact us when she was ready…I wouldn’t have come to you with this if I wasn’t desperate. I was hoping you might know where she went since no one else does…I actually went as far as to call your fucking ex-sub, but she didn’t have a clue.”

I’m floored.

“My ex-sub? Gabrielle told you about me?”

“Not every little dirty detail, but she explained what you had, and it isn’t hard to put two and two together…I personally don’t give a flying fuck what you do behind closed doors. I only care that you make her happy, which you did…Do you know where she is?”

I think for a moment. There are only two places that come to mind, my house in Seattle or…Then a conversation from the night before the incident comes back to me. I know exactly where she would go. If she isn’t there, I don’t have a clue.

“I think I know where we could find her,” I tell him, “but I want to go alone.”

Chase throws his hands into the air, rapidly shaking his head.

“I wouldn’t ask to come anyway. She doesn’t want to see me right now.”

I rise, snatching my black wool coat off the hat stand, and stride toward the door. On my way out, I say over my shoulder, “Thanks for being honest with me.”

“Thanks for not killing me,” he retorts.

I nod and rush out the door.

I
stride out of the main lobby of The Huntsman into the madness of downtown and the mild chill of May. I walk with purpose across the street, through the Art Deco lobby, and into a waiting elevator.

She has to be here.

It seems to take forever. I feel as though the walls are closing in on me, the air becoming thick until it’s nearly impossible to breathe. My heart’s pounding, sweaty palms trembling, and mind racing. Finally, the doors open and I rush out, taking in a huge intake of air.

I stride up to the front door, yanking my keys out of my coat pocket. I shove the key into the slot and unlock it, swinging the door open wide and striding through.

“Gabrielle? Are you here, angel?” No reply. “Come on, baby. Where are you?”

I walk down the hallway, calling her name again, but again there’s nothing, not a whisper. The door to the playroom is shut and I open it without hesitation, praying she would be on the other side. She isn’t. There’s only emptiness.

I let out a long breath, defeated, and turn around, ready to head for the airport.

Barely Surviving

E
very second of my pitiful, broken existence is excruciating torture. I can’t sleep, concentrate at work, or breathe. I’m a shell of who I once was. I fight to get out of bed in the morning and dread the moment I lay my weary head down at night because that’s when I think about him most. I lie in the dark, staring blankly at the ceiling, picturing him. I think about our final moments together. The look on his face just before I exited those doors, and his life, flashes through my mind constantly. The memories that hurt the most are the good ones because it reminds me of what I had and lost.

When I shut my eyes, he fills my dreams. Though, they are far and few between. Mostly, I have the same reoccurring nightmare. The darkness is all around me, I’m lost in a black haze. I can see a blinding light in the distance, and Hunt’s voice beckons to me from its incandescent depths. I run toward it as fast as I can, and just as I’m about to reach the light, just as he comes into view, emerald eyes ablaze, he disappears. He vanishes, taking the light with him, leaving me in the pitch black, alone and crying.

The night I left Hunt, Chase came searching for me back at my apartment, scuffed up and furious. He was pissed about letting Dante get away. He told me that he and Liam went after him, but he had managed to evade them. When he noticed the state I was in, he asked why I had left Hunt’s, and I explained the whole thing in whimpers and broken words, wrenched by the flood of tears pouring out of me.

He made me a stiff drink to calm my overwrought nerves. Once I calmed down a bit, mostly because I was smashed, I proceeded to tell him everything. I mean, I went way back. I told him all about the extent of Nicholas’s abuse, my relationship with Hunt, Dante’s attempted rape and his threats. The only thing I didn’t mention was Hunt’s past, because it wasn’t my place to divulge. I finally got the opportunity to talk with Chase, and it got real.

I talked forever. His golden eyes were wide and glued to mine the whole time. He would take swigs of his whiskey when he heard something particularly unpleasant, especially when I talked about Nicholas. He got up a few times to refill his glass.

When I finished, he sat there for a while, thirty minutes at least, staring vacantly at me. I just stared back. I didn’t know what else to do. Finally, he spoke with tears streaming down his cheeks, apologizing for not protecting me from Nicholas or Dante, and I assured him there was nothing he could’ve done.

Once
he
calmed down, he asked about Hunt and our relationship. He asked about our bedroom escapades, arguments, and break-up. I answered honestly, the booze working as a truth serum of sorts, and I told him everything. By the time I was done, we were wasted off whiskey and my confessions.

“Jesus, kid,” he uttered. “I hate to admit it, but he sounds like a great fuck and a pretty amazing boyfriend. I mean, he has issues, and he’s kinky as shit, but who isn’t nowadays?”

I breathed a sigh of relief and weakly giggled. I was sure he would tell me I was fucking crazy, but he didn’t.

“What are you going to do if they catch Dante?” he inquired.

“I don’t know. I want to be with him, but it’s all so damn complicated, and I can’t think straight,” I replied.

We talked and drank the night away.

It’s been four awful months since that fateful night, the hardest of my life. I bide my time reading, crying, and hanging out with friends. I’ve actually spent quite a bit of time with Brooke. She knows what it’s like to love Hunt and leave him. We’ve become rather close, spending much of our time talking, watching movies, and drinking…a lot. I split the rest of my free time with family and friends.

I keep asking Chase and Maya what happened between them, but I still can’t get an answer out of either one. I can’t even get them in the same room together.

Poor Jules, my bestie, struggled with her brother’s, Nicholas, death and stayed locked in her old bedroom at her parents’ home in Snob Hill. I’d brought her a few batches of my chocolate chip muffins, which she always took appreciatively. Then, about a month ago, she started becoming her old self again. She actually seems genuinely happy.

Sloan is dating Shane from the nightclub, which eats up most of her time, but she still manages to set some aside for me. She keeps dragging me out to clubs and bars. I dance and drink, which distracts me for a minute, but I feel empty. I usually end up leaving early and head home to wallow in my misery.

Drunk crying isn’t pretty.

I forgave Walker for his indiscretions, and we began spending time with one another. He keeps hitting on me, and I keep turning him down, but he makes me laugh. He attempts to woo me by bringing me flowers, chocolates, and trinkets. He’s even sent me a few of the paintings from his exhibit that last night with Hunt. One being the very intimate portrait named, Gigi Bared. I can’t stand looking at myself so I packed them up and sent them off to my parents’ house for storage.

We go out to dinner, movies, museums, and picnics in the park. The newspapers and paps still follow me around, though they don’t as much as they did in that first month after Hunt, but they still buzz about. They’ve written about how close Walker and I have become and speculated our possible relationship status.

Gabrielle Hyde, ex to Damian Hunt, CEO of Hunt Industries Inc., gets cozy with Walker McQueen, her up-and-coming artist boyfrien
d
.

They haven’t tried to confirm it, and I have yet to deny it. I don’t like them fabricating stories to make a buck, but it’s best to have it out there, considering Dante is likely to keep an eye on me to ensure my end of our deal is held up.

I
t’s a mundane Monday morning. I’m sitting in my office, gawking at the ceiling and wondering what
he’s
doing. I think this has been the worst part about the breakup, avoiding him at work, knowing he’s right above me all day, the overwhelming urge to run up and see him. I want desperately to be in his arms, loving him, but I can’t. I made a promise to myself to do whatever’s necessary to protect him, and it’s a promise I don’t intend on breaking.

Suddenly, my cellphone goes off, startling me out of my thoughts. I check the screen. It’s Maya. It strikes me as odd because she never calls while I’m at work. I pick up and place the phone against my ear cautiously.

“Hello?” I answer warily.

“Gabrielle…” she replies in a weak voice.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, concerned by her tone and use of my full name.

“It’s Dad.”

“What? What’s Dad?”

“He…He.” I hear her whimper, and then my mom comes on the phone.

“Ellie, darling, your father…he’s gone.”

“What do you mean gone? Where?”

“Darling…your father died this morning,” she whispers, tears wrenching her words.

I can’t comprehend what she just said. I’m not sure I heard her correctly. How could he be dead? I saw him last night. He was fine.

“No…No, you’re lying…Please, tell me you’re lying,” I beseechingly whisper.

“I wish I were,” she cries.

“I…He…” I sputter and burst into a steady flow of tears. I leap out of my chair with the phone firmly planted to my ear and grab my bag out of my desk. I rush out of my office, slamming the door behind me, and head for Chase’s office toward the front. When I get there, he’s in the middle of a call. He must sense me because he glances up from the mess on his desk and tilts his head to the side when he spots the anguish on my face. I stare at him from red, puffy eyes, shaking my head back and forth, fighting the urge to scream and freak out.

“I’ll call you back. Something came up,” he says into the phone and hangs it up.

“Ellie, what’s the matter?” he asks with a creased brow and alarmed golden eyes.

“My dad...” I cry, holding the phone up to him. “Mom,” I murmur, and even with my mumbled, broken speech, he seems to understand instantly. He jumps up, snatching his blazer off the back of his chair, and strides over to me.

“Come on. I’m taking you to your mom.” He takes the phone from me and places it against his ear. “Elizabeth? Yes, we’re on our way. Where are you, doll…? Okay. We’ll be there in less than an hour. Bye.”

He hangs up the phone and shoves it in my purse. He wraps an arm about my shoulder and guides me out. We make it to reception, where Kat eyes me enquiringly.

“Ellie, are you okay?”

“Family emergency,” Chase answers her. “Inform Olivia we’re leaving and take messages for us. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Sure, of course,” she responds with concern written across her face. I nod faintly, tears soaking my cheeks, and head into the waiting elevator. When the doors shut, Chase whips out his phone and swiftly punches in a few numbers. He smashes it to his head and waits.

“Who…are you…calling?” I brokenly inquire.

“Hunt,” he replies simply.

“No. Don’t,” I plead.

“Quiet. I’m not going to tell him about you, though I probably should. The guy has a right to know why you left him, the right to make up his own mind about it.”

“Please, don’t.”

“I won’t. Trust me.” He squeezes his strong arm about my shoulder, giving me a reassuring smile, and I nuzzle my heavy head into his side. “Yes. Hello. My name is Chase Cahill. I’m calling to speak with Mr. Hunt regarding personal matters. Let him know he’ll want to take this call. It’s urgent…Thank you. Yes, I’ll hold.”

He taps his foot and lets out a long sigh, decompressing from the strain of the situation. He perks up.

“Yeah, it’s me. Listen.” The doors open, and we walk out. “Hold one second…Gabrielle, could you give me a moment. I’ll meet you at the front doors.”

I stare nervously up at him, and he gives me a look as if he’s not to be questioned. I turn to walk away, slowly, so I can still hear what he’s saying. Once he turns away from me, I creep back toward him.

“I’m guessing this morning…I wanted to inform you of your business associate and Gabrielle’s absence at work…I think they have enough on their plates…Not good…I don’t think that would be wise…Yeah, I will…You’re welcome…I swear I will. Bye.”

He hangs up and turns back.

“I asked you to wait by the doors, kid… Come on. Let’s get you to your parents’ house,” he says, throwing his arm about my shoulder and guiding us out the doors.