Fighting Destiny (25 page)

“What could have
possibly happened to you, to make you turn on me like that, Darius?” asked Candasee shaking her head in disbelief. “It was as though I didn’t know you anymore!”

Darius took a
nother deep breath trying to steady his emotions. Just seeing her pain had caused a knot to form in his abdomen because he knew that he’d hurt her badly.

“I was born in Scotland as you know and my family was unusual because it was inter-racial. My father’s family hated my mom and they treated her badly
but they also hated me. So although I had a pretty good relationship with my dad in the beginning, things changed as I got older. He was under a lot of pressure to provide for us because his parents cut him out of the family trust saying he had to divorce Mom to regain access.

He did love my mom I guess at some point
, but he grew to resent her and me more and more as the years went by. He soon started drinking and seeing other women right in front of my mother’s face. One day, I suspect he came to take me away from my mother to go to his family home and my parents fought. I remember trying to stop them by jumping between them and it was then that she appeared.”

“Who appeared Darius?” questioned Candasee urging him to get to the point.

“My father managed a troupe of performers and the woman who entered then was the lead dancer. It wasn’t the first time I saw her with my father. I walked in on them making love in his office before and I realized that day again that he was cheating on my mom. They were the reason why she was always so sad and depressed. Of course mom lost it again and they fought and eventually he left saying that he didn’t want me anymore. He kissed that woman right in front of us and that was the last day I saw him before hearing that he died from alcohol poisoning when I was fourteen. We didn’t go to the funeral because we couldn’t afford it, so it was the last thing I saw him do and I can’t remember him much any other way. I have held onto that resentment all these years.”

Darius bowed his head and rested it on Candasee’s lap willing her to say something, anything in response
to give some sign that she understood him.

“Darius
please look at me!” said Candasee gently, her heart now hurting after hearing all he’d said. He didn’t move immediately so she slipped off her shoes and slid down to the floor to join him. She had a pretty good relationship with her own father and really looked up to him for his guidance and example. He was the one who taught her about being authentic and expressive and the talks she had with him were very important, in fact they still were.

“I
can’t imagine how traumatic that must have been for a ten year old boy to experience his father in that way. I’m sorry to hear that happened to you,” she exclaimed. She now understood why Marianne encouraged her to just listen and see what the problem was! Post-traumatic stress could arise in anyone given the right trigger and apparently she was his trigger back then. All the emotions he’d buried as a child resurfaced when she decided to dance full-time. He never closed the issues with his father because those were literally his last memories of him.

“I don’t know how we could have approached us differently
back then either, we were just both so angry!” she continued.

Darius raised his head slowly finally allowing Candasee
to see his eyes now filled with his own tears.

“We have a chance to approach things differently now, Candee! We can talk this out! I have always loved to see you dance but I had this irrational fear with it that we would become a dysfunctional marriage and I would become
unsuccessful and a louse just like my drunken father. I felt like I was betraying my mother’s trust just like he did with her. It was crazy then and I am asking you to forgive me Candasee, please forgive me!” he asked with a ragged voice. It was never you!” he said.

“
Why didn’t you call me or try to tell me this sooner? Why did you have to wait until I’m involved with someone else and everything is so complicated now?” exclaimed Candasee in despair. “I’ve made promises to Nathan!”

“I have been turning this over in my mind for a
while now. But I just didn’t know how to say I wrecked our marriage because of a childhood fear. I felt you wouldn’t take me seriously and I didn’t think I deserved you either. But I missed you more and more and nothing I tried to do even began fill the gaping hole in my world that was created when you left me,” he said.

“All this time, I was working at convincing myself that you forgot your roots and that you were a liar who manipulated me into marrying you and now that I am wrong about that I don’t know where that leaves me. I feel as though I am in limbo! What are you really expecting me to do? Just pretend that the last two years never happened and uproot my new life and come back to Derrien Island with you?” she asked incredulously.

“I know that I should have told you something sooner and it is presumptuous of me to assume that everything could just go back to how it was between us. But can you blame me for at least hoping
it could especially knowing now how you feel about me still?”

“We can’t just erase the past like that
Darius! We’ve both moved on and other people are involved now!”

I know it’s messy but life is not always clear-cut Candasee.
I’d finally decided to come to you pretending it was just about surprising you for your birthday! But fate brought you to me instead! Not even I could’ve planned this so perfectly. Haven’t you asked yourself why out of all the hotel’s Solange chose mine and that I also needed what your academy had to offer at the last minute. This is destiny working with us Candasee, can’t you see it?” he asked.

“Maybe destiny is helping us to finally close this issue between us so that we can both finally move on
too Darius. Aren’t you forgetting something here about Solange and the fact that we both have new people in our lives?” she repeated emphasizing the ‘
we
’ in her question.

“We?” he asked quizzically.

“I saw Solange kiss you that night, so it is obvious that you
two have strong feelings for each other!” said Candasee, reliving the pang of jealousy she experienced that night on the walkway.

“Exactly that, y
ou saw her kiss me but I never returned the kiss. I don’t know what came over her to act in that way! In fact, I told her I couldn’t see her that night. Solange and I are just friends! Sometimes when I needed a date to a business event I would take her with me, but that is all. If something was going on between Solange and me why have I been pursuing you? She’s not the one here with me tonight!”

“
Darius I didn’t come here with you either. You aren’t my date. I came for Marianne so you were always free to bring someone else!” she insisted stubbornly.

“There is nothing free about my heart when it comes to you Candee and there hasn’t been anyone that I’ve fallen in love with since we separated
and that’s the truth,” said Darius earnestly.

Bristling at the cool implication behind his words about her own relationship with Nathan
she got up from the floor and sat on the lounger again.

“
Well, obviously you have been leading her on because she seems to be in love with you! Nathan said you asked her to come and meet you yesterday which happened to be the same day you wanted to see me. I thought you were playing some kind of game.”

“
Nathan? What the hell does he know about my life anyway?”

“I saw you with her with my own eyes Darius,” said Candasee.

He looked so puzzled that she almost applauded his performance.

“You came upstairs to see me yesterday?” he asked incredulously.

“Yes I did and your guard told me to go straight in and that you were expecting me. So I did, and I saw you kissing Solange. I just left the document Nathan told me to drop off on your secretary’s desk and I left quietly.”

“Why didn’t you say something, I waited
the entire evening for you to show up,” said Darius feeling about ready to explode. “When have you known me to be the game playing type Candasee?”

“Are you telling me I imagined
seeing that?”

“No
, I did ask her to come by but it was because I wanted to make sure she was clear on the fact that nothing could ever develop between she and I. I was taken aback when she kissed me that first night. I gave her a hug when she was just about to leave and she kissed me again. Candasee I’m telling you the truth.”

“I don’t know who to believe because Nathan said that she told him you were seeing each other for a long time now.”

“I don’t get what Nathan could possibly know about my life and what is this about a document? Why were you dropping off a document? I asked you to come so we could talk in private.

“
Nathan said you were making a huge deal about needing the audition listing that night but he couldn’t deliver it because he had to finish a session and he had a meeting afterward. He asked me to bring it to you instead.”

“I never asked him for anything of the sort Candasee and I never received any documents.”

“But he said...” said Candasee struggling to understand where she went wrong in understanding all of this.

“He lied to you Candasee, he lied to make me look bad and I think he set you up and it looks as though Solange was in on it too.
I am not having a relationship with her. I admit to taking her along to business functions sometimes for the company but that is it. I can’t get you out of my mind or out of my heart and no other woman even appeals to me remotely.”

Candasee was s
tunned by what Darius was saying especially as she realized that she’d decided to have sex with Nathan only after feeling she couldn’t ever trust anything Darius said again.
Could Nathan really be capable of deceiving her like that?
He was hiding something about Eve and he was laying the blame on the Academy board and on his family. Who could she really trust?

“
Candasee listen to me, I can’t control who loves me or who wants to spread vicious rumours about me either. All I know is that I love you and I want you. I want us and the life and family we had. I want to have that family we were planning for! Don’t you remember any of that?”

Candasee recalled how they both wanted to have two children and were planning to start their family just before they began fighting
. Having Darius’ children would’ve been a dream come true back then.

“Darius, this is
all really hard for me to process and digest right now. I can’t believe that Nathan would lie to me like this. What would he have to gain by lying?”

“He knows that you still love me Candasee and he is willing to do anything to keep you”.

“You don’t even know him Darius,” retorted Candasee defensively.

“I know enough about him to know that he has secrets that he is probably in way over his head
with. I don’t want to see you get hurt anymore that you have already.”

Candasee stood up and
walked over to a window which overlooked one of the gardens below. “My life literally feels as though it is falling apart all around me!”

“
Do you really love him Candasee?” asked Darius, holding his breath unwilling to accept her answer but still needing to know.

Candasee considered her words carefully before replying as thoughts of
Nathan came to mind and also how wounded he was when she left him earlier that evening. Was he really the manipulative liar that Darius was making him out to be? This afternoon was the first time he hadn’t been gentle or loving toward her. Did she really know him?

“Yes, I do love Natha
n and I don’t want to hurt him! He is unique, loving, thoughtful, passionate, a good listener, a talented artiste and a savvy businessman. He really loves me and he wants the best for me,” she said finally feeling extremely conflicted.

Darius winced inwardly hearing Candasee speak so openly of another man’s qualities especially when it was so clear that he wanted it to be him she was describing.

“Do you still feel anything for me? Do you love me Candasee?”

Her entire life was
now in a giant tailspin facing the reality that she’d allowed herself to love two men who were as different as night and day. She could finally admit it to herself, yes she still loved Darius. In fact, she probably always would.

Darius stood and followed Candasee over to the window where she stood and turned her
around to face him.

“Do you? All I’m asking for is a chance for you to consider me worthy of your heart again!” he said.

“Darius, yes I still love you and that fact is something I could never understand...how you could get so far under my skin that I can’t shake you off. God knows how hard I’ve tried...”

She never got a chance to finish her words before Darius claimed her mouth as his own.
That was all he needed to hear! Drawing her lower lip deeply into his own mouth he teased her lips in the way only he knew how. After years of making love to this woman he knew exactly what drove her crazy and what stoked the flames of desire in her in seconds! He cupped her face with his hands and pulled her closer as he tasted and relished the softness of her mouth.