Stoned (The Stone Series) (65 page)

“I don’t know how you’re going to get in the building without him knowing. He has people looking for you all over Connecticut and here. The building is swarming with security and he keeps calling or coming down to check if I’ve heard from you. I know he doesn’t trust me to tell him if I hear from you especially after I sent Alex home, who’s pissed off at me now, thank you.”

“I’m sorry, Park and thanks but please lie to Damian for me if he calls again. What goes around comes around. What does he expect? I don’t want to see him.”

When I get to the apartment building I am found out by Pedro who says he has to alert Damian that I am in the building but I know if I run it should still give me enough time to get to Parker’s apartment before he can. It doesn’t matter though; once he hears I’m here he’ll use his code to let himself into her apartment if she won’t open the door. I’ll have to lock myself in the bathroom to avoid a face to face.

I head to Parker’s and warn her that Damian will be barging in within the next three minutes and sure enough before I can even ask her if I can stay with her for awhile, until I figure things out he’s banging on the door. I give her a sad smile and nod for her to open the door as I turn and head to the bathroom. I close and lock the bathroom door. Damian enters the apartment yelling my name and Parker must point to where I am because he starts pounding on the bathroom door demanding that I talk to him.

“Sydney, come out and talk to me, baby. Please, you have to believe me that I had no idea Samantha was your mother. Her last name is Blake; I never thought…I didn’t know. I swear to you, I didn’t know. It doesn’t change anything with us; don’t let this change anything with us. I love you; I’ve only ever loved you. God, baby I was so scared when I didn’t know where you were.”

“Damian, I’m very drunk, very tired and I don’t want to do this right now. I’m safe so go home. I don’t want to see you. I’m staying with Parker tonight.”

He’s quiet for a second then I hear his curse, “Fuck, Sydney. Baby, I can’t leave you like this. Don’t make me leave you when you need me. Let me take care of you, let me make everything okay.”

I start to cry, soft sobs turning into uncontrollable gulps.

“Jesus Christ, angel. Don’t do this. Let me in. I can make it better.”

“I wish you could but you can’t unless you can go back in time and NOT FUCK MY MOTHER” I yell through the door. “Now go away, it’s over” I cry. “I can’t be with you.”

“Sydney, don’t say that. I will not accept those words from you.”

“Knock it off, Day. Stop being my fucking Dominant, I’m not your submissive!”

“I wasn’t, Sydney. It’s not about that right now. This is about us. We can work this out, baby. Please don’t leave me. I love you. We can make this be okay. Please, I can’t lose you, I need you. Sydney please don’t say you are not mine, you are and you always will be.”

“There is no us anymore and I am not yours. Now leave and leave me alone. Please. I cannot do this. We will never work. I was stupid to ever think that we would.”

Before Damian can respond I hear Parker talking to him then I hear his voice soften as he says; “Listen to me. I am going back to the penthouse to give you some space to think things through but we are not over. I will trust Parker to take care of you for now. I will be back in a few hours to check on you. I love you, Sydney. I love you” he says and then there’s quiet. I curl on the cold floor and cry myself to sleep, telling Parker to leave me alone too; I can’t talk about any of it to anyone, not even her.

For the next week, I think it’s a week, I don’t know, I can’t keep track of time. Like how I lost all time when Damian pushed me under into my subspace I have no concept of time now. I sleep a lot but I am never rested. I hide under the covers, savoring the dark and trying to get warm. It’s only mid-September but to me it feels cold enough to be January, it’s a cold deep down to my bones; a chill that covers my body and it won’t go away.

Even in sleep I am in turmoil. When I finally make my eyes close and I drift to sleep all I see is him, I dream of him, the most realistic dreams I’ve ever had. Some are of us and things we did, dinner at his place, kissing in the elevator. Other times I dream of our future and we’re together and happy, other’s I’m alone and scared. The worst dreams are the erotic ones. I feel him touch me, stroke me between my legs; it creates an ache that I can’t rid myself of. An ache that is present in my sleep and wakeful hours. I dream of him being kinky, spanking me and tying me up. Never do I feel fear during those dreams, but I feel alone and empty when I awake.

I can’t allow myself to slip into my mind, to think about what has happened but I can’t think about anything else either. I want to talk to Parker and Drea but I can’t find the words to explain this to myself much less someone else. I want to hear from Drea and ask how Damian is. I wonder if he’s moved on or if he’s as wrecked as I am. He’s come to check on me a few times but he’s left when Parker has turned him away. He’s not fighting for me so I can only assume he’s done with me, moved on, welcomed sub number twenty-two into his bed already or maybe now that he’s been reunited with my mother he’s gone back to his submissive days.

I continue to spend my days and nights burrowed under the covers of the bed with tissues scattered all around me. The worse times are when I can’t control the sobbing and they make me wretch until I vomit and shake. I am ugly and my face is blotchy and red, my hair is stringy and greasy, I don’t remember the last time I showered or brushed my teeth. I think about Damian constantly. His face is a sight burned into my memory, his body is a feeling seared into my skin. I smell his scent with every intake of breath; I smell it in my pores. I taste him on my lips. I hear his commanding voice and his laughter; I see his wicked grin when I close my eyes. I miss them all. I am going out of my mind.

I continue to refuse to see or speak to Damian, fighting my overwhelming need to see him, allow him to hold me, give him a chance to explain and make it all right. He resumes coming to Parker’s apartment to see me saying that he’s tried to give me space but that he can’t take being away from me. I run into the bathroom or the bedroom and lock the door, refusing to face him. He begs, he cries but I still refuse him. I don’t know which is worse, him coming and me refusing to see him or if he was to stop coming by again, confirming my growing fear of abandonment. I feel lost, abandoned, like I am grieving from the death of a loved one. I don’t eat, I make Parker get me wine in large quantities and I still barely leave my bed long enough to shower. I feel bad; Parker’s been great, giving me her bed and putting up with Damian’s constant pleas to see me. Thankfully she’s that kind of friend, one who is there for me in any way that I need her to be.

When’s Damian’s not here trying to talk to me not an hour goes by that I don’t pick up the phone to call him then put it back down again. I am out of control but without his guidance I can’t seem to recalibrate myself, I’m a mess, barely functioning. It hits me that I am truly alone, my relationship with my mother can never be repaired; my relationship with Damian is ruined, I can’t face my father or my friends, I can’t work.

On the morning of the eighth day, or maybe it’s the one hundredth, I’ve lost count, Drea comes to Parker’s and begs me to talk to her, she refuses to leave without seeing me. I agree after she swears Damian is not with her. She tells me that he has a huge meeting with the top executives from each of his companies this morning and promises she’s alone. I come out of the locked bathroom and Drea hands me a cup of coffee and offers me a firm hug.

“Sydney, we need to talk. I know you don’t want to hear about my brother right now but he’s a mess and you look just as bad. Now sit down and please just hear me out, I’m concerned about both of you” Drea begs.

She begins by telling me that she understands that Damian is a complicated man and that it’s difficult to be with someone so wealthy and in the public eye all the time. She says she can’t imagine what it must be like to be with someone as controlling as he is and then add to that the sexual dominant aspect, she admits it would take her down. She admits it sounds like the cards are against us.

The tears pour out of me, coating my face and I allow them to. Drea sits on the bed and holds me while the rain out of the bedroom window matches the tears falling from my eyes. We cry together, the sounds coming from me scaring us both, too painful to hear. I tell Drea that I feel the damage done is too deep to repair, it is hopeless and I am helpless. I am an empty shell.

“Syd, this is a mess, especially with your mother, I agree but you need to hear me out, please.” She leads me into the living space and I agree to listen as we curl up on the sofa together. I wrap myself up in a down comforter, still unable to get warm. It’s as if without Damian’s arms around me, without his body next to me, I am freezing inside. It’s as if I am dead and no longer have any body heat but being without Damian feels worse than being dead. I can’t help but think that if I were it’d be better, at least I wouldn’t have to endure this pain any longer.

Drea tells me that Damian hasn’t shaved in days, he barely showers and he can’t sleep. She says he won’t even go into the master bedroom and that he tried to destroy the playroom blaming his sexual lifestyle with my leaving. “Thank God Mac was there, I like getting my freak on in there” she jokes with me trying to elicit a smile out of me, it doesn’t work.

She goes on to tell me that he’s been either drunk since I left him or in his gym working out but he hasn’t gone into work until today. She says that he finally showered for the meeting today but only because she insisted that he must. She says he ran an electric razor over his face, it didn’t do the trick.

“His employees are going to think that he cracked, he looks like a crazed lunatic. He misses you so badly he told me it feels like a wound to the chest. He said he feels split open. He loves you, Sydney.”

“I know he does. I love him too.”

“He told Mac that you respond to him in bed like the best submissive he’s ever seen but in your everyday life you have this fire about you, it reminds him of your hair, he said, he thinks that you challenge him and for the first time in his life he wants that from a woman, from you. He said it’s one of the traits that make him love you so much. He said you’re beautiful and intelligent and sassy sometimes. He told Mac for him, it’s only you, it’s only ever been you and only ever will be.”

I listen through my sobs then Drea goes on to tell me about their childhood growing up and how their parents were distant and never put them first. She says she had it better than Damian did because she had him and even at eight years old once she was born he always put her needs first. “He came to every dance recital, every play I was in. I’d look out in the audience just hoping for once that my parents would be there but it was always Damian sitting in the seats with Tate and Brook. At least I had him. He was a big high school star on his baseball, basketball and football teams but my parents were always too busy to make it to his games. Tate and Brook went to as much as they could but they aren’t his parents. I know it doesn’t make it right but I think when he went to college and your mom, well, I think he needed someone to take care of him, you know? But he didn’t feel worthy of real love, she probably sensed that and used it to her advantage. I’m not saying he wasn’t at fault too but Sydney, honestly he never knew she was your mother.”

“I know. I couldn’t see that when it all happened but I do know that now, it’s all I’ve been thinking about” I admit.

“Sydney, are you truly in love with him?”

“Yes, I’m more than in love with him. I’m possessed by him, I’m obsessed with him and I am dying without him. I know how pathetic that must sound to someone as sophisticated and strong as you but it is truly how I feel.”

“I’m not any more sophisticated than you, I certainly am not as strong and I understand how you feel. I know not everyone understands why I want to be with someone older than I am. I hear what people say when we’re out. I hear the whispers about me needing a “daddy” and maybe I do. Hell, we all know what my dad is like but I love Mac, no holds barred.”

“I get it Drea and if it matters at all I think you and Mac are great together. I think Day and I are too.”

“Then what’s the problem? When you think about it nothing has really changed. You knew who he was sexually when you got involved with him, you knew about his relationship with an older professor. He didn’t know you at the time when he was involved with her and he didn’t know she was your mother at the time he got involved with you any more than you did. He’s not with you because of her; he’s with you because he is as possessed and obsessed with you as you are with him. I see it when he looks at you, when he talks about you, hell; I’ve seen it in his eyes when he’s just been thinking about you.”