24. Sienna
SIENNA
T he memory of Damian telling me that our marriage is still temporary has rung over and over in my head every few minutes since I walked out of his room.
Just temporary.
The words still echo in my head as I sit in the library, a book open in my lap that I haven't read a single word of.
Adam is napping upstairs, exhausted from a morning spent running around the estate grounds with two of the younger security guards who've taken a shine to him.
He's adapted easily to this new home that we've been thrust into.
Before long, he’ll have to get used to somewhere new, all over again.
I hear footsteps in the hallway and tense, but they pass by without stopping. Not Damian, then. I've become an expert at recognizing his walk—quick, purposeful, slightly heavier than the others. The sound of a man who's always ready for a fight.
The man I fell in love with.
The admission hits me like a physical blow, even though I've been dancing around it for days, even before I tied myself up in his bed and laid myself bare to him. I'm in love with my husband. My temporary husband, who made it crystal clear that whatever this is between us has an expiration date.
I feel like a fucking idiot.
Of course he doesn’t love me. He’s made a point of telling me, over and over, that I’m young. Innocent. Not tough enough or jaded enough or whatever it is that he would need from a woman that he’d keep in a world like the one he lives in.
I never thought Valentina seemed all that jaded, but maybe I don’t know her well enough. Maybe I don’t know anything about any of this, and I’ve been stupid enough to believe I could fit in.
I close the book with more force than necessary and stand up, pacing to the tall windows that overlook the gardens.
I see Valentina walking through the rose beds, saying something to the gardener as he follows her down the path.
She looks peaceful, content, like a woman who knows exactly where she belongs.
I’ve never been really jealous of anyone until now. I wish I knew where I belonged. I never have, and now I don’t know if I ever will. I feel like when I leave, a part of me will always be stuck here, with Damian.
I jump when I hear his footsteps. Before he can pass by the library, I drop the book, hurrying out into the hall.
I want to see him—to say something to him, even though I don’t know what will come out of my mouth yet.
Not to beg him to let me stay… but something.
Something to make him realize what he’s done to me, even if he didn’t mean to.
He looks more disheveled than usual, his hair messy as if he’s been running his hands through it, dark circles under his eyes. He stops, looking at me warily, and I bite my lip.
“Damian.”
“Sienna.” He says my name carefully, and I wish he wouldn’t, not like that. I want to hear him whisper it, moan it, bite it out angrily, but not this… not that calm, cold way of saying it that makes it seem like we’re strangers.
It’s like all his walls are up, and I don’t know if I want to bring them down again, but I… I don’t want to leave things like this, either .
“Where are you going?” I ask as lightly as I can, and he frowns.
“The Russos,” he says flatly. “I don’t want to tell you more than that. You don’t need to know.”
Something sharp jabs in my chest. “Because I’m a temporary wife?”
He flinches. “No. Because I don’t want you to know things that could put you in danger.”
I swallow hard. “Damian, you don’t have to protect me. I mean, you do from the Russos, yes, but the rest of this, the everyday…”
“This isn’t everyday,” he says tightly. “And it’s not that simple, Sienna. Nothing about the situation is simple. And when I said?—”
“What?” Anger flares sharply in my chest, the hurt rushing back.
I hadn’t planned to argue with him, but looking at him, cool and collected, my chest aches as if I’ve been stabbed.
“That this is temporary? That it means nothing?
That seems pretty simple to me, Damian. It seemed pretty simple when you were fucking me.
It seemed pretty simple when you were telling me how much you wanted me, how perfect I felt.
But the moment I showed you that I cared about you—really cared—you couldn't get away fast enough. "
He flinches like I've slapped him. "You don't understand?—"
"Then explain it to me." I take a step closer, trying not to breathe him in, to smell his cologne and sweat and remember how it felt to have his scent streaked across my skin. "Tell me why you're so determined to push me away."
For a moment, I think he's going to turn around and leave, refuse to answer me. But then his shoulders slump slightly, and he looks at me with something that might be defeat.
"Because I'm not good enough for you," he says quietly. "Because you deserve better than a man who kills people for a living."
I feel like all the air has been sucked out of me, like I can’t breathe for a second. My heart aches for myself… but also for him, hearing that. Hearing him say that he’s not good enough, when I know that he is.
Everything he’s done for me proves it, everything he’s tried to be.
“You’re wrong,” I say softly. “And that's not your decision to make. "
"Isn't it?" His voice gets harder, more like the man who saved me from that warehouse. “I said I’d protect you, Sienna. That includes from myself. From a life that you’d regret, eventually. You’ve seen me kill people. Kill the men who had you in front of that camera that first night. Men in that warehouse. And I’ve done worse.
I’ve tortured men. Killed more than I can count, now.
I’ve hurt them in ways I could never begin to tell you.
And I’ve never felt guilt or shame or regret for any of it. ”
I know he expects me to be horrified, disgusted. Instead, all I feel is a fierce gratitude that I have a man like this to protect me. That I never have to fear that he’ll falter or fail. That he’d never let anyone who laid a finger on me live.
"Good," I tell him bluntly, meeting his gaze, and his eyes widen in surprise.
"Good?"
"Good," I repeat, stepping even closer. "I'm glad you killed them. I'm glad you felt satisfaction. Those men would have hurt me, would have used me, would have sold me to the highest bidder. And you stopped them. You protected me."
"You don't know what you're saying."
"Don't I?" I reach up, touching his chest, and I feel him flinch. "Damian, your violence isn't something I'm afraid of. It's something I'm grateful for. Because that violence, that brutality you hate so much about yourself—it's the reason I'm alive. It's the reason my son is safe."
He pulls back from my touch, shaking his head. "You're twenty-two years old. You should be dating college boys, going to parties, living a normal life. Not tied to a man who?—"
"Who what? Who makes me feel safer than I've ever felt in my life?
Who looks at my son like he's precious? Who touches me like I'm something worth worshipping?
" I laugh, but there's no humor in it. "You keep talking about my age like it makes me some kind of child.
But I wasn't too young when you had me bent over your bathroom sink, was I?
I wasn't too young when you fucked me while I was tied to your bed until I screamed your name. "
A muscle in his jaw ticks, and I can see the war going on behind his eyes.
Desire battling with guilt, need fighting against what he thinks is right…
and something else, too, something that I’m afraid to let myself see, because it looks too close to what I feel, and I’m afraid to let myself believe that he feels it, too.
"I feel guilty about that," he says finally. "I struggle with it every day, Sienna. About taking advantage of you, about the power dynamic?—"
"Stop." I cut him off, my voice fierce. "Just stop. You didn't take advantage of me. I wanted everything we did together. I asked for it, begged for it, and you know what? If I’d said no, if I’d told you to stop, you would have.
Because, despite what you think about yourself, you're not a monster.
You're a man who's capable of incredible gentleness, incredible control. "
"Sienna—"
"I'm not done." I'm on a roll now, all the hurt and frustration of the past few days pouring out of me.
"You want to know what I think? I think you're scared.
I think you're so used to being alone, so used to thinking of yourself as unworthy of love, that when someone actually feels something for you, you panic. "
The word hangs between us like a live wire, and I see the exact moment it hits him. His face goes white, then red, and he takes a step back like I've physically struck him.
"You don't love me," he says, but his voice lacks conviction. He draws in a breath and looks at me, his jaw tightening. “Even if I wanted to let this be real, Sienna, even if I thought I wasn’t dooming you to a world you wouldn’t want to live in once the shine wore off, there are things you don’t know about me?—”
“I don’t care about the violence?—”
“Not that.” He cuts me off. “I can’t have children, Sienna.”
It feels as if all the air has been sucked out of the room.
The memory of the scars I felt on him comes back to me in a rush, and it all makes sense now.
I hadn’t asked because I wanted him to tell me on his own, even though I suspected it might be something like that.
Now he is telling me… but not the way I’d hoped.
Not confiding in me , but throwing it in my face as yet another reason we can’t be together.
I see his pulse beating in his throat, and I can tell it was an effort for him to admit it. To talk about something so personal. I feel guilty for dragging it out of him, but at the same time… I’m glad he told me. I just wish the way we were talking about all of this was different.
“There was an incident, when I was younger,” he continues, his voice tight. “After I came to work for Victor Abramov. I was beaten, badly. I can’t have children. I could never give you more…”
“I don’t care.” The words come out choked, and I fight back the tears burning at the backs of my eyes at the thought of someone hurting him, of Damian, much younger, broken and alone in a hospital room, hurt that terribly.
I wish I could go back to that moment, hold him, comfort him.
But I was a child then, probably. “I thought you might not be able to, the first time I felt your scars. It never mattered to me, Damian! That would never matter. I have Adam. I have a beautiful, perfect little boy who already adores you, who, by the way, has warmed up to you like I’ve never seen him with anyone.
And if I wanted more children in the future, there are other ways.
You are what matters to me, not the idea of children that don’t exist yet and that we haven’t even talked about before this.
But Damian, that's not what this is about, and you know it. "
I can see the conflict written all over his face. Part of him wants to believe me, wants to accept what I'm offering. But the other part, the part that's been hurt and broken and taught to believe he's worthless, is fighting back.
"You don't understand what kind of life you'd be signing up for," he says desperately. "The danger, the uncertainty. The fact that any day, someone might put a bullet in my head and leave you a widow."
"You think I don't know that?" I laugh, and this time, there is humor in it, albeit dark.
"Damian, I've been living with uncertainty my entire adult life.
I've been a single mother working multiple jobs, never knowing if I'd be able to pay rent, never knowing if my son and I would be homeless.
At least with you, I know you'd move heaven and earth to protect us. "
"That's not the same thing."
"Isn't it?" I reach for him again, pressing my hand against the front of his chest, and this time he doesn't pull away.
"You want to know what scared me? Dancing at that club, never knowing which customer might follow me home.
Living in that apartment with locks that barely worked, wondering if someone would break in while we were sleeping.
Raising my son alone, knowing that if something happened to me, he'd have no one. "
I see something shift in his expression, and I press on.
"But with you? I've never felt safer in my life. My son has never been happier. He asks about you when you're not here. Did you know that? He wants to know when you're coming home, if you'll go swimming with us, if you’ll teach him how to dive again."
"Sienna—"
“We could be something,” I whisper. “We could all be something, if you’d just get out of your own head, Damian, if you’d just?—”
He steps back again, once more pulling away from my touch. “I’ll ruin you,” he says quietly. “This life, this world, will change you. I can’t let you be infected by it. I don’t want you to suffer or hurt because of me.”
I stare at him, and I know that he sees what he’s doing, whether he wants to or not. “Then why are you doing this?” I whisper, and his jaw tightens.
“I’ve already told you why. I can't give you what you want." His voice is flat again, emotionless, hard as stone. “You need to drop this, Sienna. You’ll be happier when this is over, and it will be, very soon. I’m going with Konstantin to deal with Russo now, and when I come back?—”
“You’ll divorce me.” My voice sounds hollow, and I can see that his eyes look the same way, his expression flat and dead as if he can’t allow himself to feel anything at all.
“We’ll talk about it when I come back. Make arrangements?—”
“For me to leave.”
Damian’s shoulders drop. “Yes,” he says, and I feel my chest hollow out, my entire body aching with the need to not believe him .
But I can see the sincerity in his eyes, hear it in his voice, and I know he thinks he’s doing what’s best—which somehow makes it all so much worse.
As if he knows what’s best for me, and I don’t.
As if he really, truly believes that I could never love a man like him.