Chapter 24 Damien
Chapter twenty-four
Damien
"Take me home."
Three words. Flat. Final.
I pulled back onto the road without argument, the grocery store parking lot disappearing in the rearview. My hands gripped the wheel at ten and two.
I kept waiting for something—a sob, a scream, even the sharp inhale that came before tears. Something I could respond to. Something I could fix.
But Emma stared out the passenger window, her reflection a ghost against the glass.
Say something. Please.
Traffic lights blurred past. Red. Green. Red again. The city moved around us like nothing had happened, oblivious to the fact that my entire world was ripped apart at the seams.
"Emma." Her name came out rough. "Are you okay?"
She didn't answer.
Didn't move.
Didn't even blink.
Guilt pressed harder, settling into my ribs like concrete. I'd felt it before—after the restaurant, after the leak, after every lie I'd told myself was for her own good. But this was different.
This felt permanent. The outlook bleak.
She's going to leave.
The thought sliced through me, cold and clean. I shoved it down. Left turn. Signal. Brake. The mechanical act of driving kept me from drowning.
The penthouse came into view too soon. Or not soon enough.
I pulled into the garage, killed the engine. The silence expanded.
"Emma—"
"I'm sleeping in the guest room tonight."
Her profile was carved from stone—jaw set, eyes fixed straight ahead.
"I need to think things over," she continued. Quiet. Controlled. The corporate mask she wore for hostile negotiations.
She was using it on me.
"Can we talk about this?" I hated the crack in my voice. Hated how desperate it sounded. "Please, Emma. Just—let me explain—"
"You already explained." She reached for the door handle. "You said you'd make the same choice again. You said you'd do it even knowing I might never forgive you."
The words hung between us, accusation and acknowledgment all at once.
"I meant—"
"I know what you meant." Finally, she turned. Her eyes met mine, and for one terrible moment, I saw it all—the hurt, the anger, the betrayal.
And beneath it, something that looked a lot like doubt.
She's not sure she can do this anymore.
"Emma," I begged. "Please don't—"
"Goodnight, Damien."
She was out of the car before I could reach for her. I followed—of course I followed—but she was already at the elevator, already pressing the button, already stepping inside without looking back.
The doors closed between us.
I stood there, frozen, staring at the brushed steel like it might once again open. Like she might reappear and tell me this was just a bad dream.
She wouldn't.
And by the time I made it upstairs, the guest room door was already shut. A thin strip of light glowed beneath it—proof she was awake, proof she was right there.
I raised my hand to knock.
Stopped.
She asked for space. Give her space.
My palm flattened against the wood instead. I stood there like a fool, forehead pressed to the door, listening for any sound. Movement. Breathing. Anything that might tell me what she was thinking.
Nothing.
I wanted to break down the door. Wanted to drop to my knees on the other side and beg her to look at me—really look at me—and see that everything I'd done, every lie, every manipulation, every decision I'd made without her, had come from the same place.
I can't lose you.
I can't survive it.
I would rather burn everything else to the ground than watch you shatter.
But I couldn't say any of that. Not now. The words would read as excuses, not truths.
I pulled back. Forced myself down the hall. Into our bedroom where the sheets still smelled like her and the pillow still held the indent of her head.
I pressed my face into it. Breathed her in.
Pathetic.
I was pathetic.
And I didn't care.
I thought about her hands. She'd snatched hers back. She'd reached for the door handle, desperate to escape.
I wanted to hold them. Press my mouth to her palms. Trace the lines there and promise her I'd do better. Be better. Become whatever she needed me to be.
But she was twenty feet away and I couldn't even bridge that.
I didn't sleep.
Couldn't.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her face. The moment understanding landed.
The clock on the nightstand ticked past midnight.
Past one.
Past two.
Every few minutes, I'd catch myself straining to hear footsteps in the hall. The creak of a door. Some sign that she'd changed her mind.
Nothing came.
Somewhere down the hall, the guest room stayed silent.
I thought about the collar around her neck. The promises we'd made. The rules we'd barely started to build before everything fell apart.
I thought about the look on her face when she'd said goodnight.
Not angry.
Not cold.
Just... tired.
Like she'd finally run out of fight.
And for the first time since this started—since the lies and the audit and the careful deceptions I'd convinced myself were love—I let myself consider the possibility I'd been avoiding for weeks.
What if she doesn't come back?
What if this is it?
What if I spend the rest of my life reaching for someone who isn't there?
The questions coiled around my chest, tightening until I couldn't breathe. I welcomed it. Let the pressure build. Let it crush me.
Good.
Let it hurt.
I deserved this. Every second of it. Every sleepless hour, every unanswered question, every moment of not knowing whether the woman I loved was lying awake with hatred of me, or sleeping in peace without me.
The price of protection she'd never asked for.
This was what I'd earned.
I must have slept.
Suddenly the room was gray with early light and my neck ached from the angle I'd collapsed at. Still dressed. Still on top of the covers.
Her perfume still clung to the pillow beside me—vanilla and coconut—and for one disoriented heartbeat, I thought she was still there.
I reached for her.
Empty sheets.
I sat up slowly, blinking the blur from my vision.
The clock read 6:47 AM.
The house was quiet.
Too quiet.
I was on my feet before the thought fully formed, moving down the hall. The door was still closed. I knocked—two quick raps—and waited.
Nothing.
"Emma?"
Silence.
My hand found the handle. Turned it.
The bed was made.
Crisp corners. Smoothed duvet. Pillows arranged with precision.
She'd been awake. She'd had time to think—and she'd chosen to leave without a word. Without even a note. She'd folded the evidence of her presence into neat hospital corners and walked out like she'd never been here at all.
The bathroom was bare. Towels untouched.
I checked the closet. Her overnight bag was gone.
No.
No, no, no.
I moved faster now—kitchen, living room, study—calling her name like it might summon her from thin air. Every room came back empty. Every space echoed with absence.
I pulled up her number on my phone, fingers clumsy against the screen.
Straight to voicemail.
"You've reached Emma Sinclair. Leave a message."
Her voice.
Professional. Polished. The version of herself she showed the world.
Not the version that laughed at my terrible jokes. Not the version that sighed my name in the dark. Not the version I'd held in my arms a hundred times, feeling her heartbeat sync with mine until I couldn't tell where I ended and she began.
"Emma. It's me." I forced my voice steady. "I know you need space. I know I have no right to ask anything of you right now. But please—just let me know you're safe. That's all."
I hung up.
Called again.
No answer.
"Emma, I'm not—" My voice cracked. I swallowed hard. "I'm not trying to pressure you. I just need to know you're okay. One text. That's all I'm asking. One word. Anything."
I hung up.
Stared at the screen.
Typed a message. Deleted it. Typed another.
I'm sorry.
Sent.
The little bubble sat there, mocking me. No read receipt. No typing indicator. Only silence stretching into forever.
I called again.
No answer.
"I know you're angry. You have every right to be.
" I was pacing again, unable to stop, unable to breathe.
"But shutting me out completely—Emma, I can't—" I stopped.
Pressed the heel of my hand against my eye.
"I can't do this without knowing if there's still an us to fight for. Please." My voice splintered. "Please."
The word hung in the air after I ended the call.
Damien Holt didn't beg.
Damien Holt controlled rooms. Commanded boardrooms. Made grown men flinch with a single look.
Damien Holt was currently standing in his living room, phone in hand, begging a voicemail to bring back the only person who'd ever made him feel like more than the sum of his worst impulses.
Is there still an us?
For the first time in my life, I had no answer.
I tried Candace. Maybe Emma had gone to her—curled up on the couch, processing, needing her best friend instead of the man who'd broken her trust.
She didn't answer either.
I left no message. What would I even say? Have you seen my girlfriend? The one I lied to for weeks? The one who finally learned the full scope of my arrogance and walked out?
I sank onto the couch—the same couch where we'd eaten pizza after Sebastian's accident, where she'd fallen asleep against my shoulder, where I'd watched her laugh at something stupid on television and thought this is it, this is everything, I will burn the world down before I let anything hurt her—
But it had been me.
Not Nathan. Not the board. Not the leak or the merger or any of the external threats I'd been so focused on neutralizing.
Me.
I was the threat I should have been protecting her from.
Do I light myself on fire?
My phone sat dark in my hand.
I called one more time.
No answer.
I didn't leave a message.
There was nothing left to say.
The morning stretched ahead of me—gray and formless—and I sat there in the silence, waiting for a call that might never come.
Wondering if I'd finally pushed her past the point of return.
Wondering if I'd wake up tomorrow in this same spot, with this same hollow ache, and every tomorrow after that.
Alone.
The way I deserved to be.
Let it hurt. Let it carve me hollow.
If this was the price for what I'd done—for every lie I'd dressed up as protection, every choice I'd stolen from her—then I'd pay it. I'd pay it every morning I woke up without her. Every night I reached for warmth that wasn't there.
I pressed my hand to the couch cushion where she usually sat.
A sound crawled out of my throat—low and wounded and barely human.
I whispered her name into the empty room, like the word itself might bring her back.
It didn't.