The Florencia Lozano Homepage - Fan Fiction
AFFLICTION
BY TROG |
CHAPTER
26 |
CHAPTER 26
Everyone in The Palace looked up when Aaron Blackmoor strolled into the lobby, towering above everything and everyone with intimidating height and beauty wearing his gleaming blonde hair like a crown and his pale blue eyes like jewels. Imperially slim and exquisitely dressed, he walked with the arrogance of a winner, a champion, a man who did not understand defeat. Handing his suitcase to a bellhop with the arrogance of a king handing his horse to a stableboy, he made his way to the elevator quickly, in a hurry to see his wife...his queen...his love.
One shot. That’s what Tea was to him. She had made him feel again after years of living like a drone...a killing machine who had shut off his humanity in order to survive. Tea made his blood pump, his body sweat, his heart race...she made him want to awaken to the sunrise each and every morning just to look at her lovely face. Living had suddenly become precious to him, more than precious...desirable. He needed her essence...her energy...he needed to drink her blood....to eat her flesh, so that he could feel the force that emanated from her when she was in his arms. He was Lazarus, she was his Goddess, arousing him from his tomb, giving him another shot at living...one shot.
When he knocked on her hotel door he found himself shaking and trembling with the anticipation of seeing her, a strange reaction for a man who killed with a steady hand.
Tea opened the door and looked up at him anxiously. Stepping into the room, he pulled her into his arms and lifted her into the air with his ardor and his excitement, twirling her around with joy. Tea put her arms around him, holding on as he whirled her about wildly and happily. A few weeks ago she would have welcomed his attentions, feeling safe and flattered by his love, but now she felt terror and revulsion as she held on to this stranger...this murderer who had killed Ben Davidson...this killer who loved her.
Aaron put Tea down as the bellhop entered with his bag. He tipped him generously, rushing him out the door and turning back to Tea who stood where he had placed her in the center of the room. For a few moments he just watched her without speaking, absorbing her delicate form and her wild brown hair, dressed casually in a white, cotton shirt and jeans.
“I’m never leaving you again, my sweet...no more trips...no more traveling. I never want to be away from you again,” he said as he approached to kiss her.
Tea stepped back but he was too quick and he took her in his arms and kissed her. Her mouth was tight and rigid as he struggled to kiss her, but Tea felt a wave of terror rush through her body and pulled away from him.
Aaron looked confused as he watched her pull away. Tea put her hand to her mouth and shook her head softly.
“Aaron...don’t. We need to talk.”
“Darling...what’s wrong. Is it Carlotta? Has she taken a turn for the worst?”
Tea turned away from him...her body shaking wildly with fear as she struggled with the terror rising inside of her. When she turned she looked at his lovely ice-blue eyes and his pale, golden hair and wondered how a man who looked like an angel could have killed Ben Davidson.
“No...Carlotta’s fine. In fact she’s going to be released soon.”
Again Aaron approached her, but she pulled back.
“Tea...what’s going on?”
Her legs felt weak with fear.
“Aaron...we...I...need to talk to you. Can we sit down?”
Aaron nodded silently and they sat down on the sofa together.
“When we first got together...you asked me why I was so reluctant to get involved with you. I told you that I was still getting over someone.”
“Yes...I remember. Why are we talking about this now?”
Tea got up and paced around in front of him.
“His name is...Todd Manning. He lives here...in Llanview.”
Aaron watched her quietly...taking in her movements, her facial expressions, watching her beautiful, soulful eyes avoiding his.
“He...he...came to see me while you were away.”
Aaron Blackmoor stood up and walked closer to her, his immense stature dwarfing her petite frame and making her feel like a naive, little fly in his malignant web.
“And? What did he want?” asked Aaron.
Tea looked up at him.
“He...he...wants me back. He wants for us to try again,” Tea said in a fragile voice, her eyes misty and her body stiff and awkward.
Aaron‘s eyes narrowed and he cocked his head slightly. He had always known that she wasn’t in love with him. From the moment he saw her looking out at the ocean on that night in the Hamptons, he had realized that she had lost her heart to someone and she would never willingly surrender it to anyone again.
When he had approached her standing by the water, looking out into the darkness in her red, chiffon evening gown, she had turned to him just as a shiny tear ran down her exquisite cheek. Her beautiful, dark eyes were filled with the deepest sadness he’d ever seen and he knew that she had lost a great love and that her suffering and anguish were as deep as that black ocean that she watched in despair. Love. Love is what he saw in her face and as she wiped her eyes...he knew that he had to have her. Her love was for another, but he wanted a woman who could love so profoundly...he needed to feel that level of emotion, that raw, naked awareness of another human being--that primitive, altered state that made him feel a part of the living, instead of the dead. Her love for this man was so powerful that Aaron felt it vicariously...for a moment he was an empath who sensed her agonizing dejection as well as her glorious passion and for an instant...he felt alive...he felt a tiny sliver of her love.
“Marry me,” he had said to her.
Tea had looked at him sadly, then her face had broken into a brilliant smile.
“I’ve already been married...twice...to the same man. I’m not interested in ever repeating that experience with any other man,” she had said in the loveliest voice he’d ever heard as she walked away.
“Well...I guess we’ll just have to live together until I talk you into it,” he had answered her.
Tea turned around, smiled and shook her head...then she just walked away as he continued to watch her. Within one month...she was living with him.
Aaron walked slowly around her, circling her like a panther.
“It doesn’t matter what he wants. The only thing that matters, my sweet, is what you want.”
Tea looked up at his beautiful, chiseled face and noticed how controlled he was, fixed and sculpted.
“I...I’m not sure what I feel, Aaron,” she said as tears formed in her eyes. “I thought I’d never see him again...and when I did...I felt...confused.”
“What are you telling me, Tea? That you still have feelings for this man? This Todd Manning?”
“Yes...I do.”
Aaron’s mouth flinched and his perfect brow furrowed as his eyes sunk deeply into it and a dark expression clouded his face. He turned his back to her and closed his eyes, swallowing hard...panicking.
“It’s perfectly natural to have residual feelings for someone you once loved. I’ve been away a lot and...you probably felt lonely and neglected, Tea. This is nothing...it will pass. You and I are husband and wife...we’re married. That‘s all that matters.”
When he turned to face her he seemed calmer, almost unaffected as if he had been reprogrammed. It frightened her at how easily he could recalibrate his emotions...like a machine.
“Aaron...what I feel for Todd...it’s more than...confusion.”
“What exactly are you saying, Tea. I’ve only been gone a few weeks, for God’s sake! Are you telling me that in that time...you’ve decided to leave me for this...this Todd Manning?” he asked her as his control started to slip and a tinge of anger colored his voice.
Her hands brushed her hair nervously as she shook her head.
“I don’t know! I don’t know how I feel about him...about us anymore. I don’t want to lie to you...I have feelings for him...I think...I know.... I’m still in love with him. I think...I always will be,” said Tea as she buried her face in her hands and cried. “I’m so sorry...I never wanted to hurt you like this.”
As she cried Aaron noticed that she wasn’t wearing her wedding rings and that she’d probably already been unfaithful to him, divorcing him with her body.
“Tea, this is absurd. You’re not leaving me. I won’t let you. Not like this.”
Tea looked up at him. His jaw was tight as he stared at her with eyes she’d never seen before, the eyes of a man she didn’t know...the eyes of a killer.
“Aaron...I need some time.”
“What are you telling me, Tea...you want me to go?”
Tea wrapped her arms around herself to stop from shaking.
“I just don’t think I can be with you right now...not while I‘m feeling like this. It’s not fair to any of us.”
“YOU’RE MY WIFE! YOU CAN’T JUST WALK OUT ON ME LIKE THIS!” he yelled, blowing up quite suddenly, approaching her with a hostility that she’d never witnessed in all her time with him. Tea backed away from him, filled with terror.
As Aaron read the fear in her face, he stopped and shook his head. Reprogrammed.
“Don’t do this. Don’t leave me,” he said calmly.
Tea looked away.
“I can’t be with you like this...feeling like this. Please...I think you should go right now.”
Aaron Blackmoor stared at her silently, his eyes calibrating...calculating the situation before walking over and picking up his suitcase.
“I’ll get a room, but I’m not going anywhere, Tea, not until you come to your senses. I have plans for us...for our life...for our future. I need you. I‘ll give you a little distance if that‘s what you want...but I‘m not leaving you. Think about what you‘re doing, Tea. Todd Manning is your past...I am your future.”
Holding his suitcase he walked over to her and kissed her cheek tenderly.
“I love you...I’ll wait for you...but I’ll never let you go,” he whispered emphatically before walking out the door, sending a frightening chill through Tea, his declaration of love sounding like a deadly warning.
Tea walked listlessly over to the sofa and dropped onto it. Resting her head against the back and looking up at the ceiling she sighed deeply and closed her eyes with relief. Sitting up she looked around at this strange room. Everything seemed strange....foreign. In a few weeks her perfect marriage, her perfect world had turned into a place of chaos, a violent vortex swirling around her filled with lies and betrayal, murder and madness. And in the middle of all this pandemonium was her obsessive love, her relentless passion for Todd Manning which ruled her very soul.
to be continued...
2002 Copyright by Trog
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