“I’m defective. How could he want me? Why would he?” The stupid tears won’t stop, and my breathing feels tight.
“’Cause you’re fucking perfect for me.”
Great. Now I’m imagining his voice.
“Get out of my head,” I cry. Until mom spins me around and there he is.
Arsen.
My knight.
My broken dream.
My legs won’t hold me any longer, and I crash to the ground, black dots spinning my vision into nothing.
Arsen
After driving all night and listening to Marina’s brief but heartbreaking message, I’m finally at her family home. I waste no time walking up the paved pathway and the porch steps. Ringing the doorbell, all I want to do is burst through.
I need my girl.
An older man opens the door. “Can I help you?” he asks.
As I’m about to introduce myself, I catch Marina saying, “I’m defective, how could he want me? Why would he?” I rush through the house at the broken emotion in her voice. Seeing my woman cry on her mother’s shoulder, I don’t hesitate to tell her, “’Cause you’re fucking perfect for me.” Realizing she thinks she’s hearing things, hurts like hell. Mostly because I did this to her.
When her mother spins Marina around, the anguish is clear in her gaze as she looks at me. Seeing her knees go weak, I rush over to catch her in my arms before she hits the floor. I feel her spritely body vibrating with her pain.
“I got you, Ari,” I murmur in her ear, savoring the feel of touching her again. It feels like it’s been forever and a day. “I’m sorry, baby, so fucking sorry.”
“S’okay. I’m broken. I get it,” she whispers, her voice full of tears.
Sitting in the chair her mother pulls over for me, I cradle Marina in my lap, lifting her chin up to see me. I need her to hear my next words. “You’re not broken, Marina. You’re special. You’re everything I never knew I wanted.” I see a slight bit of hope light her gaze. “From that first touch, to your laughter, your sweet kisses, you’re all mine, baby, and there isn’t a damn thing that’s going to change that for me.”
“You didn’t call,” she sighs. I can feel her body relaxing into mine.
“Karma is not my friend.” I shake my head.
She looks puzzled. “I don’t understand.”
Brushing the hair back from her face, I hate how exhausted she looks. “That lead I got? The jackass ran. I had to chase. My phone got broken as I tackled him. I didn’t get a new one until just before I left late last night.”
“You drove all night?” She seems awed.
“Baby, I would move heaven and earth to get to you.”
“Oh my,” her mother whispers. I’d forgotten they were in the room.
Securing Marina more firmly on my lap, I introduce myself. “I’m Arsen Daniels. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Her mother looks lovestruck by my words. Her father looks pissed off. “You made her cry,” he growls, not giving me an inch.
“It wasn’t intentional. I handled a shock and demand in a bad way, and I’ll spend however long I have to making up for it.”
“Shock and demand?” he asks.
“I’m a detective with MNPD, and moments before Marina told me her secret, I had been called in to view a video of a potential suspect in a gruesome double homicide. It wasn’t my finest moment. And I have no excuse for how I left her that morning.”
“Why has it taken you so long to search her out?” her mother asks.