INDEBTED To A Tyrant King

You Are Home

Summer

I was in a daze. My eyes fluttered but didn’t open fully as I tried to wake up. It felt like hundreds of pounds was weighing my body down, no matter how much I tried I couldn’t even lift my hand. And that was about may be hours before, now when I opened my eyes there was almost a soothing type of flow that was going through my system. Looking around myself I realised that everything was shrouded in the darkness. The curtains flew from the cool breeze coming from the open window and I saw the moonlight streaming inside. It was night time. Exhaling heavily, I looked up at the ceiling and wondered what I had dreamed about. But then I felt my brows furrowing as I saw the patterns and designs on the ceiling, like someone just threw a bucketful of French drawings.

I tried to understand, but the soothing hum was fading away and twinges of pain from various parts of my body was registering, like I was waking up from a long sleep. Like a sleeping beauty. I scoffed, but I was the little red. At that thought bits of memories came to the forefront. Arjun. Then in the car, me wanting to kill Gabriel. Bullets. My eyes widened and my breathing increased as I remembered the crash. And then, again just words and pieces. He was there. He had come for me. Little Red, come on… grab my hand. Doctors. Sirens. My hand automatically reached for my wrist and sure enough it was bandaged.

With a sigh I closed my eyes, but only for a second as they flew open when another fuzzy scene came to my mind. And I knew it wasn’t a dream. The airhostess. The announcement of the pilot. This time when I looked at the ceiling I knew what it meant.

I bolted out of the bed, and gasped in pain, when my legs screamed in agony at the sudden weight on them. For a moment dark spots danced in front of my eyes. But I couldn’t not confirm it, what I already knew was true. I hobbled to the windows, grabbed the curtains out of my way. And there it was. The streets buzzing with excitement, the shops and little houses all lighten up for the night. Night in the French Quarter.

“No. No. No. No…. How? How could he!!” I hissed, shaking my head as I walked away from the window.

“How could I what, Little Red?”

For a moment I froze like a deer in the headlights, I didn’t realise that all this time I had an audience. I turned to look at him and there he was. Sitting in the dark, with his one foot on top of the knee of his other leg. A lit cigar dangling from his fingers. Once again he was in the dark, but his eyes, they glowed from the moonlight. As my own eyes adjusted, I saw hard lines of his face, he looked like he was made out of stone. So silent and still as he was.

I grappled for words, not liking the intensity in his gaze, the way he was looking at me, it unnerved me. I remembered the last words spoken and I remembered what had made him speak in the first place. Taking two steps in his direction, I pointed my finger at him. “You had no f*****g right to bring me here. How dare you!”

“I dared because I don’t want to see you die.” Every word out of his mouth was slow and deliberate.

Making new memories coming forward, making the fact known that he was the one who saved me. “It doesn’t give you freedom to move me around the country, and that too when I was unconscious.”

“Were you?”

I stopped short. Of course, I was. What was he getting to? “Stop playing with me, Gabriel. Get me back to New York, I want to go back.”

“What you want no longer matter.”

My blood was starting to boil. I wanted to slap him across his stoic face. Grab him by his shirt and shake some sense into him. “Listen,” I breathed in order to calm the rising panic, I was starting to feel like any moment I was going to be pushed off the edge of a very high cliff. “I don’t want your help. I’ll find an another option, just book me a flight to go back.”

Finally, he uncoiled himself from the chair, with a grace that no doubt even top order ballerinas would envy. And then my eyes held in the magnificence of him. He took steps to erase the distance between us. Even though my mind was upset, I didn’t miss the way he carried himself. And how f*****g perfect he looked. Tall and imposing. Wild and dangerous. He looked down at me with those glowing blue eyes. Trapping me in place.

“I want to go back home.” I said, my words hanging between us. A question. A demand. A request.

He didn’t reply right away. No, he made me wait. And then, he answered in a low voice like we were having an intimate moment. “You are home.”

I took a step back from him. “This place hasn’t been my home since last three years. And you can’t make me stay here.”

“Can’t I?” One dark eyebrow raised and I knew… I knew. No… No!!! My mind screamed, but the word refused to come out of my mouth. But it seemed he didn’t had any such problem, he spoke easily and his next words took my breath away, “On the contrary, I can make you do anything I want, Little Red.” He produced a sheet of paper from his pocket, perfectly rolled up and then opened it in front of my face with a flourish. “Or should I call you Wife.”

To Be Continued...

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