~Malia~
Daniel was hovering over my head and for a short moment, I conjured up a memory of us at the lake, a long buried memory that I didn't allow myself to reminisce in because of how much pain it caused to think about.
We had been sitting on the bank of a murky man made lake trying miserably to catch a tan, at least for me, and he was steadily skipping rocks out onto the dreary water.
"What are you going to do when you graduate?" He had asked me, and I pondered the thought for a long while.
"Is it sad to say that I want to be a professional athlete?"Â I had laughed then, wanting to accentuate my words with humor to disguise the fact that I wasn't actually joking.
"Hey, you're a track star. I don't think it's that far fetched. You can do anything you put your mind to, Lia. I love you, you know that right?"
I gazed up into his green eyes and blinked hard, the memory swimming away into a haziness as bleak and colorless as that day at the lake, the clouds becoming murky ink blots blacking out the sky above.
And then he was there again, over my face and inches away from touching.
"Daniel." A breathless hush that cracked on the second syllable.
A corner of his mouth twitched a bit and I took the time to soak in his features, a face I never thought I'd ever see in person ever again.
He had aged into a man, as he was only eighteen the last time I'd set eyes on him, fine lines creeping around his eyes and accentuating them even more, the jade green I remembered making way for a more hazel tone.
His nose was slightly off center as if it had been broken one too many times but it made his face seem tougher, as if no one would ever want to mess with him, like he'd been through plenty of fights and knew how to take care of himself.
I wanted to reach up and trace my hands along his jaw, the squareness of it half concealed with dark brown stubble that seemed like it wanted to grow into a full beard but he just trimmed it at the last second.
A throat cleared in the room and it took me a minute to realize that we weren't the only people in the room.
Mar looked concerned and disapproving and my grandmother looked straight up scandalized, her hand across her heart as if the scene before her had given her a heart attack or something. My grandfather on the other hand had taken to drinking with a short glass of what looked like bourbon in it raised to his mouth as he gulped down the amber liquid.
Coughing, he wiped his mouth with the back of his aged hand and began to speak.
"Malia, we realize you have had a...troubled past, but you can't be seen with the Prince after having met the royal family and then have another boy come calling at our door. It might send the wrong message, and we definitely have press getting coverage now, they're simply vultures. They can tear a person apart and they will never get their reputation back...you understand?"
His gruff voice was something tangible, an essence that I could hang onto to allow myself to gather my wits.
"Of course, it's not an unfair request. And this is highly inappropriate, as the boy before you has no business being in this house. I'd ask for an apology but even that would be too kind. I really just want you to leave."
Daniel's biceps bulged on the ground where he was crouched by my body which was still laid on the ground from when I had fainted, though I was slightly raised up to look everyone in the eyes.
Mar came forward, still biting her tongue though I wasn't sure why, and helped me up, her arms a comfort that I felt myself melt into as she reminded me so much of my mother, someone that I desperately needed in that moment to do what I needed to do.
"Malia, I did come back to apologize," he said, eyes pinned to the ground as if he couldn't bear to look me in the eyes, to see the stark pain of betrayal that I knew was shining through them.
"I knew as soon as the news broke that I was still alive that you would have questions and I am here to answer anything that you want to know."
He looked up at me then, still kneeling where I had fainted but his green eyes were full of unchecked emotion and I almost pitied him with how pathetic he looked on the ground before me and my family.
"What we had those years ago was real. That was the real me, before I went on deployment with the military. My time overseas changed me and I found myself mixed up into things I didn't have any business with, and I know it's no excuse and it won't take away all the hurt that I caused, but I am sorry."
I rolled my eyes as I felt the tears roll down my cheeks, and when I spoke next my words were thick with pain I hadn't allowed myself to feel yet.
"You faked your own death, let your entire family believe you were dead. You let me believe it. And then you're just living it up in Vegas as if you didn't have a care in the world? Something doesn't add up. If you're mixed up in something bad enough to make you fake your own death, why go somewhere as public as Vegas, why show yourself in public at all, at least without a disguise?"
Mar piped up then, finally.
"If the press hadn't made the connection between you and Malia, would you be here right now?"
Daniel rose to his feet, a full six foot three and towering over all of them.
"No."
"Well then I think that's all we need to know, isn't it?"
I agreed with my aunt and was just about to show him to the door when he said something that made me stop in my tracks completely.
"I still love you, Malia. I never stopped. I know I hurt you, and I know that I can never make it up to you for what I did, but you have to know that I had to do it, I didn't have another choice. I would have died for real if I didn't fake it."
I could feel the shaking in my bones before I said it, something I should've said the second he came through the doors, if I hadn't fainted of course.
"Maybe we would all be better off if you didn't actually fake your death."
"Yes, exactly that's what I've been trying to-"
"No, I mean, we'd be better off if you had really just died in the first place-and stayed dead."
The voice that came out of my mouth sounded detached and strange, but it was something that needed to be said void of any emotion so that he would get the message and leave me alone once and for all.
He had crushed my entire heart and soul when I found out that he had 'died' and that was a kind of pain that I couldn't go back and rewrite, I couldn't get back the rest of my sophomore and junior years of high school where I spent grieving a boyfriend who wasn't really even dead.
I couldn't get back the months of crying myself to sleep thinking I'd never see the 'love of my life' ever again, and he needed to know that I was never going to forgive him for what he'd done to me.
"Oh," he said, head dropped to the floor once more in resignation, and for a moment I brought myself back to that time when he told me he loved me for the first time at the lake and I felt more tears spring to my eyes as if I were nothing but a fountain of salt water.
"I loved you once Daniel, but you lost the right to hold any place in my heart besides the one reserved for contempt. I think it's time you left."
He paused, eyes finally reaching mine filled with a pain so deep I recognized it as something I saw almost every time I looked at myself in the mirror-fear.
He mad a move to go to the door and when he pulled it open he stopped short and I was about to give him another piece of my mind when I realized just why he'd stopped in the first place.
Standing there in the clothes he had worn during the press conference looking every bit the most gorgeous man I'd ever laid eyes on was Louis, confusion etched into his features and then finally hostility.
"What's he doing here," they both asked simultaneously, and the scene in front of me was almost too much for me to take.
My dead-not-dead boyfriend standing in my England home with my royal-adjacent family and glaring at the crowned Prince of England. Could my life have gotten any more complicated?
Apparently so, especially when my grandparents invited said Prince inside for a cup of tea.
What could possibly go wrong?
*******
Author's Note:
So what did you guys think??
I know some more Malia and Louis time has been requested but I think we all needed to hear from Daniel eventually!
And don't worry, some serious romance scenes are in your future ;)
What do you think will happen next??
What do you WANT to happen next??
Thoughts on Daniel from this chapter?
Until next time my lovely readers,
Kristen :)