chapter 34

“There she is!” Announces Patrick happily. I force myself to put on a smile, walking down to where he and Keenan are having a discussion. “I knew this day would surely come.” He tells Keenan with confidence.“Are we supposed to believe that, Dad?” Keenan asks, with a raised brow, clearly not believing in what his father just said.The old man shrugs indifferently. “From the first day I saw the two of you together, I knew you were meant to be.” He points out in a convinced tone of voice, “although that was four years ago and you were still much in love with Taylor, I knew there was something about Vary that made her the ideal woman for you.”Keenan drinks a little from his glass of wine. “And you never told me any of that.” Keenan pointed out to him. “I knew it wouldn’t be clear, so I let fate lead both of you to your destiny.” The man just responds, still much convinced by what he’s saying, “you certainly don’t believe it was a coincidence that she was the only one that took you home six months ago. I think what you two have now has been built on months of care and genuine affection.”Keenan chuckles mildly, “I think we owe forty per cent of our happiness to you then.” Keenan says as a joke.Not getting the joke, Patrick continues, “I’m just glad to see you two happy.” He taps Keenan’s shoulder softly and does the same to mine before leaving us.Keenan's large hand wraps around my waist and slowly cradles me to himself. “What’s wrong?” He asks with a concerned tone of voice.“Huh?” I ask absentmindedly as I look up at him. He is wearing a curious and grandly concerned look as he looks at me as well.His hand comes up to stroke my face, “You were silent the whole while Dad and I talked.” He points out carefully.“I’m a little tired.” I lied and look away from him. I’m not exhausted, but I am disrupted by the stranger’s vision, and that seems to have dominated and weakened my whole being ever since then.How did he even know me? Was he just lying to scare me and if so, why would he do such a thing?He sighs and takes my hand, “I think it’s more than that,” and when I keep quiet he probs further, “tell me, I might help.”I guess he’s right, I may not know who the stranger is, but Keenan being exposed, might. “Do you know or have you heard of anyone that sees?”His brows furrow as he repeats my question. “Sees what?”I nod and add, “The future.”His wry frown decreases, “Yeah, his name is Mycole.” he tenses up again, this time his brow drawing in and my panic increases. He moves closer as if seeing danger and trying to shield me from it. “Wait, did you see him? Did he talk to you?”I nod slowly, but not ready to talk about what he told me. If Keenan knows him, then he is no longer a stranger. “I need to go inside, please,” I respond instead, giving him tired eyes.“Okay,” and with no further word, Keenan leads me upstairs, away from the guest and into our room. He opens the door and I step inside while he leads me gently to the bed. Once at the foot of the bed, I settle into it, silent and cold.The room is in awful silence, and I take a few deep breaths, trying to regain myself.“What did he say?” Keenan finally asks out, breaking the silence that has elected itself lord of the room in the last few minutes.I jump a little being startled by Keenan's sudden question, and I swallow shakily. I just this has affected that Keenan too, if not more. “He said he sees evil days coming, and my worse fear will be revealed, but I should never forget that he loves me.”“Who the ‘he’ he’s talking about? Himself?” Keenan asks, finally coming to sit on the bed beside me.I shake my head, “No, I think it’s you.” I reply, torn, and a bit drifted. “and I’m just confused, and scared with what it all means.”“Shh, come here,” he slowly orders and opens his arms, and I snuggle into them. “It’s going to be fine. We will be okay. You will be fine and whatever the future holds, we’ll go through it together.”I pull away a little to stare at him and wonder how I got so lucky in love. “I love you so much, Keenan.”He smiles, “I love you too, Varisha.” He says, leaning down and kissing my lips. I kiss back and pull him closer, wanting nothing more than to forget this nightmare.He pushes me down on the bed as our kiss deepens and becomes frantic as well as hot. My hand goes into Keenan’s hair and tugs as his lips trail kisses down my neck. He slides down the thin hand of my red gown and kisses my shoulder. He does the same to the other hand, and he drags it off when we hear a knock on the door.“Who is it?” Keenan asks, bringing the hand of my dress to the way it was, a scowl growing on his face.“Rebecca, the guests are asking of you.” She answers with a small voice we almost don’t hear.Keenan sighs, “Tell them I’ll be right there,” he says, then stares into my eyes as though looking for the right words to use. “Well, have to finish this later, love. I’ll go bid farewell to the guests and you can just stay here and freshen up, and don’t stress yourself, okay? No trouble, okay?”I’m all by myself in this room. Who will I find trouble? But I play along.I bat my eyelashes at him, “I’ll try, but you know me, avoiding trouble is not my strongest point.”“Don’t I know that?” He claims my lips once more before getting up. “This won’t take long, I promise.”“If it does, I might just decide to occupy myself with a little work and I know how much you resent me doing that.” I tease with innocent eyes.“Don’t you get naughty with me,” he warns, with a hard glance.“Why not?” I ask, pouting and acting clueless.He rolls his eyes, but he answers, “Because you know how easy it is for you to turn me on, I don’t want to be raring a boner while I bid farewell to the guest and I’m sure as hell you don’t want to that either.”As much as I’d like to torture him, I’d like to be the only one that sees it. “Okay, no naughty till you return,” I promise.He smiles and goes out of the room and once he’s out; I get up and undress out of the party dress before walking into the bathroom and turning on the shower, hitting on the warm button and waiting for it to go warm before entering.The warm water pours down my face as it falls and I wash my body with the bath soap slowly and I rest my hand against the wall to let the water wash off the soap.As my eyes close, the words of the stranger named Mycole run into my ears and as much as I try to resist and keep him out, I can’t.“Your worse fear will be revealed.”I close my eyes and exhale slowly, to prevent myself from shattering. He may have seen the future, my future, but like he said, it’s my fear and the only way to be safe is to not bring it up for any reason. It’s my past, and it stays there.“You will be shattered and let down, don’t cast him completely out in your pain and grief, there are his pain and grief as well. Learn to trust him and together you will win, but alone you will both fall.”I couldn’t tell Keenan about this vision because I didn’t want him worrying about the meaning although the vision was for both of us, I think it’s for me alone, and it’s not like I don’t trust Keenan, I trust him with my whole existence, but I can’t trust myself, my body, my brain not after everything it’s been through.I turn off the shower and my mind wanders into a place I have forbidden it to go for nearly six to seven years now and all the dirty horrible memories rush back like a flood.The fear of destroying Keenan with my past plague storms my heart, and it clenches the life in me. I know Keenan. I just don’t know how he’ll feel when the truth comes out. I feel a pair of warm arms around my midsection and I flinch in fear before turning around to see Keenan behind me. He’s wearing black shorts and a black singlet. The fear subsides and I sigh in relief and smile a little, but that does not stop or ease the weary eyes he gives me.“Are you okay, Vary?” He asks, taking my face into his hands.I try to laugh, but that doesn’t go well. “Yeah, why won’t I be?”“You were here for too long?” He reveals, a little sceptical, but deep concern, “what have you been doing?”“Thinking,” I shrug, before wrapping my hands around his neck.His eyes twitch, “Don’t tell me it’s about what Mycole said.”“Yeah, it is, Keenan,” I reply with honesty.He holds on to my face so I stare into his soulful eyes, “I don’t believe something bad is going to happen and if it comes, we’ll face it together as husband and wife and I love you enough to know I’m not leaving you.”If he does, I could tell him everything and hope he understands. “Keenan, I–”He seals my complaints up with his mouth as he tenderly kisses me, “Shh,” he hushes tenderly.“No, Keenan,” I try to protest, trying to speak, but he shuts me up with his lips again.He lifts me, and I wrap my legs around him as he leads me back into the bedroom.He drops me on the bed and pulls away to stare into my eyes, “Stop worrying yourself and the baby and let me make love to you tonight.”I quiver under his gaze and I bite my lips as he watches me, “I’m not gonna stop you, ‘cause I want this too.” I admit to my lustful desire.He grins and his blue eyes spark a little, before kissing my lips again, “You can think of this as an early Christmas present from me to you.”And 6so it was an early Christmas present indeed, with Keenan at the top of his game just to make me feel satisfied. I moan, groan, cry, and growl from excitement. He falls back to bed after the second round, breathing heavily and his eyes close.I draw closer to him and trail my hand on his chest, “Thanks, that was amazing,” my hand trail to his toned stomach.He peels an eye open to take a quick look at me and he smiles, “I’m glad you enjoyed it as much as I did.”I lower my trailing finger and before I can go further, Keenan grabs my hand and I raise a brow at him. “If you enjoyed it as much as I did, you won’t still be hard and arching.”“I knew if I was aiming for my satisfaction I won’t meet yours as much as I did, so sue me.” he makes a cute face at me.“That was what I was about to do when you captured my hand.” I point out with a wink, and he chuckles. “You already gave me an early Christmas present. Let me give you yours.”Sighing in defeat, he lets go of my hand and I trail it down to grab his erection and he chuckles, “I knew you liked it rough, like a boss,” he purrs, his eyes slowly closing.I keep stroking him slowly, teasing at first, then faster next. He moans, and he bites down on his lower lips and I move down to take his hard, veiny erection into my mouth.“Fuck!” he cusses and his eyes fly open. “Non puoi farlo senza dirmelo, avrei potuto avere un infarto. (you can’t do that without telling me, I could have had a heart attack.)”I pull off, clearly not knowing if I’m being praised or scolded, “Don’t forget I have a native tongue too, so you tell me in English if you want me to stop.”“No, don’t stop,” he growls, his hand moving into my hair to help me out.He keeps the light and slowly at first, then the pace increases as he approaches his release. “Va--aary, I’m close–” he announces, weakly, his voice stuttering through. “I think youshouldpulloffnow” he is barely through when his release hits and shatters him completely.I swallow and move back to his side and as his eyes open, he mumbles, “Thank you,” out for me to hear.I smile and kiss his lips deeply before lying close to him and before long, we both fall asleep.Third POV4 months, 3 weeks later.“What have I done?” He cries.Keenan can’t bring himself to answer the question as he pulls his phone out of the left pocket of his jean trouser and dials Rory’s number.After a brief ring, he answered the phone.“Hello? Keenan? What’s wrong and why do you sound like it’s the end of the world?” Rory asks in a dull voice and Keenan figures he must have woken him up from sleep since it is about 10 p.m.“I messed up, Rory, I messed up real bad!” Keenan sobs into the phone.Knowing something terrible must have happened, perhaps resulting in life and death, he sirs up on the bed and the dullness in his voice vanished as he asks, “Where are you?”“The general hospital.”“I’m on my way.” He replies before ending the call..Â