Chapter 8 (Pt 2)
�What was it?� Christian interrupted, noting her tightly clenched fists. Her body seemed tense like a tightly drawn guitar string, threatening to snap at any moment.
�A wallet. Filled with cash. Or so I thought,� she snorted ruefully, shaking her head, as she still refused to look at him. �Turned out those were papers. Some stupid papers that didn�t mean anything to me. I remember being so disappointed�.�
�What did you do?�
�Threw it out.� She shrugged indeterminably. �I still had a whole day of �work� before me. I couldn�t waste time with that.�
She lowered her head, letting her dark shoulder-length hair fall forward, completely obstructing his view of her face. Her voice grew even quieter now, tight with the effort of trying to hold back the flood of emotions that threatened to overcome her.
�I came home late that night. They were waiting for me. Four of them. I still don�t know how they managed to track me. The whole place was in shambles, like they were looking for something. And my� f-father was lying on the floor, tied to the bedpost in the middle of that mess.� She drew in a shaky breath, pushing herself to go on with the story.
It was hard � so hard to make herself remember that night.
�One of them � my future boss � came up to me and asked where the papers were. I said I didn�t know what he was talking about. He slapped me. Hard. Then asked again. I told him the truth then � that I threw them away. � He didn�t believe me. He pulled out a gun and trained it on my father. He said that if I didn�t tell him the truth, he�d shoot him.�
Christian listened without interrupting now, his imagination drawing him the troubling picture of a frightened 15-year-old girl in a room with four ruthless killers. And he dreaded what he guessed she was about to tell him next.
�I cried,� Xandrie continued, her voice trembling with tears she no longer had a tight control over. �I cried and I pleaded with them to believe me. But they wouldn�t�.� The words caught in her throat, and she stopped abruptly, fighting to regain her composure.
Christian reached up wordlessly, his fingers brushing against her cheek, gently forcing her to look up. And she did, her eyes meeting his hesitantly at first, as if unsure of his reaction, startled to find her own pain mirrored in the blue depths. That discovery comforted her, as if in a way at that moment they were able to restore some of the connection they used to share, and she smiled at him � a ghost of a smile through unshed tears.
Then the smile vanished, and her expression hardened, as the memories poured on.
�I killed my father that day, you understand. I may as well have been the one to pull the trigger. If I hadn�t stole that stupid��
�You couldn�t have known,� Christian objected, but she was relentless.
�Yes, I could have. I could have stopped when you asked me to stop; when you asked me to go to l�Am�rique with you; when you offered me to start a different life � with you.�
Christian frowned, remembering that conversation, as she shook her head, lamenting the irreversible finality of her decision.
�You just weren�t ready then,� he acknowledged sadly. �There�s nothing that you should blame yourself for. There was no way that you could have imagined something like that happening.�
Xandrie turned her gaze back to him and shook her head again, a sad smile touching her lips. �My readiness wasn�t the issue, Christian,� she stated simply. �I was just scared. Scared of what your offer meant for me� scared of how much I felt in love with you�.�
A tense silence fell between them, as Christian attempted to digest her sudden confession. Did that statement still apply? Did that mean she still loved him?
Xandrie began talking again, and he broke off his train of thought, forcing himself to focus on her words.