Tell Me Ariel, Are You Mine?

Chapter 21 - Everything I Am

"What have you told Nera? How much does she know?"

"I told her everything. She knows everything."

I blinked several times. My lids lowered hard to the floor as I tried to think of it all, everything. Seriously? What had he told me?

"Tell me everything you know, Ariel. Don't leave a single thing out. Dante totally owes you this. And I don't think he's giving you enough credit. In fact, I'm guessing it's fear that's the reason he's been reluctant to tell you very much."

"Fear? Of what?"

He looked at me like it was so obvious. "Of losing you, of course."

I blinked looking hard into his eyes; I was taken by complete surprise. I mean, fear? So far I hadn't known Dante to be scared of anything. That was seriously unexpected to me.

I put my thoughts together, gathering my information, I stood there and told him. I told him everything I knew about him, mainly from what Nate had told me, and things that Dante had revealed however disguised it had been. In fact, more often than not it had been that way. Cryptic as hell, and nothing remotely forthright.

"Damn." He said shaking his head.

He took a deep breath and swallowed as he looked to be running everything I'd said over in his head, contemplating. I could tell he wanted to tell me something, but he was clearly conflicted. It was all over him. He frustratedly huffed, opened his mouth to speak and then shut it again. I watched him.

"Malcolm," I said, urging his eyes to me.

Immediately, he put his hand in his pocket as if being alerted. He'd got a text message. Looking at it he regarded me more sternly before slipping his phone back in his pocket.

"Oh, for fucks sake Malcolm! C'mon!" Ugh, I could so shake him right now!

"Alright!" He took me to one side and we stood confronting each other. He told me he had a staunch belief in telling me this, that he trusted me to know it all, to make decisions he felt I deserved to make, the same decisions his wife made, he felt he owed me that.

He also told me not to go in blind.

Dante had once said this to me too.

He had that look on his face that was somewhat similar to Dante's at times, the look of trying to analyse my thoughts through my expression. I was starting to think being able to tell something before even one word was spoken was a thing of theirs. I could tell he was trying to come to some conclusion from me, so I decided to assure him.

"You know what I told him, Malcolm?" I confided to conflicted eyes. "What I said to Dante the day he drove us to his home? I found out what he is and he asked me why I was still around after knowing that. I told him I had nothing to lose. It's true; I have nothing to lose."

"You do, Ariel. Your life."

I gave a cynical smile. "What life?" I shrugged.

His eyes narrowed as his brows drew in; a vicious line appeared between his brows as his expression contorted into disbelief. "What...?" he said as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What life? Are you for real? For fucks sake Ariel, don't say that. Whatever you think you've lost in this life it's not worth dying over. Whatever life you have, however little you think is left of it, it's not worth losing it. You deserve to have a life. You deserve to love free from all this BS. You deserve to be oblivious, to be blissfully ignorant to people like us in your world. You deserve a human life, a child if that's what you want, a future. That's what you deserve. Whatever has happened in your life, you deserve to have one. You fucking deserve it for fucks sake!" he almost croaked, he placed his fist over his mouth. Emotionally, he was fraught.