Ignitable

Ignitable - Chapter Seventeen

Cade...

Last night, I could have lost the best thing to have ever come into my wretched life. With the shame and guilt now flooding my sobering brain, I am just relieved that the best and beautiful thing, is still laying beside me; sleeping soundly. Staring down at Sophia, it slowly dawns on me that she is so much more than I deserve—much more than I can ever justify.

But one day, I will be the man who deserves her.

One day, I will be able to justify having her in my life.

Because, for the very first time in my life, I feel loved. Sophia is trying to love me in every way, shape and form; and I'm ready to let her. Having her unquestioning heart, makes me realise just how lonely I have been all these years. Since a child, the intolerable and never ending loneliness is all I have ever known. It's something that has become so deeply ingrained in me. As a young boy, I actually used to imagine how it would feel to be loved. But that would only make my childhood worse, because I was imagining something that I knew I would never have. There was just no point in wishing for something that my mother would never be able to give me, so after a while; I stopped imagining. My mother was dead on the inside and so formally cold on the outside, and I never knew why. All I truly knew was that it was the loneliest feeling in the world to know that my own mother didn't love me. The only way of coping with it, was to become just like her. To become just as dead on the inside and formally cold on the outside. As an adult, I learnt to fill all of my insufferable loneliness with work, sex and alcohol. And until Sophia, it worked. But now, my beautiful Sophia has changed everything.

With her, I no longer feel dead inside.

With her, I feel the amazing warmth of love.

So after my deplorable behaviour last night, I will spend the rest of my life repaying Sophia for choosing to stay with me. She has not only chosen to stay with me, she has chosen to still love me. Even after Marion and the drink, she is still here. Which is why I keep staring at her while she sleeps. She's just so beautiful—so beautiful and still mine. When my mother sent that text, my whole world had emptied. It had emptied, and I didn't know how to cope with it. I wasn't able to think straight, because I thought I had lost the one and only good thing in my life that was worth having. All rational thinking, devastatingly flew out of the window. The dead and cold Lapley defence mechanism had destructively kicked in. I slipped right back into the person I was before I met Sophia, because it was the only way I knew how to cope with thinking that she had chosen her ex over me.

But I was wrong.

Completely and ashamedly wrong.

And for that, I will spend the rest of my life trying to love Sophia in the very same way that she loves me.

I love her.

I love her so much, it actually scares me.

I think I fell in love with Sophia from the moment that I first saw her. In fact, I know I loved her from the moment that I first saw her.

And she loves me.

Unbelievably, she still loves me.

And to think that I could have destroyed feeling this way, just sickens me to the core. With that sickening feeling rolling over and over in my stomach, Sophia begins to stir. Sweeping strands of her hair from off her sleepy face, I stare down at my awakening beauty.

With her puffy, heavy eyelids trying to open, she groggily says. "You okay?" Blinking over and over, she's trying to get the lids that cover her tired grey eyes to stay open for longer as they lovingly look back at me.

"I'm okay." I quietly tell her, still stroking the side of her smooth and soft cheek with my attentive fingertips. "I'm just admiring my morning view." Now I smile at Sophia. Not a cocksure smile, just a truly grateful one.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Sophia soon asks with the most beautiful of concern gracing her just awoken face.

All at once, I feel like I need to express just how shit I feel about all that has happened. "About last night, it won't happen ever again." I have never grovelled before, but I'm only too happy to grovel to Sophia.

Sleepily smiling, her reply is quick. "It had better not happen ever again." Every emphasis is on the not.

"I really am sorry." More of my sincere grovelling falls from my mouth.

Reaching up, to return my affectionate gesture of stroking her cheek, she lovingly strokes mine. "I know you are." But then the beautiful small smile that is upon Sophia's lips, sweetly fades away from sight. "But if I ever find another woman in, or coming out of your flat, ever again...I'm gone." Her grey spheres are now deadly serious. "No matter how much I love you, I won't let you treat me like shit. Do you understand?" Between her sleepy eyes, sits a single and prominent frown line. I have never noticed it before, but I know it's there because Sophia means serious business with me. She's pissed, and rightly so.

"I understand." And I really do. And you want to know something else? I love her even more for caressing my cheek in the way that she still is, all the while scolding me with that single frown line. "I love you, Sophia Hale." I blurt it right out with a big and elated smile spreading all across my hungover face. Because in that serious but tender moment, I just needed her to hear how I honestly feel. Now, I need her to hear more of how I feel. Holding her warm cheek within my thankful palm, my heart starts telling her my truths. "You are now the most important thing in my life, Sophia. There's not going to be anymore Marion's. No more drink. And no more Mother."

Her eyes narrow, her concern deepening. "What do you mean no more mother?"

Growing with bold confidence, I am all too keen to answer. "I want her out of my life. I want out of Lapley Law Firm. I don't care about the Lapley heritage and all the shit that is tied to it. I just want to be free of it all. I have enough money and contacts to go it alone, and that is what I'll do."

Sophia sits up higher against the pillows. "Are you sure about this, Cade? You're making a very big decision, here. Maybe you should think things over for a while?"

Never being more sure about anything before, my reply is even more coated with confidence. "I'm sure. I don't need to think things over. This is what I want. I've been wanting to do it for years. After last night, I'm done. I just can't have my mother in my life anymore, both personally and professionally. She needs to be completely out of it." My reassurance comes with an accompanying smile. "I don't need the Lapley money. I can make my own money. I can set up my own successful law firm. I don't care about continuing the Lapley name, all I care about, is you." Cozying myself up against her body that's all warm beneath the duvet, I too, become serious. "I want all of your heart, Sophia, not just a fraction of it. You are it for me. I know I'll never feel the way I do about you, with anybody else. I have fallen in love with you. You're the one. The only one. You're the person who I am supposed to be with. My life is with you. Which is why I need to walk away from my mother and the business. I won't have her contaminating what we have. I just won't."

Sophia elatedly laces her fingers around the back of my neck, pulling me in for a soft and understanding kiss. "And I love you, Cade Lapley. Whatever you decide to do, I am here. I am here with the whole of my heart, and not just a fraction of it." Then her sweet velveteen lips kiss me again, this time slow and cherishing.

Our entire future is wrapped up in that kiss.

With our mouths, our commitment to each other has finally been sealed. But in order to give us that future, I know what I must do.

It's time to face my mother, and to sever all ties with her.

**DO YOU LOVELIES THINK CADE IS DOING THE RIGHT THING?? YOUR THOUGHTS & VOTES ARE ALWAYS WELCOMED** ♥️