LEV
The sunset was beginning to set, and as a result there were fewer people by the beach on the tropical island, Gran Canaria.
I stood on the shore as the ocean water almost reached my ankles, while I watched the sunset by the beach, with a cigar between my fingers.
I watched the infinity of the ocean as I thought of what Rose was currently doing back in Russia.
Was she eating enough?
Did she get enough sleep during the night?
Did her ankles hurt since they were swollen?
Was she thinking about me, like I was thinking about her?
I inhaled the smoke from the cigar, as it had been four weeks since I last saw my woman.
The memory of her pleading voice haunted me every day because I did not want to stay away from her for a few weeks, especially when she was close to giving birth.
She could give birth any day now, and I needed to go back to her.
But the memory of the day when I felt her lingered in the back of my mind, because I could still vividly recall and sense the touch of her hug.
She had hugged me when I had come back home from my trip to Italy, but I did not hug her back, because If I did, I would never let her go.
It was extremely difficult to leave her that day, and every single day I wanted to go back to her, but I did not, I needed to stay here in Gran Canaria because I had unfinished business.
But soon it was time to head back home to her because she was nearly nine months pregnant and about to give birth at any moment.
I did not want to think of her giving birth all alone when I'm not there to support her through the process.
I could not live with myself if she had to go through the birth alone, since she should have somebody to support her, to be by her side since this was her first time giving birth.
But I did commit a sin, and that had been lying to Rose.
I had been married to Ana the entire time, and I had been guilty of being a married man because I was protecting Ana's life, since here was a deal between Ana's father and me.
Ana's father had begged me to protect his only daughter.
As a horrific thing had happened to Ana right after Layla's death, and she needed my protection. In the Bratva, Ana needed to be married to me or have a living child in order for me to protect her.
Though, in the public eye, it had to seem that we were divorced, but in reality we were legally married since we needed to lure a few people out, and those people would come out if they thought Ana was no longer married to me.
I managed to lure those people who harmed Ana a few months back, and sent those people to Ana's father, who would deal with them.
But these past months, ever since I got together with Rose, I sent out the divorce papers to Ana because I was starting a new life with a woman I loved, but Ana avoided the divorce papers like the plague.
I had gone to Italy with the divorce papers since I knew Ana was there, at the same time I was on an important business trip.
As Ana had been traveling the world, and checking off her bucket list.
But we had met in Venice because I had been checking up on the hotel chain I owned there, since there had been some issues, but they were solved with ease.
I found out Ana had been traveling the world by herself, as my cousin and my niece, Oksana and her daughter, occasionally joined in for her travels.
Ana ended up inviting me for a friendly dinner one last time, to catch up on our lives, and I agreed because I handed her the divorce papers, since it was not fair to Rose if I was a married man.
I asked Ana during dinner in Venice why she was suddenly travelling to all the places she wanted to visit, and if it was because she was avoiding divorcing me?
But it was then in which she confessed that her body was growing weaker as she was dying, and that I would end up as a widower in the end, that there was no need for a divorce.
I found out that Ana had pancreas cancer as she was in her final moments, and she was dying.
Pancreas was a silent killer, you don't know you have it until it's too late, and that was the case with Ana. She did not know she had cancer until the doctor told her that it was too late and nothing could be done.
That's why she was traveling the world, and the last place she wanted to visit again, had been the place where we had our honeymoon in Gran Canaria.
Where she wanted to spend her last moments and die there, since our honeymoon had been a time for her when she was at her highest point.
She did not want to spend her last moments in the hospital, she wanted it to be somewhere special, even if she was in pain.
I thought it was a good idea for her, she could go there for all I cared, but I wanted to divorce her one way or another.
But then she started to plead for me to come with her because it would be the last time we would spend time together, she begged as she began to cry inside the restaurant, and we attracted an audience.
She even brought up the very first cancer she suffered from, and it was a few months before Layla had passed away.
Ana had suffered from breast cancer, but she had survived since the doctors caught it in time and it had not been too late for her.
Back then, she had been afraid to die, she had constant panic attacks in the middle of the nights and could no longer properly function.
But she ended up surviving the first one, but this time, the cancer came as a surprise to her and returned differently.
Unlike the first time, she accepted her fate this time.
But that did not stop her from begging me to come with her, she cried as the people around us in the restaurant watched the whole thing.
Then she started to mention Layla, how she was the last and only connection that I had to my dead daughter, and once she died, I would lose my only connection to my daughter.
She had been the mother of my child as she knew how devastated I had been after our daughter died by the hands of that cult, I could barely sleep or eat back then, as I wanted to die with my daughter, even tried to end my own life.
Ana pleaded with tears in her eyes.
"Layla would want her father to spend our last remaining moments together on earth because she died all alone by the hands of the cult. Remember how we had no remains to bury? "
"Remember our vows? Till death do us apart. That was Layla's favorite thing about us, how close we were to one another, don't disappoint our child. You had already disappointed her enough when you could not save her from the cult."
"Our daughter would be crying in her grave if she knew that you left her mother all alone, you know how much our daughter loved me."
"I want to spend my last moments with you, because we never got to spend our last moments with Layla as she brutally died by the hands of the cult, her body had been torn into pieces, our poor little daughter."
I was conscious of the tactics she tried to pull on me, she was trying to manipulate me, guilt-trip me into going on this one last trip before her death, and sadly it ended up working.
During my two weeks stay in Italy, she came by every single day to the hotel I owned, and pleaded the same thing over and over again.
"Come with me to Gran Canaria for the sake of our daughter."
"Do you remember how much she loved the tropical island? She always wanted to go back there, she loved the beach house, and we were supposed to go there with her, but she ended up dying."
"Layla's last moments were horrific, and as her mother, I would wish nothing more if at least my last moments were by your side since she died all alone."
"I do not want to die alone, like our daughter did."
In the end, I made the decision to stay with Ana for a few weeks, but she would need to sign the divorce papers, for all I knew, she could have lied about the terminal illness.
But she did not lie as I double-checked with my private family doctor, who examined her and confirmed that she was indeed dying.
I did not stay with Ana for her sake, I agreed to stay by her side because of our daughter since that was what my daughter deserved, since I could recall how much Layla loved her mother.
I would had no intention of traveling to Gran Canaria, If it was not for the sentiments of Layla, I would have left Ana by herself since she meant nothing to me no more.
All I hoped was to end this final chapter with Ana as she was going to die in the end, and I could start my life with Rose without any obstacles of the past.
I tried to divorce Ana right after I had slept with Rose in my office because I sent out the divorce papers to Ana, but she avoided the papers as she was traveling all over the world.
She did not want to divorce me, and I wanted to divorce her since I had somebody I wanted to share my life with, until death do us apart.
Now, I was a divorced man, who was waiting for his ex-wife to pass away, as the only thing I did during the days was to dream about Rose Spencer, the woman who owned my heart.
I turned my gaze away from the ocean and I looked at the bucket of red roses that were in a vase on the table.
How badly I missed her.
"What are you... thinking about...?" Ana's voice made me look away from the bucket of roses, and at her, as she snapped another picture of me.
"Ana, I don't want you to post any pictures of me. We are not together any longer, and don't treat me like your husband." I told her as I let out another cloud of smoke from my lips.
I would need to call Ivan to take down all the pictures from Ana's social media because I respect Ana as a person, but our relationship has ended a long time go.
"Why can't I? I'm dying either way..." Ana spoke up from the sun lounger as her facial complexion was pale, and she looked lifeless since she could die at any moment now.
"I don't want my partner and the mother of my children, to get the wrong perception about us," I explain as the inhalation of nicotine spreads throughout my lungs.
The last time I smoked this much was when Layla had died, and now it was for Rose, who was far out of my grasp.
"Did you ever love me... like you love her...?" She asked as she put her phone away while wincing since she was in a state of pain all the time.
"I loved you like a good friend, but I love her like she is the love of my life, and I can not wait to go back home to her." I turned away from Ana as I looked at the ocean as my thoughts drifted to Rose.
What was she doing?
What was she feeling at the moment?
The way I left her was horrible, I inflicted a lot of pain upon her when I should not have done that, I could have told her the truth about Ana.
But that would have made me a true villain in her eyes, and I was one selfish man who did not want to stain the image she had created of me.
If she no longer had a good perception of me, would she still love me the same?
There are no excuses for what I did to her, but I would pay the price when I go back to her.
She could lash out at me, she could stab me in the chest with a knife, she could mistreat me, she could push me away, but I would do everything to ask for her forgiveness.
She could kill me for all she wanted.
"Don't need to be so... mean towards me..." Ana chuckles in a way that makes her wince a second time, as I had completely forgotten about my ex-wife for a moment, and that has happened many times.
Ana is not somebody who occupies my thoughts or my heart.
"You always... forget about me..." She says, as she spoke with gaps between words, since she had no longer much strength in her weakened body.
Her personal nurse came up to Ana, and the nurse handed Ana painkillers since she was in a lot of agonizing pain.
"Ana, you were a good mother to Layla and a good wife to me, but don't ask something from me that I can not give you," I tell her as I finished smoking the cigar.
"Can you at least tell me the truth... about something?" She asks.
"What do you want to know?"
"Do you no longer see me as your wife...after what those men did to me? Is that why you wanted to divorce me...? " Her gaze was nearly lifeless, but at that moment despair flickered through her.
"What those men did to you, was not the reason why I wanted to divorce you after Layla's death."
"They had nothing to do with my decision, I could just not handle another person, since I could barely handle myself back then." I explained as I started to make my way out of the ocean water as there were no waves in sight.
"Thank god... I thought you left me because I was used goods... that I was used by those men... meant that I was dirty to be considered your wife..." She held back the tears from her eyes.
"What they did to you was a crime, a crime that no one should have gone through in the first place, and those men paid the price once I found them and sent them to your father," I say.
"Thanks for telling me that... I would not be able to die in peace... If I did not know the truth." A few tears escaped her eyes.
"That is the least I could do for you before your death," I confess as I glanced at her one last time and headed out of the beach.