“He beat me so hard, I fell to the ground and then he…”
I stop. I can’t say it. I can't name it.
But my body remembers. Every crack. Every bruise. Every breath that felt like my last.
My voice breaks. Tears stream silently down my face, but I don’t wipe them away.
“He didn’t stop. Not when I screamed. Not when I begged. He… tore everything apart.”
I can feel Dorian’s whole body turn to stone.
The silence between us expands. Tight. Electric. Every muscle in him trembles, his jaw clenched so tightly I can hear his breath break through his teeth.
“The last thing I remember is the sound of my phone ringing—your ringtone. And him laughing, saying, ‘Glad you could assist, boss.’ Then he smashed it with a rock.”
His entire body coils like a wire pulled too tight—face twisting with something raw and feral. For a second, I swear he looks like he might shatter the air around him.
“I blacked out. If it weren’t for the two factory guards who noticed the cab lights in the field and came to check it out….”
Dorian doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Just stands there—like if he lets go, something inside him will never come back together.
“I woke up after twenty-five days of induced coma. I couldn’t talk. Couldn’t walk. Could barely breathe without pain. I had to learn it all over again. And just when I started to think maybe I could survive…”
I swallow hard. I turn my head; I cannot meet his eyes.
“They told me I… I lost the baby. Our baby.”
The silence that follows is unbearable.
Dorian stares at me like he’s just heard his entire world crack in two. His eyes are wet, shining with horror—helplessness.
“Jesus, Della,” he says hoarsely, his voice wrecked.
His arms come around me like a lifeline—steady, protective, full of silent promise. One hand cradles the back of my head, the other wraps gently around my waist. Like he’s trying to keep my pieces from scattering, to holdmetogether. Like if he could absorb my pain through his touch, he would.
“I was six weeks. I didn’t know. And after that… I felt guilty, tainted, unworthy—a broken doll.”
His face buries in my hair, his breath shuddering against my neck.
“Don’t—” he breathes, leaning in. “Don’t say that.”
My voice slips into something smaller.
“I was crushed, lost, unable to move, to speak.”
My eyes drop to my lap. “I wanted to call you. A thousand times. But the words wouldn’t come out. And when I finally did…”
I meet his gaze.
“I lost you, too.”
For a moment, he doesn’t speak. Just looks at me like my words carved open something deep inside him. His jaw tightens. His throat moves with a hard swallow.
Then he exhales shakily, like the guilt’s been lodged in his chest for years.
“Can you ever forgive me?” he whispers. “I should’ve known something was wrong. I should’ve come for you. Fought harder.Believedharder.”
His voice cracks, thick with grief.
