Alpha Damon (Sienna) novel Chapter 73

Sienna:

The early morning light filtered through the large windows, soft and golden, dancing along the edges of the room. For a brief second, I forgot where I was.

This wasn’t my childhood bedroom. It wasn’t the Infirmary either.

This was his room.

It was the room that he suddenly chose to want me to stay in with him. His bedroom. The one place that I wouldn’t have expected myself to be in.

His sheets. His walls. His scent clinging to the air like smoke.

I turned slowly, expecting to find him lying beside me.

I had hoped that he would go to sleep despite me being here, despite not wanting to see him. At least knowing that he got a little rest would give me the ease of falling asleep here. A mistake that I made unintentionally, it was the exhaustion that took over me that had me falling asleep.

But the bed was empty.

Untouched.

The sheets on his side hadn’t been disturbed, not a crease, not a wrinkle. I sat up, the soft fabric of my nightshirt falling around my thighs as I pushed the covers off. My heart sank, though I couldn’t exactly say why.

Had I really thought he’d sleep beside me?

Did I really believe that he was going to be sleeping by my side? Did I really think that I wanted him to sleep by my side?

After everything?

After our arguments, after everything that kept happening, After me resenting him, after him standing against his own family, for me, after his mother’s harsh words. Did I really expect him to be sleeping by my side?

I ran my fingers through my tangled hair, trying to make sense of the silence. It was strange, this stillness. Stillness that I did not understand. Was one that I did not like, especially after all the chaos that I’ve been going through.

Something about that stillness brought me more discomfort than I wanted to admit, but I knew not to acknowledge it. I knew not to press on the subject. I knew not to allow myself to give into it.

I slipped my feet into my slippers and crossed the room, careful not to make too much noise. I slowly walked towards the bassinet where my baby girl was asleep by my side. Damon was right, she did sleep better when she was beside me. Though I refused to allow her to sleep on the bed, the last thing that I wanted was for her to be getting used to me go sleeping by her side when it was time for her to sleep on her own. Though it would be give me more comfort for her sleep by my side, I still knew that it was an uneasy feeling that it did not want to hold on to.

She was curled up in her bassinet, one tiny fist resting near her cheek, her breathing soft and even. I smiled for a second, staying quiet as I looked at her, just watching her. A piece of my heart I hadn’t known still existed seemed to expand inside my chest.

But the peace didn’t last long.

I doubted that it would anyway. I would have been concerned if it did.

The sound of the door opening behind me had me turning my head.

Damon stepped inside, dressed in his usual dark jeans and black button-up, the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His hair was damp, like he’d just come in from a shower somewhere else. He didn’t look at me right away, his eyes instead going to Isla for a brief moment.

“Damon…”

He showed me a look, and I stayed quiet as I looked down at my feet. For a moment I found myself getting lost in my thoughts before I looked up at him, refusing to be weaker, refusing to allow him to control me the way that he wanted to.

I stared at him, my chest tightening. I wasn’t sure what I was hoping to hear, but it wasn’t that.

He didn’t look angry. He didn’t look cold. But there was something else beneath the surface, something I couldn’t quite name. Like a storm building he was trying to bottle up.

I nodded stiffly and turned back toward Isla’s crib.

“Right,” I said, quietly. “You’ve got things to handle. Good luck with them.”

I didn’t hear the bathroom door close, but I felt his presence shift, and soon the sound of water running replaced the quiet tension that had taken root between us

I brushed my fingers along Isla’s blanket and whispered, mostly to myself, “What are you doing to me, Damon Lockwood?”

And the worst part?

I wasn’t sure if I wanted an answer.