I Am His Cure and His Curse Chapter 2

The next morning, a knock came again.

It was the maid. “Miss Reed, Mr. Blackwood would like you to come downstairs.”

I opened the door. Liam was standing at the top of the stairs, dressed immaculately in a dark suit. His face was drawn and tired, but his expression was calm, resolute.

“Get dressed. I’m taking you somewhere.”

“Where?”

“A clinic. You need to see a doctor.”

I looked at him, at the dark circles under his eyes. He hadn’t slept either. Was it from worry, or from anger at me?

“I’m not sick,” I said softly.

“You threatened to kill yourself yesterday,” he stated, his gaze unblinking, complicated. “What would you call that?”

I lowered my head, unable to argue.

The car pulled up to a high-end private clinic downtown. The interior was sleek and sterile. Liam spoke with the doctor in an inner office, leaving the door slightly ajar.

I sat on a plush sofa outside, catching fragments of their conversation.

“She’s become more and more erratic lately,” Liam’s voice was strained, laced with a weary frustration. “Her moods are unstable. Yesterday, she ran off…”

Erratic. Unstable.

The words were like thorns pressing into my heart. So that’s what I was to him now. Not just a burden, but an unstable one.

The clinic’s front door opened and Serena walked in, carrying a file folder.

“Liam,” she said, pushing the office door open without knocking. “These need your urgent signature.”

Through the gap in the door, I saw Liam rubbing his temples, the picture of exhaustion.

Serena moved behind him, her movements fluid and natural, and began to gently massage his temples.

He didn’t pull away. He leaned back into her touch.

The sight was so sharp it made my eyes burn.

I shot up from the sofa and walked toward the exit.

Liam saw me. He rushed out and grabbed my wrist. “The session isn’t over. Where are you going?”

His touch was a shock.

And at that exact moment, a wave of nausea roiled in my stomach. Maybe it was the empty stomach, or maybe it was the tidal wave of emotion.

I doubled over, a violent gag reflex taking over. I threw up right there on the polished floor.

Some of it splattered onto his expensive trousers and handcrafted leather shoes.

The foul smell filled the air.

He recoiled as if he’d been burned, flinging my hand away and stumbling back, his face a mask of undisguised disgust.

“Thea, why are you always like this?” he yelled, his voice cracking with a decade of frustration and fury.

Always like this. Always making a mess. Always causing him pain.

Serena was there instantly, stepping between us with a handful of tissues, carefully dabbing at his trousers.

“It’s okay, Liam, don’t be angry. I’ll clean it up.”

She knelt at his feet, tending to the mess with meticulous care, as if his suit were a holy relic.

And I stood there, covered in my own filth, a repulsive, superfluous piece of trash.

I looked at them, a sharp, twisting pain in my chest.

I turned and ran from the clinic.

The sunlight was blinding. I walked aimlessly, with no destination in mind.

I stopped in front of a bridal shop.

In the window, a mannequin wore a stunning satin gown, its design simple and impossibly elegant.

It looked so familiar. I stared, my mind a blank.

Then, a flicker. A hazy, broken memory…

A younger me, years ago, standing on this very spot, pointing at this very dress, smiling at the boy beside me.

“Liam, that’s the one. That’s the dress I’m going to wear.”

Back then, there was no neurotoxin. No scent. No Serena.

Back then, when he looked at me, he was smiling.

“Thea.”

Liam’s voice, coming from behind me.

He had followed me.

I didn’t turn around, my eyes still fixed on the wedding dress.

He came to stand beside me, his gaze following mine to the window.

He saw the dress.

The anger on his face slowly dissolved, replaced by a complex, unreadable expression.

He just stood there, looking from the dress to me and back again.

His mouth opened, then closed. He said nothing.

The two of us, disheveled and miserable, standing like fools before the brightly lit window of a bridal boutique.

The space between us was so much more than a few feet of pavement.