Loving Phoenix (Impact Of Her Adaptation) GirlxGirl

One- Phoenix

Phoenix

I watched her silently, always from the shadows, never letting her catch sight of me. God. If she did, I wasn't sure what she would do. Or what I would.

The woman I'd become after I'd left her was no longer the person she had once adored.... loved, even. I was unhinged without her.

Frantic. Obsessed with her, almost to the point of no return.

I had already permitted my past to lure me away from her once, and she'd been badly hurt in the process. My departure had almost broken the beautiful girl who was right in front of me, and all I could do was stand by and watch. 

Hayley was so good, so naïve and innocent to the dark place this city could be. New York City wasn't the glamorous, awe-inspiring place they often showed on television and in movies. No, it was home to the darkest side of crime: Rapists. Murderers. Perverts.

I knew that firsthand. I would never let that side of me touch her. Never.

Somewhere, somehow, the sweet redhead had gotten under my skin. While every other woman I'd slept with had been a passing interest (if that), Hayley was more. Not only had I allowed her over my walls, but I'd even dated her. Nearly two years we were together, and it had... changed me.

That was the only way I could describe it. The society into which I was born, however, wasn't fond of attachment to anyone from the "outside world", as they so aptly referred to those who were not privy to the dark, seedy underworld that was the New York Syndicate. I knew trying to hide Hayley from their omnipresent eyes would be a waste of time. They saw everything. My father had eyes on all of us, even when we didn't know he did. It was only a matter of time until they found out about her.

Once they discovered her, I couldn't see any other way to protect her. So, I lied. I lied to push her away. In doing that, I had to crush that heart that had always loved the broken in me. The sad, lonely little girl I once had been. Even the salacious slut I was in the bedroom. She loved all the parts of me I thought were too depraved, too dark, to see the light of day.

Hayley saved me in more ways than one... and she didn't even know it.

I watched, rapt, as her long, red hair blew into her face, her head tossed back in laughter at something her friend had said. Dialing my attention in to the camera I held in my hands, I noticed a hint of black ink scrawled down her wrist, and my chest caved in at the sight.

My baby girl hated needles. Was she really so angry at me that she would go to such lengths? And what kind of tattoo had she gotten, in the hopes of ridding me from her heart? I had to know.

I had to know every little piece and part of her, or I would go crazy.

Slowly, I realized I had to make her see that I was no longer the same girl who'd left her six months ago. Maybe I wasn't completely free of El Famiglia or their dark influences that had kept me from her before, but I was hell-bent on breaking their hold as soon as I possibly could.

Hopefully, with her by my side.

Turn around.

My mind warred with my heart in an inner battle I knew I'd never win. My heeled boots clicked as I paced across the hardwood floors of the local dive bar that Hayley seemed to love, now that she had come of legal drinking age. Smiling to myself, I remembered the first time she had a sip of my beer, and the tart face she'd made at the taste.

That's gross. How does everybody drink that? She'd snapped the words at me from across my kitchen island on one of our first nights together, her eyes filled with sass, but I had merely rubbed my lips over her temple as I whispered, you'll get used to it. If the margarita in her hand was any indication, however, I doubted that she ever had.