ContractxFamily

Chapter 17

Anya pov

I can't believe Heidi pushed me on the stairs last night! 

It was so instinctual that she didn't even think before she did it, trusting fully in Damian's ability to catch me.

I told Hildegarde about Heidi's antics and she started laughing at me! 

"I know it was an arranged marriage, Anya but it doesn't mean feelings aren't involved," she explains to me. "It's pretty obvious that Damian really cares for you."

We turn the corner onto a road full of clothes shops and tailors, "Really?" I ask.

"Yes of course," she nods. "The year I got married to Demetrius was the same year you left Eden college you see."

Operation Strix had ended, I didn't need to attend Eden college anymore, Papa resigned as Agent Twillight and decided to stay married to Mum and keep me. A good year.

"Oh?"
"Damian was really down the rest of that year," she explains. "His grades dropped from 10th overall to 20th, when he returned from school during the holidays, he barely left his room and didn't speak to anyone. He only got better when he started working for us."

"But did he tell you all that was because of me?"

"No of course not," she laughs. "Demetrius told me that a few days before we got married Damian came home in the middle of a school day looking really down and said only one sentence, 'She dropped out of Eden.'"

My jaw drops, I knew a bit about Damian's grades dropping that year, Becky told me about it, but I didn't know how bad me leaving affected him. 

We got along well in those last few years in Eden as Imperial Scholars, more than I thought I guess.

Maybe it's because I didn't give him a proper goodbye. 

I didn't think I needed to. 

Becky broke the news to him, she never told me how he reacted.

I need to go see her. "Hildegarde, would you mind sending me to Blackbell Manor?"

Hildegarde was looking at a bag in a shop window, "Oh Anya that bag will look wonderful with the dress I'm making for you."

I nod in agreement, then I ask her again and she agrees.

Hildegarde's driver took me to Becky's manor I go inside, "Hi Leon!" I say to her butler. "Is Becky home?"

"Miss Blackbell is in her ro...." I don't wait for him to finish his sentence and I run upstairs to Becky's bedroom. "Becky Blackbell!" 

Becky jumps, dropping her magazine, "Anya what are you doing here?" 

"Is it true Damian cut classes the day he found out I'd left Eden?!"
She looks at me confused, "Yeah? Didn't I tell you?"

"NO!" I exclaim. "That's a rather important detail. Hildegarde told me he was depressed for a whole year."

"Whose Hildegarde?"
"Damian's sister-in-law."

"Oh," she nods. "Why is that important?"

"I don't know," I say sighing as I collapse onto her bed. "I've got to be  nicer to him now, I guess, he went through all that because I didn't say goodbye, back then."

"I don't think it's because you say goodbye," Becky starts. "Maybe he missed you as a whole. Classes did feel  really empty after you left."

"What brought all this on, though?" she asks me as she shuffle closer. 

"Hildegarde said he really cares for me," I mutter.

"Yeah that's common knowledge,"  Becky agrees.

"What do you mean common knowledge?" I exclaim. "I didn't know, we barely even speak for days on end, that's not the attitude of someone caring for another."

"Do you try to make conversation with him?"

"Sometimes, but we usually only see each other at meal times, and I'm not allowed to speak then."

"Don't you speak to him in the evenings?" 

"Not really, he's usually really tired when he gets back. I did yesterday though, it ended with him kicking me out of his room."

"Why?"

"Because I said he was jealous of Baer."

Her eyes widen, "Context please?!"

I end up spending half an hour catching her up on mine and Damian's actions the past few weeks until Leon comes in the room and says Damian had called the landline saying I needed to come home.

"Aw your hubby got worried about you," Becky teases. "I still can't believe you got married before I did."

I cringe at her calling Damian my 'hubby' then I say goodbye and head home.