“You are not fit to be her trainer if you can't control yourself! I can understand it from Eliza, she's not used to the intensity of the urges, but you, of all people, you should.”
Tears welled up in her dark eyes, something I hadn't seen for quite some time. I felt bitterly ashamed as she clearly was right. I should have known better; been in control. I hated myself for letting everyone down, having given in to my yearnings. I had been weak.
“I don't know what to say. You're right.”
I paused and looked at Zaphire who barely could look me in the eyes.
“But I swear, on my life, that it won't happen again. We talked about it; we know it wasn't meant to have happened. It was a mistake. I offered Eliza to resign as her trainer, but we both agreed it felt right to continue. Please Zaphire, can you accept that? Please?" I begged.
I knew if she didn't accept it, it would be over. There's absolutely no way that Markus would let us carry on once he was told. Zaphire was silent, but the hostility had ebbed away the slightest bit, which I grabbed hold on.
“Please, trust..." But she didn't let me finish.
“Don't say another word." she barked.
“Let me think.”
In the mean time Eliza had appeared back out of the bathroom, her eyes red from crying, but appearing much calmer now. I signalled to her to keep her distance for now and she crept onto the sofa, waiting for Zaphire to speak. Slowly but surely I sensed Zaphy's attitude change from downright hostile to one which was more conciliatory, though far from calm. She was fighting her initial urge to run to Markus and I could feel, to my relief, she was succeeding.
“Zack. You're a dickhead. But even I can see that you bring the best out of Eliza, though you have the potential to elicit the worst from her too, and from yourself as well. I'll give you one more chance before I report you to Markus. Don't give me an excuse to do so, because that will be it. I will not take any prisoners next time, even a whiff of it. No pun intended.”
She managed a little smile at her own little joke. Trust Zaphire to somehow lighten the mood, even though she was hurting like hell. It wasn't about me breaking the rules, it was purely her feelings for Eliza that had riled her so much. Eliza meant a lot more to her than I had thought. Poor Zaphire.
“Thank you. That means a lot to me and I won't let you down. Trust me.”
I really felt it, but it was going to be difficult. I knew for a fact I had undeniably and irrevocably fallen in love with Eliza.
I glanced over to Eliza, smiling but didn't like what I saw. She sat frozen on the sofa with a thousand mile stare. Zaph rushed over and I let her take charge of the situation.
CHAPTER 49
I hardly dared move whilst Zaphire was talking to us, afraid to lose control once again. Not sexually but emotionally. I just wanted to scream and scream. I could not make sense of any of my own feelings and everyone else's emotions were physically hurting me. My head was pounding, my stomach was churning, my body was aching with excruciating stabbing pains. I couldn't actually work out what my own feelings were or which belonged to the twins. I owned them all and it was driving me insane. My whole body felt heavy and hot. I couldn't actually hear what was being said any more. It felt like I was falling, spiralling out of control.
“Eliza...Eli...are you okay?”
I heard a voice trying to emerge above the noise and fog in my brain. I couldn't make out who it was, but then I felt two cool soft hands cradling my face, and two beautiful eyes boring into mine. It was Zaphire.
“Eliza. Come on. Regain control. Shut down your other senses, just listen. You're fine. You just experienced a bit of sensory overload. You're safe. Relax. Everything is sorted sweetheart. I have you.”
The pain fell away and I suddenly felt as light as air. I slumped into Zaphire's arms, grateful for her not to reject me. I wasn't sure if she'd forgiven me, but she was here for me now and that felt good.
“I'll order us some drinks and food." I heard Zack whisper to Zaphire who nodded, without letting go of me.
“How do you cope with this crap, Zaphire? It's exhausting fighting with my senses like this.”
“You will learn, babes. You'll develop a coping mechanism. We can't keep letting other people's emotions cripple us like that. You'll get there. Believe it or not, experiences like this will only help fine tune your control over them. You'll learn to shield better and if that doesn't work, you'll develop a greater pain threshold to absorb other people's emotions. Look now, you got out of it. Well done.”
She smiled her mesmerising smile with her luscious lips. Don't even go there. I berated myself. It felt like I had turned into a nymphomaniac or something!
I couldn't make myself move so I just sat on the sofa, leaning into Zaphire who was all too happy to just sit there. In the mean time, Zack had wisely kept himself out the way, and didn't speak to us until our order arrived. I wasn't feeling hungry, but I doubted the twins would let me get away with just picking at the food. There were some nachos, chicken fajitas, corn on the cobs and some fruit and as expected Zack put some of everything on my plate. I resigned myself to trying to eat as much as I could as I couldn't muster the energy to argue. Besides, it would probably do me good anyway.
When I started eating I realised how hungry I was as we never actually got to eat in the end.
