CHAPTER 129: HIS MADNESS, HER MAJESTY

–Damon–

Is it just me? Or is madness the only natural state when you’re married to someone like Livana? I swear, the thought of what my wife is doing at this very moment gnaws at me like a rat behind the walls. I haven’t seen her at the office lately. She’d look dangerously seductive with those glasses perched on her nose—oh, wait, she’s blind. But that doesn’t make her less lethal. No, she reads the world in braille and commands a keyboard made for the sightless—yet somehow, she still sees right through me.

I think about her too much. I fantasize about her too much. It’s not even healthy. But what’s health compared to obsession? She’s the only woman who exists in the constellation of my mind. My graceful ghost orchid—rare, untouchable, and poisonous if mishandled.

"Focus!" Caine snapped, pulling me back from my pleasant hallucination. "Stop daydreaming."

I turned my head slowly and looked at him with whatever look a man wears when he’s drowning in love and lunacy. I don’t know if my eyes said I want to kill you or I want to marry you for telling me to stop thinking about her. Probably both.

"My wife is a ghost orchid," I murmured dreamily. "And when she wears that black dress... God." I pressed my palm to my cheek like some blushing boy who just got a peck on the cheek from his first crush. Pathetic? Maybe. I call it devotion.

"Oh, damn," he muttered under his breath. "I think I lost you." He stood abruptly. "Come on. Let’s get you to a hospital. You need serious medication."

"Yes," I agreed with a sigh. "Take me... back to my wife."

He didn’t. He dragged me out of the office like some misbehaving dog.

"You got this, bro," he said, gripping my arm as if that would anchor me to sanity. "Take her off your head just for a few hours. Let your brain breathe."

He didn’t understand. No one did. My life begins and ends with Livana. She’s the map, the territory, the storm and the harbor. I don’t just love her—I orbit her like a dying planet hoping for gravity. If I can’t have her beside me, then at least let me stalk her. A discreet live camera feed would be perfect, but Deanne is always there like a hawk, guarding her, depriving me of my harmless voyeurism.

How cruel can they be to a man in love?

Caine hauled me to some café, a civilian’s idea of comfort. He bought me a milk tea and shoved it into my hands.

"Livana loves these," I murmured.

"Yeah, go ahead, drink," he waved me off, already tired of my face. "Stop being so dumb, Damon. People are watching us."

I sipped it. The drink had black round things at the bottom—what do you call them again? Ah, pearls. My wife likes these pearls. Now I like them, too.

"I think Livana forgot to give you your medicine," Caine added, his voice a distant echo. I barely heard him; I was too busy cataloging the shadows at the corner of the café. CIA, probably. Or someone worse.

"Come on, cheer up. Focus on the project," he patted my arm.

"Call Deanne. Let’s have lunch with them," I suggested.

"She told me not to bother them. They’re busy."

I slumped back like a starved cat, listless, waiting. His orders arrived—pasta, sliders, more food I didn’t care for.

"Eat. Maybe it’ll help your brain think about something other than your wife."

"You’re killing my appetite with your words," I muttered, picking up a mini burger anyway.

Then—click, click, click. High heels, a stench of perfume that burned my nostrils. I looked up and there she was. The woman I would love to strangle with piano wire—Tyrona.

"Damon, hello," she chirped, sliding into the chair beside me like a snake slipping into a warm hole. Livana’s half-sister sat beside Caine. A virus with a smile. Tyrona grabbed a burger slider like she owned it. I shifted away as though her skin might peel mine.

"I’m losing my appetite," I grumbled to Caine. "Next time, hire bodyguards who shoot first."

"Oh, stop being so mean, Damon." She laughed—an irritating, tinny sound. "Still rattled every time I’m close to you?" Her voice was sweet, but her eyes were all daggers. Revenge. That’s what she wants. I know. I killed her lover.

I leaned close, let my smirk crawl across my lips like a scar forming.

"Don’t flatter yourself, Tyrona. You’re nothing to me." I leaned back with a sigh. "If it wasn’t for Livana, I’d have already buried you somewhere scenic. But my sweet, merciful wife told me to avoid unnecessary enemies."

Tyrona’s smirk deepened. "Tell Livana I’m going to take you from her," she said smoothly. "The same way she took Alejandro from me."

"Oh?" I turned to Caine, he shook his head, already exhausted. "You mean kill me?" I chuckled, low and bitter. "Oh, darling." My voice dripped with sarcasm. "Good luck with that. My wife is territorial. She’d skin you for sport."

But then—oh. What a thought. The idea thrilled me like a blade sliding too close to the skin without cutting. My wife, enraged—feral yet divine—her dominance spilling over like wine staining silk. Protective, territorial, dangerous. I imagined the veins in her neck surfacing like angry rivers, her words scalding enough to blister the air. I grinned, suddenly alive, a moth salivating for the flame. I haven’t truly seen that side of her—not yet. She’s always been the picture of poise, the calm before a storm that never comes. And God, how I ache to be the storm that drags it out of her.

"I agree with you, Tyrona." I reached for her arm and shook it gently like a madman congratulating his executioner. "Do it." My grin widened as I sipped the bubble tea. "Enjoy the food. Summon your men. Try to catch me. Let’s have a little action." I stood, feeling the electric rush of a dangerous game.

"You are a fucking lunatic," Tyrona spat.

"I’m not joking," I told her earnestly, almost tenderly. "Do it. Call me crazy, but my wife looks devastatingly sexy when she’s furious. I live for that. Her wrath is foreplay."

Caine buried his face in his hands. Tyrona glared. Me? I was already imagining Livana’s voice slicing the room like a blade, her fingers on my collar like a leash. Just the thought made my pulse spike.

–Deanne–

Livana sighed and palmed her face like a queen massaging her own patience. She was stressed—no, burdened—by that stupid husband of hers, who behaved less like a CEO and more like a runaway from a mental asylum with good hair. And the irony? It wasn’t Tyrona who looked like a fool today; it was Damon, in all his lovesick, darkly comedic glory.

Tyrona wanted to trigger Damon’s "dark aura," that famous ominous, domineering presence that made even men twice his size tread carefully. But what did she end up summoning instead? His "madly-in-love puppy aura." Tyrona clearly skipped the fine print on Damon’s psychology. She should know better—everyone with half a working brain does—that Damon is hopelessly, obsessively in love with Livana. There’s no neutral mode for that man. It’s either brooding predator or lunatic lover.

And Livana? That woman is the calm after the storm, the still surface of water that hides a leviathan underneath. She doesn’t show emotions easily, rarely expresses herself unless the universe itself asks her to. If Tyrona thinks killing Damon would destabilize her—oh, sweet summer idiot—she has no idea. Killing Damon would probably give that man the thrill of his life, a final act of passion. He would thank her for it just to make Livana’s heart skip a beat.

Caine’s voice snapped through my phone, laced with frustration, the kind that makes men prematurely grey. I had it on speaker, just to see Livana’s reaction while I stirred my coffee. She—surprise, surprise—laughed. Quietly, elegantly, but she laughed at Damon’s antics. This was the man known for being dark, domineering, and dangerous. Now? He was a tragicomedy on two legs, ruining his own fearsome reputation just because he was hopelessly, clinically in love with his wife.

"I feel you," I muttered into the phone. "Alright, relax for a bit and just keep an eye on him, will you?" My tone softened like I was coaxing a worn-out babysitter who’d just survived a tantrum. And in this case, the tantrum’s name was Damon.

"Yeah," Caine grunted. "I don’t know what to do. I think my best friend hit his head somewhere."

Livana scoffed, a graceful, lethal little sound.

"I think he did hit his head," she said. "Tell him I’ll be coming home late."

"Oh, no," I immediately objected. "I can’t tell him that. You want him to go full demolition mode? Just come home early and spare us the apocalypse. I’ll tell him you promised him—what—blowjobs, so he’ll stop pacing like a starving wolf and get back to work."

"Blowjobs?" Livana turned her head towards me, one brow raised. "I don’t kneel for men. My husband kneels for me."

"Okay," I rolled my eyes, deadpan. "Royal decree accepted. Whatever keeps your marriage burning without setting the house on fire."

The truth? They were both insane. Livana and Damon—two beautiful disasters orbiting each other, defying gravity and sanity in equal measure. And here I am, stuck as their unwilling damage control, the designated fire extinguisher in their mansion of lunacy.