Roommates With Benefits [BL]

Damien stood up, the movement smooth. "I am well aware of that."

"They’re treating you like some fucking investment they can withdraw whenever you don’t behave! And it’s not fair!" I ranted, "And you’re just standing there letting them—"

"I’m not letting them." His voice remained calm. That somehow made me even angrier, because calm felt like the one thing I could not currently manage. "It doesn’t matter anyway, I’ll find another way."

"With what money?"

His expression tightened, the first real crack in the composure he had been holding onto. "I can work."

I stared at him. "You?"

"Yes, me."

"You’ve never had to work a normal job in your life."

His eyebrow lifted. "So? That doesn’t mean I’m incapable of doing that, you do it so what’s the issue?"

"That’s different."

"How?"

"Because I’m naturally poor!" I gestured helplessly, aware that the argument was starting to circle itself. "You know what I mean, I’m used to working my ass off for little reward...ever since highschool it’s been a way of life for me. It’s not something you can just adjust to after the life of comfort you’ve lived in all your life."

"I do understand." He came closer, closing the small distance I had put between us. "But, I’ll be fine, Sunshine."

"No, you won’t."

"I will."

"You shouldn’t have to rebuild your entire life because your parents are throwing a tantrum."

His expression changed at that, something sharper moving behind his eyes. "They’re not throwing a tantrum."

"Then what do you call it?"

"A strategy."

I scoffed. "Well, their strategy sucks ass."

A quiet breath escaped him, almost a laugh. I pointed at him. "Don’t laugh. I’m angry."

"I know."

"I’m very angry."

"I can see that."

"No offense, your parents are so fucking horrible."

It was a miracle how parents so twisted and evil as them could birth someone so sweet and precious as Damien, if it wasn’t for the sheer resemblance Damien had to his mother and sister...I would have seriously thought Damien was adopted.

"They are." Damien responded.

That made me pause. I looked at him. "You agree?"

"With that?"

"Yes."

"Of course."

I blinked. "Wow, I expected you to defend them."

Damien chuckled, "Yeah, I stopped doing that a long time ago."

Something about the way he said it made my anger soften. Only slightly. Damien stepped closer and reached for me. I didn’t resist when he pulled me against his chest. His arms wrapped around me firmly, and I let out a frustrated breath against his shoulder, the fight draining out of me in uneven pieces.

"They can’t keep hurting you," I muttered as his hand moved slowly over my back. "I fucking hate this."

"I know."

"I hate that they can just take things away from you."

His arms tightened. "I’ll be okay, baby."

"You don’t know that."

"I know enough."

I pulled back slightly so I could look at him. "What if they keep going? What if they come up with more ways to make life miserable for us"

"Then we adapt."

"What if they take everything?"

"Then I’ll find something else."

"What if—"

"Oliver." His hands settled gently against my arms. "We’ll get through this, okay?"

I stared at him and he looked completely serious.

"Even if it means I have to find a job too, we’ll be fine. I promise."

I wanted to argue. I wanted to tell him that he shouldn’t have to work because of me, that he shouldn’t have to give up anything else, that his parents had already taken enough. But there was something in his expression that stopped me.

He wasn’t pretending everything was perfect. He wasn’t dismissing the situation. He was simply refusing to let fear decide what happened next. I swallowed.

"You’re really going to get a job?"

"If I have to."

"Doing what?"

"Anything."

I pictured Damien working behind a coffee counter. The image was so ridiculous that a laugh escaped me before I could stop it. He looked offended. "What?"

"I’m sorry."

"You aren’t."

"I am."

"You laughed."

"I’m imagining you making someone’s latte."

"I could make a latte."

"You’re too intimidating, you’ll scare off half the customers."

"I don’t think that’s relevant."

"It absolutely is." I smiled despite myself. "You’d hand someone their coffee and they’d apologize for ordering it."

Damien’s mouth curved. "Then I’d make an excellent employee."

I laughed softly, but the anger was still there. The fear was still there. But somehow, he had managed to pull me back from the edge.

He kissed my forehead. "Come on, let’s eat...I made dinner."

We ate dinner and changed for bed without talking much after that. The apartment settled into darkness around us, the city outside reduced to distant traffic and occasional sounds drifting up from the streets below. I climbed beneath the blankets beside Damien and immediately felt him pull me close. His arm settled around my waist, warm and familiar.

I rested my head against his chest. For a while, I thought I might actually fall asleep. Damien’s breathing gradually slowed beside me. His hand remained resting against my side. Within minutes, he was asleep.

I wasn’t.

I stared at the ceiling. The room was dark enough that I could barely make out the outline of the furniture, but I could still hear Damien breathing beside me. Steady and calm...unaware of the mess my thoughts were making inside my head. I looked down at my injured hand.

The bandage was still there, though the swelling had almost completely disappeared. I traced the edge of it with my thumb. That stupid little strip of white cloth had become a reminder of everything we’d been through. Jeremy, the photograph, the blackmail, the confrontation, the Lockwoods, the café getting lawsuit threats, the money, the inheritance.

Everything seemed connected. And somehow, every road kept leading back to the same thing.

Me.

I closed my eyes. Maybe I was being selfish. Maybe I’d been selfish from the beginning. I’d come into Damien’s life carrying problems. A sick father. Hospital bills. Two jobs. Financial problems. Family problems.

Then I’d somehow managed to add stalkers, blackmailers, angry billionaires, and a violent psychopath to the list.

And Damien had paid for almost all of it. He’d lost his inheritance. He’d been cut off from his family. He’d sacrificed the future he’d been raised to inherit. Now his parents were freezing his accounts. And his solution was to get a job.

Because of me.

I turned my head and looked at him. Even asleep, Damien looked composed. His hair had fallen messily across his forehead, and the tension that usually lived around his eyes had disappeared in sleep. He looked younger like this. Less like the cold, untouchable man everyone feared. More like the boy who had spent years trying to survive his own family.

My chest hurt. I loved him. That was the problem. I loved him so much that the thought of being the reason his life was falling apart felt unbearable. I had spent so much time worrying about whether Damien would leave me.

Now, for the first time, I wondered whether I should be the one to leave.

The thought came quietly. So quietly that I almost ignored it. Maybe if I wasn’t here, his parents would stop fighting him.

Maybe if there was no Oliver Reyes attached to his name, there would be nothing left for them to punish him over. Maybe he could get his inheritance back. Maybe he could repair things with his family.

Maybe he could go back to the life he’d had before me. Even as if his family were nothing more than rich abusive fucks, if he went back to them...would he be happier?

The thought made my stomach twist. I hated it. I hated myself for even considering it. I shifted slightly, careful not to wake him.

Damien’s arm tightened around me instinctively. Even asleep, he held on. That nearly broke me. I pressed my face against his chest and closed my eyes.

No.

Not tonight.

I couldn’t make that decision tonight. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe when I was thinking clearly. Maybe when the fear wasn’t sitting so heavily inside my chest. But the thought had already found a place in my mind. And once a thought like that got comfortable, it was difficult to make it leave. Damien had promised we’d be fine. I wanted to believe him.

God, I wanted to believe him. But lying there in the darkness, listening to the person I loved breathe while his family slowly dismantled the life he’d been born into, I couldn’t stop wondering whether loving me was costing him too much.

He had promised we would be fine.

I just wasn’t sure anymore that "we" wasn’t the main problem he needed to solve.

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