MY KING AND MY PROTECTOR

"I don't want this, I said, I don't want this!"

With tears glistening in my sapphire eyes, my miserable voice echoed in the room, only to receive a glare from my mother.

"Shut up, Eliana. Do you have any idea what the hell you are saying? Tomorrow is your wedding and that is final." She growled, pushing me away.

She refused to listen as we were being forced. My ex-boyfriend, Kyle, was threatening me to marry him.

And I couldn't... because my heart belonged to someone else.

"Please, try to understand, Mama, I can't!"

"Why!?"

"Why don't you get it?! I just can't!"

My black hair was messy, scattered over my back as I shook my head in denial, refusing to bind my life with a man I no longer loved.

It was all forced and unwanted on my side. 

I didn't want this!

"I can't do this, please, don't do this to me, Mama," 

Whispering weakly, I wiped my gleaming tears and pleaded with her yet it was unheard. My tears or anger had no effect. 

They were determined to make me marry Kyle which I didn't want at all cost, not when my feelings for him were non-existent. 

"Dear, please try to understand, that man is threatening your father. If you don't get married- what if he does something horrible?" 

She made a failed attempt to make me listen and obey quietly, to which I scoffed, folding my arms at my chest out of stubbornness.

"I don't care,"

"What is wrong with you? Why are you doing this?!" 

Done with my whining, she grabbed my arm, losing her patience when I persistently declined their demand of forcing me into an undesirable marriage with an unstable man.

And to worsen my state, the door knocked and the man I least wanted to see came, causing my heart to skip a beat. 

The one with ruthless silver eyes, hard features perfectly combed pitch-black hair, and a beard entered dominantly.

Not bothering to look at me, he called my mother.

"Mrs. Duke,"

"Ah, Denzel, thank God, you are finally here. Please, make her listen, tell her to marry Kyle quietly," 

She smiled in relief when the only person who could make me agree came and that fact brought a tear near my eyelids.

He wouldn't do that to me, right?

Narrowing my blue gaze, I wanted him to look at me which he didn't, inducing a strange ache as he approached us slowly.

"I will,"

What...?

Pulling away, I grit my teeth in frustration, not accepting this as my fate.

Especially not when the one I wanted was before me!

"When I have said I won't then I won't," 

I declared in a hiss that made his jaw clenched, earning a flinch from me.

"Your father is in the hospital because of the heart attack, stop being selfish at least now and-"

Before she could use emotional attacks to force me to marry he cut her off by raising his one hand in the air and resting the other in the pocket of his black pants.

"Mrs. Duke, calm down, I will talk to her. Please give us a few moments to be alone,"

"Okay..." 

Shaking her head in disappointment, she didn't argue further and walked away as my body shivered when we were alone in my room.

The button of his white shirt was opened, revealing his toned chest and power with perfectly rolled sleeves. 

He had always been devilishly handsome. 

Liting up his cigarette, he rolled his eyes as if me or my feelings never mattered to him and stopped before me. 

"Hmm? What is your problem?"

"Wh- what?"

"Why don't you want to marry Kyle?"

Releasing the smoke I hate, his tone demanded an answer but my chest constricted upon receiving such coldness from his side.

"He is rich, he wants you, doing everything for you. He will keep you happy. Then what seems to be the issue?" 

"How can you say this?"

With a trembling posture and gaped mouth, I stared at him in disbelief as he spoke so heartlessly that my mind shut down.

"You can't be serious. How can you allow this marriage to happen in the first place?"

He smoked calmly as I weakly whimpered.

"Stop it, stop him, stop this all, Denzel! I don't want this!"

"You are going to marry him and that is final,"

"No... no,"

With a tear coming near my eyelid, I whispered sorrowfully, praying he would understand.  

"I don't want him, I want you, Denzel,"

...But to no avail. 

"I am thirty and you are twenty-two, you are so much younger than me, Eliana. Plus, I have never seen you from a romantic perspective,"

A tear rolled down my cheek followed by a ceased functioning due to sorrow. 

"You and I were never anything, snap out of it,"

"What...?"