Dark Redemption Ch. 16

Thanks everyone, for all your feedback during this series. I am starting a new one, and I will take all the suggestions on board.

Warm regards

Barbra

Dark Redemption - Final

Exactly as he asked me to, I am standing outside the door of Peter's office, at the precise time appointed. I am nervous and excited as I always am when I meet with Peter under these circumstances, but perhaps a little more so this time, because of all that has gone on between us in the past week or so.

I knock on the door.

"Come in Anna." Peter's words are simple but there is the same strength in his tone that I love.

As I walk in I remember that day, so many years ago when I first walked in and saw Peter in his office. I was a different woman then, and I had none of the depth of feeling or passion that I have today. Even in the few seconds I have to think like this it seems like an eternity since that woman existed.

Peter stands from behind his desk, and as he is walking toward me my heartbeat starts to race. He takes my hand, and guides me to the couch in his office and sits me down.

"I know that usually under these circumstances Anna, we have special games that we play. I know that part of you" here he glances down at my lap "will be excited about what it means when I send you a note like I did today. And we will play that game my beautiful Anna, my dark queen. But first I have to tell you something about myself, and I need you to listen and then to talk to me about how you feel. If you still want to, after that we can play our games."

Intuitively I started to squirm in my belly. I had a feeling I knew what might be coming. I have longed to speak with Peter about this ever since it happened and yet now that I feel he is going to confess to me, I feel like I don't want to hear it. I want our lovemaking and I just want it all to go away.

"Anna, I know that you have felt a distance between us. I know that you have worked hard and brought us a lot of pleasure in the last few days to bring us close together again." He started to look more like a boy and less like a man. "I have to tell you, my love, that I failed you. I have failed you in a moment of crises."

As he speaks to me, Peter is holding my hand and the warmth and the building distress in his voice have me hold it tight and stroke it to give him some comfort and security. Part of me knows what he is going to say, and that I will have my own confessional, but I need to let him speak. Telling me this is essential to rebuilding between us.

"Anna, A few weeks ago I drifted in the intimacy between us. I did not cheat on you physically, but I have flirted with another woman. I sent and received text messages with her and I met her once, in a pub, a week ago. I have not seen her since and had so much trouble with my own integrity over that moment that I have ended it with her and clearly told her that I felt I was acting beneath my own standards. But that is not all. I have been searching for something. Something that was in bed next to me, but for a moment I thought had been lost to me. I was looking for the darkness between us. That darkness that has always been my salvation. For some reason Anna, I could not find it. And I am ashamed to say that instead of talking with you and working a way to bring it into our lives again, I escaped into other worlds and took an easy path with a difficult problem."

I feel so sorry for him at this moment. So sorry for the pain he must be feeling. I know that he must feel foolish and troubled. But I also know this moment is so important for us. He has to face what he has been and how close he came to destroying the most precious thing that we both have. God knows I love Peter but I do him no favors rescuing him from this.

"Now I am here, with you. We have a few hours before we have to get our children, and then life will just go on. I need to talk with you, and I need to find a way to re connect with who we really are."

He is looking at me expectantly and I know that I have to come up with my own confession now. I will have to tell him what has been happening to me.

"Peter, I know that you met with that woman. I followed you that day. I am as ashamed of myself today as I was that day, but there was something in me crying out for you and I wanted to know why I couldn't reach you. I stood in the rain across the road from you, and I witnessed every moment you had with her."

The look of horror on Peter's face was all the confirmation that I needed to see he could understand all the pain that I had been going through. This was my moment. The courage, the rage, the fear, the sadness, all the horrible little moments I had inflicted on myself were at crises point. And this was the minute in time when everything was going to change for Peter and I. Change again, and change for the better, I just knew it.

"Anna, my god. You have endured this whole, what is it, a little over a week now, with this pain? You said nothing? You did not confront me? You did not fight with me? How could you be this patient with me? How could you make love to me, reach out for me, feed me your dark side when I had done this in front of you?"

I suddenly felt enveloped with a ferocious protectiveness that compared with nothing I had experienced before.

"Because you are mine. I don't have or want anyone else. You understand me, and you call me forth; but most of all Peter, you know my darkness. You know the place where I am strong, and you don't fear it. You may be weak, and you may lapse in your judgment, but I ache for you in the darkest of places, and my torment is I am chained to that place and to you forever. There is no redemption for me but us and our dark love."

I can feel the tears streaming down my face and coupled with my intensity I know I make a desperate looking figure. But that is who I am. I am desperate. This man, this life, this is everything to me, and I will fight like a lioness to defend it and I will use everything in my power to protect it.

"You Peter, you woke up this part of me. And you tried to put it to bed out of fear, as if it can be turned on and off like a tap. You thought it would make us better parents to become ordinary folk for the first time in our lives. What do you think now? That one act almost cost us our marriage. Our Marriage. The most important precious thing in the world to me."

"My god Anna! You are right. I stole it from you, and I stole it from us. I was so scared I could not be a good father; I had to stifle you in the process of taking a kind of control. And then when I can't feed off you in the night anymore, I turn on you."

The intensity of the situation causes us both to stop and to reflect for just a moment. Everything is pouring out of me. Every feeling I've had, every frustration and all my pent up lost love. I want him so much, but I want him my way. Our way. I never want to compromise for or with Peter again.

"Peter, I won't accept your guilt just as I would not accept your wandering mind. Now is the time to be a man. Now is the time to be my man." Turning to him, I stare straight into his eyes. "Promise me that I have you for a second time and that you will never try to limit us or close down what is precious between us again."

Moved by the profound moment, Peter stands in front of me and takes my hand. He lifts me to my feet.

"Anna, my beautiful queen, my most perfect Anna. I apologize once only, here and now for my behavior. I promise you, once only, here and now, it will never happen again. I declare in this moment that you are my wife, my dream come true and everything I have ever wanted. Indeed Anna, you are more than I knew how to want. I promise you with everything inside me that I will never again let fear dominate our life in any way. Tell me you have forgiven me, accept me again as I am, and let me make love to you."

Smiling, I am so happy. So completely thrilled to be here with this man that I love and sharing this moment together. Everything inside me wants to burst open with thankfulness that I had the courage to be who I was and not let this glorious man control us when he was at his weakest point. I am proud of myself and very happy with the result of my efforts. No more sadness and no more misery.

"Peter, I do forgive you and I believe you when you say to me that you will not let this happen to us again. We met when the earth was forged at the birth of its days, and we belong together. We always have, and we always will."

He leans in without a word and kisses me. The passion between us is a fireball stretching from heaven using us as a conduit running through to the core of the earth. There is endlessness about our kisses, an eternity that speaks more than our words could, and connects us again in the place where our souls meet.

Peter made love to me that afternoon and I had never known such bliss. We have never had a problem since and I do not expect that we ever will. Our children are happy and emotionally healthy and seem to have no apparent scars from having closet wild parents.

But inside myself, I never forgot that week. I still say that to some it may appear to be such a small problem, but when one stands for a certain thing, the devil is in the detail. It was my strength of character that got Peter and I through that moment and brought us back stronger than ever. And it was Peter's strength of character that had him see the error of his ways and correct himself, rather than defend a foolishness that was robbing him of everything he had. Who knows how much worse it could have been if it were not for the power of the darkness in side of us, and our own commitment to a kind of redemption.