“And then there’s this design, which is a personal favorite of mine…” Amy continued to talk to the couple, who were viewing the home being designed for them.  Today, it was the master bedroom.
     Serena yawned.  She was here only because she had nothing better to do.  Because if she didn’t have this meeting, she would have had to go to Global, Inc. and have to face Darien again.
     It was odd enough.
     Yesterday, after she had mentioned her father, they both felt a slight strain on their conversation.
     Inside of her, there was another seed born, filled with a bitterness at having been tossed aside, for all these years.
     To be alone, to not have his friendship.
     Every time she thought of it, it hurt.
     And she couldn’t forgive him for it.
     To take her youthful heart, and cast it aside, for a sum of cold green paper.
     She was furious.
     How dare he come back into her life?  How dare he come to try to win her back?  Never again, she vowed.  Never again would she put her
heart on the line, for a greedy S.O.B.
     He would not get to her, as he had so many years before.
     He would not get to her heart, and crush it, letting it bleed, and washing the blood off so easily.
     Not this time.
     She smiled to Amy, as Amy continued to talk to the customers.
     Serena felt a sting as she saw yet another happy couple begin a new life, discussing their little house of dreams.  Why was it never her?
     Why did she have to cast it all aside?
     Because of him.
     She clenched her fist.  *Forget him.*

     “I wanted the contracts TODAY!!!!!!” Darien shouted.
     “Darien!”  Lita scolded.  “What’s going on with you?” she asked, her eyes flashing dangerously.
     Darien looked at Lita dazedly.  What was he doing?
     “Um…sorry Lita…” he turned form the window to let his gaze scan the table of board members, who all looked at him with confusion.
     Andrew Plots and Kenneth Blackstone were looking at each other, and obviously considering the change.
     “Look, um, sorry.  Forget it.  I’m tired.  Let’s just postpone the rest of this meeting.  I’ve got some pressing matters to attend to.”
     As the board all thankfully got up and left, Drew and Ken sank back in their chairs, and Lita stood up.  “Darien?  What’s going on?”
     “Nothing…” he said, turning back to look out the window.
     “Don’t give me that crap…” Andrew said, standing up.  “Something’s bugging you.”
     “Nothing’s bothering me,” Darien said, clenching his jaw.
     “I can hardly believe THAT…” Ken said, leaning back in his chair.  “You’ve been like this the past few days.”
     “Look my life is my business, all right?”
     “That’s crap…” Drew argued, “Your business is affecting OUR business now.”
     “Just leave me alone, okay?” Darien turned around, his face pale with fury, his hand clenched.  His voice was dangerously low.
     The other three in the room looked at each other, and got out of the room.  Just when Lita was about to exit the room, she said softy, “Serena Hilton canceled tomorrow’s appointment…”
     Darien swore, and Lita closed the door quickly.  The minute the door clicked, Lita burst out in a trail of foul language.
     Ken took her in his arms, “It’s all right, Lita.  He’s not mad at you…just at the circumstance…whatever it is…”

     Darien put his hands to his hair as he tore his gaze from the window to his dark office.
     Anger flashed in his eyes, though he looked calm.
     She hadn’t called, she had deliberately ignored him…even in the business aspect.  And now, it was pissing him off.
     After SHE had made the mistake of mentioning her father, he had tried to ignore it, but she evidently had some misconception and turned
into a statue.
     After that, she had started this game of ignoring him.
     She ought to be the one to apologize, to believe that her father was so much a better person than him…
     The rat.  That old S.O.B. ruined HIS life.  And he was going to have to correct it.

     Walking through the frame of the building, with a hard hat on her head, she scowled at the sun.  It was too warm, too bright.
     The headquarters were being built at a very good pace.  Serena had hurried along the construction.  She wanted the project done as soon as it could be completed.
     She wanted Darien Calloway out of her life forever…as soon as possible.
     She relaxed, and closed her eyes.  Just a few more hours, and she’d go home, and relax.
     She’s call her father, and talk to him, have him tease her about marrying some duke in England, with some ridiculous life plan in store for her, and hang up…at least one man in her life still loved her.

     Darien Calloway was tired, and very mad.
     Driving up the long gravel driveway of the Hilton residence, he remembered how years ago, he had stormed out, with the eyes of Philip Hilton, narrowed, staring at his back.
     If the man could, he would have killed Calloway then.  And right then, Calloway would have killed Philip Hilton.  Buying his daughter’s life?  Never!
     He got out of the Jag he had rented, and removed his sunglasses, staring at the forbidding house.  He then walked up the sidewalk, and rang the bell.
     He was watched in the upper window, through old eyes.
     What was that bastard doing on HIS property?  He clenched his fist.  Years ago, he thought he had gotten rid of the pest.  And now, life was going to be perfect.  He had the perfect son-in-law lined up…Lord Melvin Ericson…a true husband for his daughter.  Of course, Serena didn’t know.  She was still foolishly hiding in that pathetic little sphere she called her “life”.  But she’d see, soon, that life had so much more to offer than designing HOUSES!  He’d lead his daughter back home…or rather, to England, where she could lead the life of a princess, showing off the true lady that she was…not some genius she pretended to be.
    No, he’d waited so long, planned for so long, to have his plan ruined by the stable boy.  He nearly had a heart attack when he saw the doors open at the Rose Charity…to see his daughter…and that SWINE walking down the red carpet together, as if they were EQUALS!!!  And when the paper had printed a photo of the two, on the front page, he had burned the paper, canceled his subscription…there was no worthy news these days.
     So Darien Calloway was a rich guy now, huh?  The founder and president of Global Inc?  That could be fixed.  Everything could be fixed.  His company would sink, burn, and be buried so deep that the stable boy couldn’t possibly see what had happened.
     He had to admit, the boy was persistent, but not unbreakable.

     Darien took in a breath as he entered the building.
     When he was younger, he’d thought the place was a palace.
     Having been around the world, and having stayed at palaces…real palaces, he thought the place rather lacking in warmth.  There was no real grandness in emptiness.
     As he was shown up the staircase, to Philip Hilton’s deskroom, he could see it in his mind.  That night, so long ago, the room had seemed a large world, an inaccessible world.  He wondered if Philip Hilton still made it so.
     He entered the room to see the chair turned away from him.  He walked in, and heard the old raspy cold voice, “So you’re back…”
     “I’m back, and this time, I’m staying…”
     Philip turned, facing the young man with critical eyes.  “No, you aren’t.”
     “It was her choice, years ago, and it is still her choice.  Don’t ruin it, Hilton.  Don’t ruin her life.  I don’t know what you told her so long ago…”
     “She never really liked you, you know.  I was saving her.  You had NOTHING to give her…”
     “I loved her!” Darien yelled at him.  “I loved her, and I was on my way.  I knew I was going to do well.  I knew I was going to make it.”
     “You bastard!  You only made it to piss me off, but watch it, Calloway, I will destroy you…you’re nothing but that penniless scoundrel you were before…once and always, Calloway.”
     “You’ve kept us far apart long enough, Hilton.  I don’t know what you told her, but I’m telling her what I know…what REALLY happened.”
     “Oh, she won’t believe you.  You think she’d trust YOU, the man who hurt her, over her father, who dotes on her?”
     “Is this about seeing what’s best for Serena, or what’s best for you?”
     “Dammit, she MY daughter, and she’s already screwed up her life.  A career?  That’s not what’s best for her.  She’s going to get married, to someone I approve of, and she’s going to like her life, the life I choose for her.  You think you love her, but to you, it’s all about winning.  Nothing is thicker than blood, got that, Calloway?  Nothing is thicker than blood!”
     “You’re wrong.  Serena needs more than money to satisfy her, she needs love.”
     “Love isn’t enough for anyone, Calloway!” Philip yelled at the young man.  “It never is!”
     “Only because you don’t have a heart.”
     “No S.O.B. is going to tell me I have no heart!”
     “Then why didn’t you let the first Mrs. Hilton have some of it?  And why is the second Mrs. Hilton seeking divorce so soon after her own daughter got married?” Darien asked.
     “Don’t you DARE say anything about my life!” Philip screamed.  He picked up a paperweight, and threw it at Darien.
     Darien caught it swiftly.  He was panting now, and his fist was clenched hard around the paperweight, which was threatening to collapse from the pure tension the fist exerted on it.  Violence was in his blood, and his head was pounding.  He set the weight down on the table.  Looking away, he started to walk to the door.  “I’m going to get her back, Hilton.  I’m going to win her.  Not you, not anyone else.  She’s mine…always has been, and always will be.”
     Philip stood up, “You didn’t really love her, you bastard.  You just think you did.  It was her money!  And now, she’s a trophy!  You don’t WANT her, Calloway!  You don’t love her!”
     As the boy walked out the door, and slammed it close, Philip Hilton sank back in his chair, swearing.  The boy was going to sink, burn and die.

     “Hello?”
     “Hiya Daddy!”
     “Hello Pumpkin!”  Philip said, smiling into the phone, erasing Calloway’s visit from his memory.
     “Are you okay, daddy?”
     “Yes, fine, why do you ask?”
     “Oh, you just sounded kinda stressed out.  I was wondering if you were all right…with the…the…”  *divorce* she completed her in her mind.  Raye’s mother had filed for divorce not a week ago, and she knew her father must have been suffering.
     Philip Hilton was stretched thin.  He’d spent the last hour assigning private investigators on Darien Calloway, and organizing a plan to upset Global Inc.  Darien was gong to sink, and soon.  “No, I just had some important business to discuss…”
     “Must be very important…your line’s been busy for the last hour or so…”
     “It was of impending nature…so Pumpkin, can you come to England with me next weekend?”
     “No Daddy, I’ve got a very important project I’ve been working on…”
     “Oh?”
     “Yes, it’s the new headquarters of Global, Inc.  I told you about it before…right?”
     “Yes, that’s right…”  Another thing he had to take care of.  “Honey, why don’t you take some time off?  I’m sure that Lord Ericson would love to see you again…”
     “I’m sorry Daddy, but even you agree…business comes first.  I’ll visit you some other time…”  *When Mel’s not around…he scares me…*
     “Yes, some other time then…” he said, trying to sound calm.  Inwardly, he cursed Darien Calloway again.
     “I’m sorry Daddy, I’ve got to get going…I have to work on some contracts…”
     *Undoubtedly the bastard’s…*  “Well, then I’ll talk to you later.  Good night, honey…”
     “Good night, Daddy.  Love you…”
     He tried to say it.  But he couldn’t.  “Good night, sweetheart.”
     He hung up, and leaned back in his chair.  So much like her mother, wasn’t she?  Bitterly, he sat in the dark room, brooding.

     Darien slammed down the phone once more.
     Dammit!  This had to be the twentieth day in a row “Miss Hilton was in a meeting”.
     She was avoiding him.
     She was rejecting him.
     He’d tried sending roses a couple of weeks ago.  They were sent back to him, the card unopened.
     It infuriated him.
     Well, if she was going to be so rude about it…
     He knew that he ought to just forget about her…but he couldn’t.
     He couldn’t shake the feeling.  He told her father that he loved her.  Did he really?  In all his years, he had known there was a special place for Serena, but it had never been love before, had it?
     There was some truth in Hilton’s words, though.  Painfully, he was ashamed to admit it.  Part of the reason he came back was to show Hilton…was hurting Hilton’s daughter on his list of things to do?  Or did she get caught in the cross-fire?
     Or was she the focus of the fight?
     Regardless of what was going on, Darien had to win.  He told her father that he was going to win her.  He had to now.
     He had no idea why Serena possessed such a HATE for him…but he remembered that she had loved him, that she had cared about him, and she still did, didn’t she?  Didn’t she?
     He knew crap right now.  He swore, and tried to concentrate on his work.

     “Fine, we drop the red roses on the table…but what do we use as centerpieces?”
     “I don’t know, why don’t we try white lilies?  Those are nice…”
     “Yeah, in a glass vase, on top of a square black tablecloth, that just goes over the edges, and then we could have the white tablecloth underneath…that’d look very classy…you know, I could get black ribbon around the neck of the vases…”
     “Great idea, Mina…” Lita smiled, as Mina started to scribble down on the yellow legal pad in front of her.
     The phone rang, and Lita picked it up.  “Yes Hana?”
     “Miss Hilton’s here to see you…”
     “Oh yes!  Send her in…” Lita said, checking her watch.  It WAS time for the appointment.
     “Well, I guess our time’s up…”
     “No, you stay Mina.  You’ll want to meet Serena.”
     Mina smiled, and got up to pour her self some more coffee.  It was an exhaustive meeting.  Planning the fancy inaugural dinner of the new headquarters was exhausting.
     Serena entered, her portfolio under her arm.  It had been a month since she had last seen Darien Calloway, and she was prepared today…to do her business, and to get out as soon as possible.  She was here for necessity’s sake, not for him.
     Lita smiled at the woman, who now wore a burgundy suit, and gray blouse.  Her hair was pulled back tightly in a chignon, and her glasses were on.  Serena looked rigidly professional.  “Serena, this is Mina Plots.”
     “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Plots,” she held out her hand.
     “Call me Mina…” she shook hands.
     “Now, down to business.  Mina and I were just working on the lavish party we’re gong to throw when the headquarters’ built.”
     “Not for another year, ladies…” Serena sighed, sitting down.
     “The five year anniversary party was planned a year and half in advance…” Mina laughed.  “We’re futuristic thinkers…that, and we’re just very excited about it…”
     “Anyway,” Lita put them back on business.  “I haven’t seen you for a month or so.  How’s the progress?”
     “Beautiful.  I’ve been down to Denver to check progress.  It’s going great.  The contractors are doing well, and weather has been favorable for building.  The frame’s all up, and now they’re starting with the brick and glass.”
     “And you received the contracts?”
     “Yes…I got them from the messenger.”
     “And now, I must request a copy of the government contracts…Darien’s been bugging me about those for a while…”
     “I’m sorry about that…” Serena said, reaching into her portfolio, and taking the copies out.  “Here, this is your copy.”
     “GREAT!  He’ll be off my back now…”
     “And get on mine…” Mina muttered.
     Serena wanted to laugh.  “Should I be glad I don’t work for you?”
    “You should be extremely grateful.  That guy has a TEMPER these days…I think he should get some more sleep…he’s driving us ALL up the
wall.”
     The phone rang.
     Lita paused, and picked it up, “Hello?”
     Serena smiled to Mina, as Mina came and sat down next to her, in the empty chair.
     “Yes, I got the contracts, just now….no, she’s here.  She brought them herself.  We have a meeting today, didn’t I tell you?”
     Serena froze as Lita looked at her.
     Uh oh.
     She started to stand up, “I have another meeting in fifteen minutes, across town.  I’ve got to get going.  Sorry…”
     Mina stood up, “But we just got started…”
     “I know, and I’m really sorry, but I thought I was just dropping off the contracts today, so I’ve got to get going.  I’ll see you both soon…maybe we can have lunch together some time.  Nice meeting you Mina…” she said all in one breath, and practically kicked the door open.
     Lita and Mina looked at each other.
     “Hello?  Hello?” Lita said into the phone.  The dial tone came back on.  Darien had hung up.

     She had to get to the parking lot fast.  She quickly grabbed the keys out of her purse, her hands trembling.  She had to get away, now.
     She pressed the down button more urgently.
     Finally the elevator doors opened, and she jumped back in fear as Darien stood in the middle of the elevator.
     He grabbed her arm, pulled in, and the elevator doors closed.
    She tried to get away.
     He held onto her arm, his whole being suspended at the look of pain upon her face.  There was a feeling for her, deep within himself…now if he knew what it was…
     She was ready to cry, “Let go of me, please…” she pleaded.
     “Not this time…” he said.
     As the elevator started to move, he pulled the fire button, and the elevator halted.  The stop hit her from beneath, and she felt as if she had slammed into a brick wall.
     Serena’s heart thudded.  This couldn’t be happening.
     She started to pace.  “Are you claustrophobic?” she asked rhetorically.  “Please, I am.  Let me off, please?”
     Darien took her hands in his and looked at her.  “Serena, you’ve been avoiding me for the past month.  I’ve tried to get a hold of you every single day… you can’t possibly be at a meeting 24-7.  What’s going on?”
     “I’ve been busy…”
     “Bull…”
     “I just don’t want to talk to you, all right?” she said, trying to get around his body to press the release button.
     “Wrong answer.  We need to talk.”  Darien said.
     “Darien, you’re scaring me…”
     “I’m not trying to hurt you.  I just want some answers.”
     “I want some too!” she said, finally caving in to his request.  Fury was lining her cheeks.  “You want to talk?  Then talk!  Tell me why you decided to tear a girl’s heart out with your bare hands?  Tell me why you thought to go against everything I thought you believed in?  Tell me why you decided to take MONEY over our friendship?  You hurt me so much, Darien!  I loved you!  I loved you so much, and you just slapped me in the face, when you took that money, and never came back,” she started to cry, hitting him hard on his chest, beating against it, as he tried to hold her.  “No, don’t try that now, you jerk!  You have some nerve!  Asking me to talk, when I deserve the explanation!  Do you have any idea how much it took me to come here, to work for YOU?  Aren’t you just enjoying it, now?  Serena Hilton, who used to be so above you, WORKING for you!  Ha!  That must give you some twisted happiness, shouldn’t it?  A triumph?  To use my family’s own money to build a success, and flaunt it in my face?  Do you have any idea how much I HATE you now?”
     Darien jumped back.  It all came out in that fiery spirit, screaming before him.  Serena took advantage of the moment to press the button again.
     The elevator started to moving again.
     Serena patiently, angrily waited at the doors.
     “Is that what he told you?” he asked, anger coming into his own pale face, sparking in his eye.
     Had Serena looked, she might have seen an honest pain in his eyes.  However, she didn’t look.  She was too disgusted.
     The elevator doors opened.  “It’s called the truth.  You should take stock to it, some time,” she said, getting off the elevator.

     Laying back in her bathtub, closing her eyes, she tried not to let tears come.
     She shouldn’t shed any tears.  There wasn’t any reason to.  Not over him.  Not over anything.
     She looked at the candles she had placed by the bathtub, as the flames got blurry in her eyes.  “No, you crybaby…”
     If her father were here, he’d tell her that Darien Calloway was a sneaky little bastard, who was just twisting the knife.  If her father were here, she’d be better right now, since he would take her in his lap, like he did that night so long ago, to tell her the truth about Darien Calloway.  He’d comfort her, call her his “little Princess”, and she’d be strong again.
     If her father were here, she couldn’t have even gotten herself into this mess.
     Maybe he was right.  Maybe it was time she just got herself out of all this business…and settled down.  In a nice relaxed life, she wouldn’t have to deal with this messy crap anymore.  Life would be set, organized.
     But would it be enough?
     Serena kneaded the muscles in her arms, and shoulders, and then leaned back in the tub.  It wasn’t enough before…she could never be what her father had wanted. She couldn’t stay around, taking in champagne and caviar everyday, when there was so much more to life than that…she had to have the excitement of seeing herself accomplished, in brick, glass, stone.  She wanted solid evidence that Serena Hilton got things done.  She wanted that.  She wanted more than to just be some wife to a rich lord in England.  She didn’t want a title…she wanted to build them.  She never wanted to live in a huge manor…she just wanted to design them.  She didn’t want her future to be a clam little existence in the English countryside, because that was not Serena Hilton.
     The Warfield Tower in Chicago, the Rhyswieler Building in New York, the headquarters of Treflyn Air, the Grosvenor Hotels in Paris, London, Rome, New York, the Fairview Mall in Dallas, the FDR Airport…they were all Serena Hilton.  Serena Hilton was a signature that COMMISIONED dreams and enterprise.  It was not one that LIVED them.
     And now, after so may years of finding her center, her life, she’d found it to be destroyed by some insolent jerk from a long time ago, when Serena Hilton was still a weak little girl, who was trying to find out who she was.
     It just didn’t add up…it didn’t make sense.  Darien was so…so different from all those stupid snobs with slickum hair in “her society”.  He was down-at-Earth…once, she had believed that synonymous with “honest”.  Evidently, she was wrong.
     How could he?

     “And in national news, it is said that the Federal Trade Commission is starting investigation in Global, Inc.  The highly successful trade corporation is starting to take blows, as some rumors have been going around about the possibility of insider trading in the successful company.  Started only seven years ago, the company has taken over two hundred companies in these past three years alone.  Darien Calloway, founder and CEO of GI…”
     Darien turned off the TV.  *What the hell is going on?*
     The words echoed in his mind…*I will destroy you…you’re nothing but that penniless scoundrel you were before…once and always, Calloway.*
     He ripped the tie from around his neck and threw it across the room, swearing.  *He can’t do this to me…He KNOWS this is all wrong…*
     Philip Hilton would stop at nothing until Darien Calloway was back in his hell, burning away.  He wanted to scream at him, he wanted to show Serena.  But would she believe him?
     When he saw her, those teary eyes, crying to him, screaming “I loved you!” he felt confusion.  This was love.  This miserable feeling of being lower than life.
     His own heart was tangled in webs of revenge and hate.  But through it, he had seen that he needed Serena’s trust.  Somehow, it made him feel restless not to know she didn’t give him it.  But he had to tell her what happened, and she would believe him.
     She had to.

     The knock came at around two thirty in the morning.
     About an hour ago, after getting yet another call from Darien Calloway, she had disconnected her phone.
     Swearing, she pulled on a sweatshirt over her oversize T-shirt, and some sweatpants.
     He hadn’t woken her up.
     She knew he’d come, somewhere, inside her, she had just felt it.
     Walking to the door, she breathed in deeply.  *Fight it, girl.*
     She had seen the reports on TV just a few hours ago, and happily slammed down the wine as fast as she could find it.
     Celebration left her with a large headache now.
     She opened the door, and peeked out into the lighted hall.
     “I want to talk to you…”
     “I’m getting a restraining order on you…” she warned.
     “Hear me out.  I heard you.  It’s my turn.”
     “You deserve no turn, you bastard.  I want no more business with you.  The minute your headquarters is up, it’s goodbye Darien Calloway, forever.”
     “Dammit Serena let me it!”
     “You’ve given me no good reason…”
     “Because I can’t go anywhere right now.  The press has been hounding me all night so far.  They’re right outside my apartment building, and I had to sneak out to get here.  Some people are already here, waiting downstairs.  I need to rest.  Just let me rest.  And while I do, we can talk…” He knew he had hit a weak spot.  Serena always pitied victims of the press.
     The feeling that had come over her when she saw his name on the news was at first joy at restitution…he was finally going to suffer for his crimes.  Then, it was a pity, and a shame.  A shame she felt when she realized her former friend capable of such crimes, as capable of them as he was as breaking her heart.  Pity was for that small part of her who still, to her own mortification, loved him.
     He was being very brave, facing the public like this. “Fine.  You’ve got fifteen minutes,” she opened the door.
     He entered, and looked around the darkness, “Living like a bat, are we?” he asked, lightly, trying to find a light-switch.
     As he found one, he flipped it on, and Serena cringed at the light.  “Dammit Darien, don’t do that!”
     He looked at her in the light.  Her pupils were dilated, and her whole body seemed out of whack, in some way.  Her whole being seemed drenched in alcohol.  “Living like a drunk too as well?”
     “Shut up, and get on with it.  Or I’m just going back, and going to get some sleep.”
     Darien looked at her, sitting down.  Silence was a wall between them.
     Serena did not know what to say.  Alcohol impaired her vision, her thinking.  It was still trying to register that Darien Calloway was now sitting in her apartment, trying to explain something.
     Finally, he spoke.  “You probably don’t think much of me.”
     “You’re right about that…” she said.
     “I want to explain myself.”
     “You mean there’s an explanation?” she asked, sarcastically.  “What is there to explain?  My father offered you cash.  You took it.”
     “There’s so much more to that, though,” Darien sighed.  “Serena, I never took the cash.”
     “Liar.  My father said you did.”
     “Your father hated my guts…”
     “He had more sense than I did, evidently.”
     “He didn’t like me for the sole reason that I was poor, and that I encouraged you to be yourself…”
     “Bull…”
     “Admit it, Serena.  He never wanted you to have a career as an architect.  He never wanted you to live on your own in Seattle.  I bet he had a husband all lined up for you when you got out of high school…”
    Serena tried to gather the words in her head, trying to form her own thoughts.
     “He hated me for the reason that I was poor.  He hated me for the reason that I was the stable boy.  He assumed I’d never get any farther than that.  And he trusted society to bring me down.”
     “Shut up!” she cried.
     “When he saw me kiss you, he went insane.  He asked me into his office, and offered me a sum of cash, if I’d walk away.  He offered a huge amount, Serena.”
     “He told me about it…you accepted it.”
     “Why did he offer it in the first place, Serena?  Do you think a father just DOES that to any guy?  Pay people off?  He bought you off, didn’t he?”
     Denial was streaming in her blood, and down her cheeks, but truth slammed her body to reality.  Serena remembered…that night, when her father had reluctantly promised her that she could go to college, and pursue her career, and leave Darien behind…
     “Your father’s a manipulative jerk!”
     “I love my father.  He’s in my blood, which is the least that I could say for you!” she cried.
     “You loved me once, Serena.”
     “I was young and foolish.”
     “From the moment I saw you enter my life again, that evening, I haven’t been able to get you out of my head.  Serena, I loved you too, and I would have scorned all the money in the world if I could have just kept you in my life…” he looked at her.  The realization hit him across the chest.  It was the truth.  He HAD loved her.  Now, looking at that hurt in her eyes, he wanted to take all the bitterness she felt, and throw it away, or take it himself.  Back then, and even now.  She was gold then, and she still was.
     Surprise was coursing through her system.  Not now.  It was too late.  “You are kidding yourself.  You hardly know me.”
     “I know you.  You’re Serena Hilton, the girl at the stables.”
     “I’m a lot more than THAT…” she said coldly.
     “Yes, you certainly are, but underneath it all, you’re still the same little girl, out to please everyone.  You probably still love to eat apples, and you love chocolate.  You still cry at movies…even knowing what’s going to happen…sometimes only because you KNOW what will happen.  You love thunderstorms, as long as you’re watching them from inside, but even then you refuse to be safe, and just watch from a high level window.  You’re Serena.  I know you.  I loved you.  I still do,” he took her face in his hands.  The eyes were beautiful polished sapphire, filled with water.  She was so delicate, her soul seemed made of glass.  Just to win her…he’d
lose.  He’d let her father take away all his money, and he’d live in poverty for her, with her, just to prove that she was the most important thing to him.
     He had let her go before, and he wasn’t going to do so again.
     She turned away her face before he could kiss her.
     He backed away.  “Give me another chance…”
     She looked at him.  “How can I?”
     “Then at least believe me…”
     “I…can’t…”
     “Dammit Serena, you know you still love me…you have to believe me…”
     The fears were crashing down on her.  What was she going to do?  She wanted to cry for help.  She wanted Raye to be here with her, to tell him to back off.  “Leave me ALONE, Darien.”
     “No, Serena.  I’ve already pushed this along far enough.  I loved you Serena, and I never would have hurt you, NEVER.  Do you honestly believe that I would accept MONEY…I wrote, you know.  Every month…and I NEVER got one reply.  After five months of sending a letter every week, I gave up.  But never for one minute did I believe you refused to write me.  I told myself that you still cared, and you still did…you still do.  Trust me now, Serena.  I did not take the money.  I did not turn my back from you.  Believe me, Serena.  Or turn your back away, and leave me for your father…”
     They stood in silence, and he held out his hand.  “Take it now, Serena.  In your heart, you must know the truth.  Take it now, and let me hold you.  Let me be your friend, let me love you.  All you have to do is let go, and trust me…”
     *And turn away from my own father, who’s raised me.* she completed in her mind.  She looked regretfully at the hand, and to its owner.  Tears were starting to sting her whole soul again, and she wanted to run.  She felt her hand twitch, but kept it at her side. “Leave my property at once…” she said, coldly.
     The hurt sunk into his gut like a fist.  The air was cold around him.  His face froze, and his expression fell.  Turning away, he looked back to
her, regretfully.  His eyes were so full of pain.
     Then with fury, and a coldness that made icicles grow on Serena’s brain.  A headache was taking her mind into oblivion now, and she stood, firm, and determined.
     She had actually turned him away.
     Darien turned away.  The rope had been severed, and now the last line was gone.  He walked to the door, gathering as much pride as he could.  He turned back to see the thin willowy figure, standing in the middle of the apartment, and tossed back to her, “You’ve made your choice.”
     He stepped out, and slammed the door behind him.
     The minute the floor started vibrating in her inebriated mind, she collapsed to the floor, with tears now flowing steadily.  The tears saturated the carpet, as she found that the tears were nothing compared to the pain she felt now, in her mind and heart.

     Outside the door, Darien leaned back, wishing her to open the door, and fall into his arms.  She had made her choice.
     He had made his.  He still loved her.
     And now, she had scorned him and thrown him aside.
     Fury rang through his system.  How COULD he love her?  She didn’t trust him, she didn’t care for him.  She just threw him aside.
     Hurt, he looked to the door.  If she even looked at him with one glimmer of regret, longing, he would have given up everything for her.  He would have lost for her.
     But she didn’t.  And now, Darien’s fist tightened.  Philip Hilton knew he would win, the minute this sucker stepped through the doors.  If it went one way, Darien would lose his career, his life.  If it went the other, Darien would lose Serena.  Now, he had lost both.
     He walked away, thinking of what he was going to do the next few days to salvage his company, his reputation.  If he was going to lose Serena, he was going to make Hilton suffer.

Continued in the next Section