MAYA:
I looked up to the sky, and I was so agitated and a little bit scared to find out who had just held me from falling to probably my death. I was on a ledge at the edge of the top of a building, trying to run away from my sorrow.
Could this be Xavier? Has he finally found me? My mind raced with a million questions, all at once. Maybe I shouldn't have entered into his dark affairs, I should have just left him peacefully after finding out about his dirty little secret.
"Let me go," I screamed at the top of my voice but was astonished by the voice that replied to my scary tone.
"Wha…What do you think you are doing, Maya?" A soft yet commanding masculine voice spoke out to me and I felt my knee wobbly as ever.
He pulled me down from the ledge as I struggled to leap away down to the bussing road. Hitting the strange man's chest vigorously, I began to wail. "He is going to find me, He knows it is me and he is going to find me, I am just an ordinary orphan… I have no one to run to, I have nowhere to go, please."
I buried my face into this man's large coat and sniffed the scent of his spicy alluring fragrance. I felt some kind of peace even though I didn't have the slightest idea who the man was because of the intense darkness that overshadowed us.
He took his hands into my hair and continuously stroked my hair to calm my troubled nerves. "It's okay, it is okay, Maya. Everything will be fine, he won't get to you, I promise." He assured me.
He seemed to know my name and I didn't even know him to start with. Quickly, I pulled myself from his arms and crawled into a darker shadow. "Wh…who the hell are you?" I stammered in fear.
He stood to his feet and my God, it looked like he was a giant staring down at me. Who was this man? He was tall, broad-shouldered and his brown hair was perfectly coiled and neatly combed behind his back. You could tell from the clothes that shone amidst the darkness that he was a rich fellow.
He stretched his hands high up in the sky and paused. "Who the hell are you?!" I fired at him as I became more furious than ever.
"I…I….I am a friend, I am just a friend. I can protect you, Maya. Protect you from whoever is after your life just because of the good you did." He replied with a soft tone.
I sighed heavily and glared at the man. "I can't be protected. How do you think that you can protect me, are you some sort of government agent or whatever." I asked and he shook his head negatively and pulled his face out of the shadow to the little light.
"No, no, I am not a government agent but I hope to be the next governor soon enough. You might know me as Jabari, Aiden Jabari the billionaire?"
As I looked up to meet his face, my eyes met a pair of golden eyes. No, wait! Not golden, they had the color of flames or the lava from a volcano. I had never seen eyes like that before.
His face was very familiar, one that I have seen on big billboards and all over the internet. He was the billionaire playboy everyone talked about who wanted to run for governor.
My tense mind was quickly replaced with calmness but I wasn't loosed to think he was any good because of all the rumors I had heard about him multiple times.
I stood to my feet as slowly as possible and I still felt small in his big statue and masculinity. I dusted my jeans from the dirt on the floor and slowly dashed my eyes away from his eyes.
This man just watched me trying to jump off the top of a building, I wonder what he might think of me. I thought. "Whyâ€"" I coughed slightly and continued.
"Why are you here? Were you following me?" I asked curiously.
He dipped his hands into his pocket and I flinched. Seeing my reaction, he gently and slowly pulled his hands out. "I am not here to hurt you, Maya. I am not here to hurt you…." He said as his voice faded out.
"I am here to help." He added and I swallowed my scorching hot saliva.
"Yo…You saved the vice president of America from that heist. Without you, I don't know where we would have been right now and what we would have been facing as we speak. It was a great risk that you pulled off and people appreciate you for that." he continued and I scoffed.
"I saved the Vice President, look where it has gotten me. I am not only becoming a fugitive but I am scared for my life to be taken away by ruthless men who are angry that I ruined their heist. Who is talking about that, huh?" I replied harshly.
He came closer to me and I fell back a few steps away. "Look, Maya, that is why I am here, that is why I have been watching you since the heist. You did stop the heist and stopped the bad guys that have been on the neck of Florida, this is something not even the cops were close to doing over the years."
I rolled my eyes disgustedly and folded my arms. "So what is that supposed to make me or how is it supposed to make me feel? Middle of some political scandal?" I asked rhetorically.
Aiden took his eyes off me and threw his eyes down the ledge to where the bussing road was filled with cars driving in and out. "And you think jumping off this ledge would make you feel any better than how worse you think you feel right now?" He replied to me with a question that struck me.
I fell silent and didn't say a word to him.
"Let me help you, Maya. I have all the resources to protect you from what you are running away from." He continued.
"How?" I asked sharply and he raised his arms and said. "I am Aiden Jabari."
"I understand that you are a wealthy young man and I know that there is no possible way you can be willing to help a total stranger without getting anything in return," I replied.
He had a little smirk on his face as he stared at me. "Why would you insinuate that? I help a lot of the poor people, even the people who think they are quite rich." He said pridefully.
I chuckled lightly and shook my head. "Save me the sermon, What's in for you?"
He exhaled and dug his hand into his curly hair. "Now that you've said it, I would like to propose a deal." He announced.
"I knew it," I exclaimed. "I knew that you had something more up your sleeves. I have always heard you to be very mischievous." I added.
I paused for a while and cleared my throat. "I don't need any more part in the games of politics. I did something that I am kind of regretting now, once and I am not planning to engulf myself in another political pursuit." I said to him,
"Maya, you haven't even heard my proposal." He said in a hoarse tone.
I immediately cut him off and flared up, stomping my feet. "I don't have to hear what you have to say to know that it's something messy, nepo baby."
He creased his eyebrows and stared at me in shock. "Nepo baby?" He repeated.
"Yes, you are an over-privileged man who wants something bigger than he already has. So you know, I know the proposal you want to give me at the expense of my safety. You want me to identify the men who planned the heist on the vice president, putting me at more risk all in the name of protection so you can have higher grounds against your opponentâ€"-" I said to him angrily.
He stared at me in shock as I exposed him. "Calm down little kittenâ€"-"
"Kitten?!" I exclaimed, cutting him off completely.
"Here me out, Maya. Well, with your theory, that can work too but I am not keeping you safe so that you can help me identify the terrorist when you can't. That is not your job to do. I want you to pay me back with something different, something less risky than that." He said to me,
"And what might that be?" I asked curiously.
"Marry me."