At about four fifteen in the morning, Dominic was shocked awake. He sat in the dark for a few seconds, trying to figure out exactly what had woken him. "Fuck you!" he heard shouted outside. Oh, he thought to himself, that was it. Well who the hell was shouting in his front yard, in the middle of the goddamned night? Standing, he recognized the voices. Steven, Ali's boyfriend, had followed her here.
Looking through the window, he could tell just by his stance that Steven was drunk, and as he dodged in and out of the light, Dominic could see that Ali wasn't the only one who had walked away from their fight with bruises. Ali stood her ground now though, looking as fierce as she could in an oversized t-shirt. "You fat Kunt," Steven said loud enough for Dominic to hear.
"Needle-dick bitch. Why don't you go and slip into some hot pants and stilettos?" Nice one, Ali, Dom thought to himself.
Steven apparently didn't appreciate the humor, however, and he pushed her. She was caught off guard and she stumbled a bit but didn't fall. She retaliated by running at him, full-speed head down; she hit him like a battering ram and threw him to the ground.
"Bitch!" he shouted trying to get to his feet.
As if she had just suddenly remembered where she was, Ali spoke up. "Keep your Goddamned voice down, Steven."
"Why?! So I don't wake up that steroid-freak wop bastard that you're shacked up with?"
"I'm not shacked up for Christ's sake. I'm here to keep one of us from killing the other."
"Oh so he's protecting you, is that it?"
"No, you asshole, he's protecting you. Now get the hell out of here." Standing back, Aliana gave him enough room to get up. When he finally managed it, he stumbled forward, and he swung open handed once, landing a loud slap to the bruised side of Ali's face. She didn't react right away, but when she did, she landed several punches to his face, before Steven regained the advantage. He had her by her collar, pounding her face with his fist. Well that's enough of this shit, Dominic decided as he headed down the stairs. As he came out of the front door, he could see that Ali wasn't moving. Not that that was stopping Steven.
"Get the fuck off of her!" Dominic shouted as he came flying off the front porch.
"This don't concern you, Dominic!" Steven shouted back, not releasing the grip on Ali's collar.
Dominic stormed up and smacked Steven once in the face, hard enough to make his nose bleed. Concerned about the blood now leaking from his snout, Steven let go of Ali's shirt and her head hit the ground with a thud. "If it concerns her, then it concerns me," Dominic replied, "Go now, and I won't take out my frustrations on your face."
Steven began to speak, his voice nasal, "This is between me and her, and it doesn't conc—" Dom didn't even give him a chance to finish his sentence.
Dominic swung once. A right uppercut to Steven's chin, and Steven was airborne. He landed flat on his back about three feet from where he had been standing. Looking up, he saw Dominic standing, protectively over Aliana. "If I ever hear that you've touched her again, I'll make that seem like a love tap."
Steven, even foggy minded, didn't think that Dom was bluffing, and he reconsidered the need to handle Ali right then, or ever again for that matter. Stumbling to his feet, he wiped at his freely bleeding mouth and took off running down the street.
Dom inhaled and exhaled a few times, trying to get a grip on his anger, deciding that this much anger shouldn't be bottled up, he started off down the street after Steven, but the pained cry from his feet brought him back to reality.
Kneeling down beside her, even in the dark he could see that Aliana was in pretty bad shape. Her lip was bleeding again and her already existing black eye now had a small cut just to the left of her eye, which was oozing blood. A thin trail of blood ran from her left nostril to her lip. A small gash in her cheek was also bleeding. Bastard was wearing a ring, Dom thought to himself. The right side of her face was, also, beginning to swell with the promise of new bruises. "Ali," Dominic whispered, surprised by how weak he sounded. "Aliana," he said a little louder, shaking her shoulders slightly. He could see her eyes moving under her puffy eyelids, and slowly her right eye opened just enough for him to see her over-dilated pupil. "Are you alright?"
She huffed a half-laugh through her swelling nose, before she nodded slowly, "Yeah, Dom, I'm good." With that, she was out again. Dom inhaled deeply before wrapping his arms around her back and under her knees, and he lifted. Cradling her to his chest he made his way onto the front steps and after a few seconds arguing with the door, he managed to get it open. He started towards the living room, meaning to put her back on the couch, but stopped halfway there. The idea of her waking up alone in the middle of the night or even the next morning, broke his heart, so he retreated, and began up the steps. With both of their weight, the stairs creaked more than usual and he was worried that he would wake Mia, but she didn't stir and Dom made it to his room with Aliana.
He laid her flat on her back on the side of the bed that he had been in. Pulling the covers up to her shoulders, he smoothed her hair out of her face. After a quick trip to the bathroom he returned with a damp hand towel, and he gently wiped the blood from her face. When he was convinced that he had gotten everything, he tossed the towel into the corner of the room and moved to the other side of the bed. Lying on top of the blankets, he laced his fingers behind his head and closed his eyes, hoping to get some sleep.
Aliana moaned next to him, and he looked over just as she rolled onto her side, now facing him. She scooted her body closer to his, until her head rested next to his chest. Now more than slightly uncomfortable, Dom considered slipping out of bed and waking Mia. Let her sleep in here. But looking down at Ali, he smiled at what he saw. Her hands folded in front of her face as if praying, her knees tucked into her stomach in a fetal position, she looked like a child. Despite all of her arguing and fighting, cussing and cursing, she was still just a kid, whether she wanted to admit it or not. Seeing how peaceful she looked he wasn't about to risk waking her, so he closed his eyes once again, and drifted off.
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Aliana woke feeling as though she hadn't slept in two weeks, and her face hurt, and she was having a hard time opening her good eye. What the hell happened? She asked herself, still somewhere between awake and aware. Oh shit! she suddenly realized, Steven showed up. That's right, Steven was here. And we were fighting and he hit me and that is the last thing I remember. So where am I now? I suppose I could open my eye and find out. Realizing that that was a good solution, Ali forced her eye open.
All she saw was a bronze block of color. She blinked several times to see if she could clear her vision, when it did clear she realized what she was looking at was the side of a chest. Also beginning to take in her surroundings, she realized she wasn't on the couch. Pushing herself up onto her elbow, she realized she was in Dom's room, in Dom's bed, lying next to Dom. "How did that happen?" she asked herself under her breath. Slowly the night's events began to come back to her.
She remembered Steven showing up, and she went out to talk to him. He started yelling and then he hit her. She hit him back but then he got the upper hand. She remembered him wailing on her face, holding her by the collar. She had been rocked with the urge to scream, but she hadn't wanted to give him the satisfaction, so she had remained silent. She had heard Dom come out of the house, and after he popped Steven, Steven had released his death-grip on her shirt. Unable to stop herself, her head hit the pavement, loosening her grip on reality, and the blackness had swarmed in. Now here she was.
As she watched Dom's chest rise and fall, he stirred in his sleep, and as he opened his eyes he looked over at her. "You're awake."
"Yeah," she whispered.
"You alright?"
She smiled as much as she could, "Yeah, I think so. My face hurts."
"Understandable," he replied, rubbing his eyes, and Ali noticed the bruises on his knuckles. She opened her mouth to comment, but decided to leave it alone. "You scared me you know. I wasn't sure you were gonna wake up this morning."
"Sorry," she apologized without even thinking about it.
He propped up on his elbow, his face inches from hers. He took her face gently in one hand, turning her face to the left and right observing the damage. He shook his head, "I can take care of him for you, Aliana, you just let me know."
"He isn't worth the effort, Dominic, but I appreciate the gesture."
Dom brought her face to his, and planted a chaste kiss on her forehead (about the only part of her face that wasn't bruised or cut). "I'm just glad you're okay." He sat up then, and after throwing his legs over the edge of the bed, he stood and stretched. "Well, I need coffee. You coming?"
"Yeah, I'll be down in a minute."
"You need any help?"
She smiled, "No, Dom, I think you've helped me plenty. I can make it from here." He nodded and left the room. She sat up in bed, pondering. As the warmth from his body faded away, she realized something. All these years she had been calling her lust for Dom love, but it hadn't been love at all.
Dominic had always been there for her, and last night was just one more example. And she knew now that he always would be there for her, no matter what idiotic thing she did for sake of her ego or her pride, he would always be there. That was love. And at that moment she was positive that she would love Dominic Toretto for the rest of her life. Love him, she decided as she swung her feet to the floor, in the true emotional sense of the word…and maybe occasionally cop a good feel.
