Thank you all again for all the great reviews! As of now I am in the middle of fourty-three so it might take a while for me to update. i hope that you guys fill up with this chapter because it took me at least three days to write. As I said before this chapter is a little graphic. I kept it to a minimum but there is still some stuff in there that may disturb some people. I have changed the rating to M just to be safe. You have been warned, if you don't want to read the chapter, skip ahead to the other author's note at the end where I will give a brief summary of what happened. Chapter Fourty-Two:

Embracing the Darkness

Ayesha brushed against his pant leg, demanding attention but all he could do was stare ahead of him at the fireplace. The flames danced before him casting unnatural shadows around the room, making his blue eyes seem like gold.

He had heard people say that his eyes turned to amber when he was angry but now he was furious. Beyond furious, no words could describe what he felt.

The hate in him was as fierce as the embers before him that seemed to dull after a while unlike his rage.

He sat in a leather chair in a bleak room in his house. The room was dark, there were no windows and the gloomy colors of the walls made the room even darker. The only light in the room was in front of him, dying before him.

He thrived in the dark, after all he had had done it more than half of his life.

The small feline meowed at him from below.

He picked her up with one hand and placed her on his lap. He petted her down, making Ayesha purr. He continued to do so and then put the cat down on the floor.

The cat loved attention.

Something he didn't like.

The cell phone on the table next to him rang just as Ayesha curled up on the floor.

He reached over and put it to his ear. "Yes?"

"Erik," the angelic voice said.

Erik closed his eyes upon hearing Christine's voice. Even when she spoke his name he thought it was the most beautiful sound in the world. "Christine, you made it all right?"

"Yes," she said. "I'm fine."

"Good, my dear," Erik said to her.

He could hear some people in the background followed by a woman saying, "Raoul, tell your brother to stop!"

Erik gripped the phone even tighter. Even the thought of Christine and the fop near each other infuriated him.

"Erik, will you be able to come?" Christine asked ignoring the people on her end of the line.

He could refuse Christine nothing and even though it meant canceling some interviews, he would make it. By God, he would make it. "Yes, my angel. I will be there."

"Will you call me and let me know when you'll be here so I can go meet you?"

Erik didn't let his anger show. "Yes, darling, of course."

He could hear Christine's sigh of relief. "I'll talk to you tonight. I'll call you, all right?"

Erik nodded. "I'll wait for your call."

"Okay, bye," Christine said. "I love you."

Erik closed his eyes, all anger melted away with the angel saying those small three words. "I love you, too."

With a small bye she hung up her phone. Erik held the phone to his ear a moment longer before slamming it on the table.

The very thought of Raoul and Christine in the same room made his blood boil. Christine had said that she loved him but she loved the fop once too. If they were to get together again and she would leave him….

He threw the scotch he had in his hand into the fire with an angry yell. The flames ignited once again.

He'd kill him.

He'd place his hands around his neck and strangle him. He would squeeze and squeeze and wait until his eyes closed and would not open anymore. He would wait until all breath escaped his body and then be finished with him.

Erik stood up forcefully and Ayesha eyed him before going back to her nap next to the fire.

He scolded himself. There was no reason to think rash. Reckless actions had lost her before. He would be damned if Christine lost all trust in him, not after he tried so hard to get it. Not after all the careful planning and all the patience.

Erik took a deep breath to compose himself again.

He looked over at the sketches he had of her. Some were of her when she was in the auditorium. When she thought he was her Angel of Music, before he revealed himself to her.

He touched the paper and closed his eyes. God, how he loved her. He loved everything about her. He loved her large expressive brown eyes, her mahogany hair that once had small curls but now was straight.

The years were kind to her. She had grown up into a young woman, her curves developed, her face was even more flawless than before. She was a woman now, not the stubborn sixteen-year-old she once was. She was mature, capable of taking care of herself and not holding on to the memory of her father or the promise of the Angel of Music.

Erik looked at the sketch again but turned away. He had her now, she was with him. She loved him and he loved her.

And she's mine, he told himself. Finally she was his.

Then why was he so worried about her leaving? He looked at the sketch he had of her in the wedding dress. He knew why. She had told him one before that she was his and she just left him.

He had cursed himself hundreds of times for letting her go. He damned himself time and time again, asking himself why he had let her go in that moment of weakness.

He hated himself for letting her go. He had shut himself in his room after she released her lover so that he wouldn't hear them getting away. He knew that if he would have stayed there he would have changed his mind and take Christine against her will. And she would hate him for it. That was something that he couldn't live with.

But then she had gone back for him.

His heart leapt with joy when he saw her return. At first he had thought that she had changed her mind that she would stay with him forever but he was wrong. She had gone back to warn him of the mob.

He couldn't care less if they did come and kill him. Having his heart ripped out and stepped on was death enough for him. But her voice, the way it begged him to go, to get away, to make a life, that was what made him go.

He couldn't stay in the auditorium or even in the same town that Christine was in. He couldn't trust himself to be away from her. He wouldn't be able to get over her. He would watch her make her life with the love of her life and all he could do was watch from the shadows.

No, he needed to leave, he needed to get away from her.

He still had some money from when he worked in Persia and when he helped remodel the auditorium after the first fire, he used it to disappear. He traveled from city to city wasting his money on anything and everything he wanted, mostly girls in clubs. He spent almost his entire money trying to forget Christine.

But it was useless, every night he would start with one woman only to find Christine instead. The girl's caramel complexion would turn to milky white and it wasn't the stranger's face anymore, it was Christine.

She didn't change from night to night although her eye color and clothes did. Her face was the same, the same porcelain white skin, the large expressive eyes, her long curls in her hair, her skinny appearance.

It was torture for him but he gave in every night.

The things she would do and say. It was nothing like his angel, she wasn't as innocent as the day he had met her. No. She wasn't as pure as he remembered her.

She would say things that only street hookers and whores would say. She would ask him if he liked anything in particular or if he wanted it done special. But all he would tell her was the same thing, "As long as you don't take off the mask."

However, they stared. They stared at his black mask over his face as they danced for him, every night at different clubs, it was the same thing.

Christine's eyes would be blue then green then gold. One night, she had her familiar brown. That night was Hell.

He had walked into the nightclub, wanting only a drink. He sat down at the bar and took out his wad of bills, not caring who saw that he had a lot of money. He put down the money on the bar and asked for his drink.

As he drank, a girl approached, her auburn curls bouncing as she walked. Her voice was soft but demanding and when he turned, he almost lost his breath. She looked so much like Christine that he thought that at last, he had finally gone mad.

She smiled at him. "Why is a guy as handsome as you alone?"

Erik closed his eyes and turned back to his drink. "No one can hurt you when you're alone."

"I promise I won't hurt you," she cooed as she lightly touched the left cheek with the back of her fingers.

He grabbed her hand forcefully. "Don't touch me."

She smiled mischievously. "I've always been a slow learner, maybe you can help me."

He looked at her hopeful. "You want me to teach you?"

The Christine look-alike smiled. "Yes."

"Like an angel?"

He could see confusion in her eyes but she nodded. "Like an angel."

He didn't know what it was, maybe it was the liquor that he had been drinking all day that finally got to him. Maybe it was because she looked just like Christine or maybe at last he had finally gone crazy but he asked her something that he knew she had been hoping for.

"What time do you get off tonight?"

She bit her lip, a habit that Christine had done so many times. "At two meet me at the side entrance. I won't tell anyone or else they'll stop me. No one should give you trouble." She kissed his unmarred cheek and started leaving. "See ya."

Three hours later he had waited at the side door just as she had asked. He waited in the shadows, avoiding contact with the people that passed by the entrance of the alley.

Then the door opened and he saw her. She wasn't wearing the skimpy outfit from earlier but civil clothes, making the girl look just like the object of his obsession.

She didn't even see him coming. She gave out a surprised yell as he took hold of her arm. He put his hand to her hair and pulled on the elastic in her hair, letting her curls loose. "I've always favored you with your hair down, Christine."

The girl's flirty attitude from earlier vanished. "My name isn't Christine, its Jenny."

He pulled her again so that her brown eyes looked at his gold. "It is tonight. Tonight your name is Christine, got it?"

The girl swallowed and nodded.

Erik pulled her along and walked two city blocks until they arrived to the small apartment he temporarily called home. It was a rundown apartment building with more corruption than he had seen in years.

As long as you paid the landlord on time and in cash, he didn't care if you were the most wanted man in America. Which at that point, he almost was.

He pulled her through the smelly and dirty hallway to his apartment. Inside, he pushed her against the wall and pressed his lips on hers. She couldn't have been more than twenty, a little older than Christine but he didn't care. She didn't struggle against him and he knew she was enjoying it. With one hand against her jugular, he used the other one to undress her.

Erik shuddered thinking of the memory. How desperate he had been to claim Christine….but he was even more desperate to finally make her sorry for what she had done to him.

The anger flooded through him when he was on her and she had been grousing at what he was doing to her. He took his hands and wrapped it around her small neck, squeezing as hard as he could.

Finally realizing what he was about to do to her, she ceased what she was doing and tried to put her hands around his. "Stop," she had gasped out.

But he was so blinded by hatred that all he could see was red. "Why did you leave me? Why?" He could hear her gasping for breath but he couldn't stop. "What made you think that I could go on without you?"

The girl underneath him gasped. "Please, stop."

He squeezed harder, he could feel her blood pumping under his hands. "I gave you everything. Everything! All I wanted was for you to love me!"

He let her go forcefully and stumbled from the bed. He could hear the girl coughing and crying as she tried to get away from the bed. Erik reached for his favorite weapon in his coat.

Using the skill he had learned during his teenager years, he captured the girl's neck in the lasso and pulled as hard as he could. The girl's body made a deafening thump on the floor after the fatal snap of her neck.

Erik shut his eyes at the memory. The depression that year was unbearable. He could feel himself being slowly dragged into the abyss of madness. The girls he used to slake his lust only reminded him of the love he had lost.

It was while he watched the girl's body turn from porcelain white to cinnamon that he finally realized how desperate he had become. He watched as Christine's features disappeared from her face leaving only the eyes as their likeness. He had looked down at his hands. He had killed the girl out of rage he had for Christine.

How he wept that night. He hated himself for even trying to think of harming his angel. There was no way he could hurt her. Never. Even the thought of harming her smooth skin made him hate himself even more.

It was in that time that Erik decided that he had to go away. He needed to do something to get his mind off Christine. He made a few calls and in no time had transport to go back to Persia.

But there was something he had to do first.

He had waited outside the Giry's home for hours in the shadows just to catch a glimpse of her. He needed to see her if it was only for a second. He had waited for her through the early morning to noon until he finally saw her.

His breath had caught when he saw her. She was walking out of the house with a bowl covered in aluminum foil in her hands. His memory had betrayed him, she was more beautiful than he remembered. His heart seemed to have burst from his chest when he saw her face.

She still had the wide innocent chocolate eyes, the mahogany curls were now to the middle of her back. The milky complexion radiated with a glow that he had always seen her with and her lips. Oh, her lips! How he wanted them against his cold skin.

And she was humming! If it was at all possible he loved her even more. If he only he could touch her…

"Damn it!" she cursed as she put her finger in her mouth. "Meg, I thought your mother told you to put the knives in the other bowl!"

Meg ran out and took the bowl that Christine had in her hands from her. "You still have to carry the macaroni."

It seemed as if they were getting ready for a picnic. When he saw what she was wearing, he had the sudden urge to grab her and take her away and claim her. He loved the small notes on the bikini, it seemed as if she carried her music everywhere.

He was about to when he heard Meg's voice call Christine. "What time did Raoul say to be there?"

"One!"

Erik could feel all his anger come out of him. How he wanted to scream out into the sky. But he refrained, knowing that if he did he would scare his angel away.

He continued staring at her until Madame Giry and Meg came out with bowls in their arms.

He followed them as they walked down the street to a house. He recognized which one it was. It was the de Chagny home. He watched them all day as they had fun and laughed.

On more than one occasion he had the sudden need to lunge out and drown the boy in his pool or maybe put his pretty face in the grill before him and scar him but thought better of it, he was already on the run from the police for killing the girl before.

He stayed with them until they began eating the food that they made. Then he went to the auditorium where he composed a letter for Christine. He told her how unhappy he was that he would only know happiness if she were by his side.

He knew that they would be gone all day that was why he had the courage to leave her the letter. Even when she was out of her room, he could smell her scent.

When he entered the room she shared with Meg, he almost wept. He could almost see her in her bed, sleeping. He could see her in front of her dresser brushing her hair. He approached her dresser and found her brush, taking some locks of her curls from the brush, he put it in a small box he had in the pocket of his coat.

He then placed his head on her pillow and inhaled deeply, breathing in the scent of her.

God, how he missed her. He would have stayed there all day, he would have made his presence known to her if only…

If only she were unhappy. But it was quite obvious that she was happy with that foppish boyfriend of hers. He had seen it in her smiled that day, heard it in her voice.

Somehow, he knew that if he tried to take her away again, she would hate him. She would hate him more than she did now and it wasn't something he would be able to live with.

He placed the rose and letter on her pillow and left.

He had been determined to erase her from his mind that was why he went back to Persia.

Persia would make him forget. He had been infamous when he lived there before when he was a teenager. He was young but capable of killing anyone without remorse. That was what he wanted again. To kill, a luxury that before had been denied him.

Those two boys, Joseph and James were not the first and certainly not the last.

Upon returning to Persia, Erik had been hired by a rich man. Shah, as he liked to call himself, was a drug lord never caught by police or even suspected by them. Which made Erik's job a lot easier.

Shah would tell him who to kill and because of the money and misery he would do so without hesitation. Erik had been creative in those days. He would slit throats or wrists or hang them or shoot them or suffocate or drown them. It was all too simple to take a human life.

But it wasn't as if Shah only wanted the men that betrayed him dead, no, he wanted the entire family dead. So Erik did as he was told, slaughtering whole families in one night. He wanted to drown his sorrow in their blood. He killed mercilessly and did so thorough a job that no one knew it was him.

Shah had called him his Angel of Death because of his voice. He sang to his victims the Requiem Mass right before he took their life. Shah had said that he was able to swoon women merely by opening his mouth.

Erik had laughed then, knowing he would take that back as soon as he saw his face. They all did, all except one. Christine.

Surprisingly, Christine was the only one that didn't cry out in fear, or back away from him. If anything, he had seen pity in her eyes. Erik would curse himself then for bringing her up. Persia had not helped him forget. This only made Erik plunge even harder into his "work."

His life had been filled with blood for months. That was until Shah turned the tables on him. He had placed a bounty on his head so big that everyone was looking for him.

Erik couldn't tolerate that of his previous employer so he killed him instead, in the cruelest way possible. After taking some of the dead Shah's money for his troubles, he met Nadir.

Nadir helped him get back to the United States, where two years later, the police weren't looking for him as frantically as before. Through Nadir, Erik met Allison who helped him stay relatively sane.

He liked his life at that point, there was no one hunting him (he had taken care of that by killing every bounty hunter he knew) and he was killing no one, one of the only things that ever brought him peace.

The other was his music. He quickly went into his music again composing song after song, thinking of his muse, Christine. Allison upon hearing his music dedicated all her time to making him the star he should have been a long time ago.

Although Erik was grateful for her help he knew that he couldn't be a star with his deformity. Not to mention that the police were looking for a man his age with a mask on his face.

Allison had given him the solution with two words: plastic surgery.

Erik had gone along with it. A year and a half of surgery and pain, including the promos the special appearances he made it to where he was. But it was all empty, especially with Allison gone, dying in an accident.

Even though he had no feelings towards her like he had with Christine, he cared for her. She was the reason he was where he was.

Nadir after that, became his dear friend and confidante. Erik called Nadir 'the daroga' because he had been an ex-cop. He had a kind heart and Erik knew he pitied him. Why else didn't he turn him in? Nadir was like Erik's conscious at one point, telling him what he should do. He even gave him advice about Christine. Erik told Nadir of Christine and Nadir in turn told him to forget about her. There was no way he would see her again.

But he did, he did see her again.

Erik smiled, remembering when he saw her again. It wasn't at the coffee shop like she thought. It was much more before then. Two weeks before he "accidentally" bumped into her.

He was driving down the street in his car when he saw her cross the street. He almost ran over someone as he stared at her. How she had grown up!

She didn't have her curls anymore, she was just as skinny as the last time he saw her. She wasn't a girl anymore, no, she was a woman. A young voluptuous vixen that got stares from other men even if she was oblivious to it.

He followed her to her small apartment, then to her college. He would watch her for hours on end, not caring about his career anymore. He wanted to be with Christine, drink in the sight of her.

But looking at her wasn't enough. He needed her. Maybe now she would love him. He was after all a new man.

He would never forget the way her chocolate brown eyes went wide at the sigh of him. He could never forget the way she touched his face when he told her who he was.

The feel of her smooth skin against his own now-perfect face.

There were many times while they went out which he wanted to take her in his arms and kiss her and tell her how much he loved her. But then there was Raoul.

A lot of times Erik regretted not killing the boy when he had the chance.

Christine talked about him so often, sometimes he thought if his foolish attempt to gain her trust again was in vain. He needed patience, patience was what was going to bring her to him.

That was all he needed, patience.

His patience had paid off in the end when he found out that she loved him. And that kiss…

That kiss drove him to the brink of madness. To feel her small body against his, her lips on his own. He was born again. He loved her more than words could express.

And that night of complete bliss when he was at last complete, when she was finally his, her body and soul. As he made love to her had asked himself why this perfect angel would want to give herself to a demon like him. He had begged every god he had ever known not to take away his happiness not when he had worked so hard to achieve it.

And it didn't go away, she stayed with him, she promised him she would, she swore. She stayed with him almost every night thereafter and his heart would swell with happiness. As she slept, he would watch her, just stare at her sleeping face thinking that if he looked away for a second she would disappear. It took him a while to accept the fact that it wasn't a dream, that it was real. He would kiss her forehead, her little fingers, loving the way her skin felt against his.

He felt unworthy of her, he would do anything to make her happy. He would die trying, he never wanted to see his angel shed another tear again.

That was what he wanted from the beginning, to be with her all the time, to have her, to let him have her. He was happy at last, after thirty years of misery it had finally paid off. He was with his angel at last.

He would never leave her, she would never leave him, they were happy and he would be damned if the fop tried anything to ruin that for him.

Erik sighed and looked around the room, at the different sketches he had done of Christine Daaé. She almost went into the room once, and if she had, all his work would have been for nothing. She would have known that he was still obsessed with her and that he would do anything to have her.

He smiled to himself. Not that it would matter now. He finally had her. He looked at a sketch he had done of her when she had perform in that bar long ago with Little Giry. "You're mine."

He walked to the small liquor cabinet he had in the room and served himself another drink in a fresh glass. He glanced at the small box he kept there. Inside was the tape of Christine singing the song about her Angel of Music. He still kept it after all this time.

Closing the small bureau he made his way out of the room.

Ayesha ran out of the room, seeing that her Master was leaving. He locked the room with the key going to his own. He had to call to cancel all of hisprevious engagements to go to New York and he still had packing to do.

Cliff notes version: Erik went completely bonkers after Christine left. He would be with whatever woman he wanted but in the end only saw Christine. In order to forget her he went to Persia again and was a hit-man for a rich man named Shah. He killed a lot of people but could never forget his beloved. Shah betrays him and every bounty hunter tried to kill him. Nadir helps out and introduces him to Allison who gets him plastic surgery and a record deal and stuff. While he is famous, he sees Christine. He followed her for two weeks until he "accidentally" bumps into her at the coffee shop. Then there's his happiness for a while then his fury when he finds out that Christine had to see Raoul again. That's basically it. I know that i was a little vague on some things but now you know about the room and the guy at the bar Christine was singing in. There are some details of his life that will be discussed later on. If I did put it in the chapter wouldn't be called Embracing the Darkness it would be called Erik's biography and yeah, no.
So, did you guys like the chapter? Anyways, because I gave you guys this very long chapter, I will take a break for a while (until I finish the next two chapters) and yes the wedding is coming up. drama, drama, drama, believe you me. Feel free to read my other phic. Twist of Fate. Thank you Asia1st, I really appreciate what you said. Its good to know that even though this is an E/C phic, R/C shippers read it too. Coming up: Chapter Fourty-Three:
The Mask