I can't believe this is chapter 30 already! Oh my god! This story has consumed my life, I don't think it's healthy how much I think about it in a day. 

I hope you'll enjoy this chapter. Xx

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Shawn parks the car at the main entrance of the village and we get out. As soon as we enter the village a smile forms on my lips. 

It's a beautiful small - but also big - village that's marvellously built. Everything connects and the shops look amazing next to one another. 

There are lights everywhere, giving me Christmas vibes. There are baskets of flowers on every corner of the village. It looks like a beautiful outdoor mall, but then prettier and cosier.

Shawn holds my hand as we walk through the village, entering stores, expensive stores mostly. 

We get into a discussion that he needs to stop wanting to buy everything I lay my eyes on, and when I do want to buy something I'm the one paying for it. 

It's like I'm talking Chinese when I ask him this, he just doesn't listen to me. He explains to me that he wants to pay for everything because he loves me and has a shit load of money that just "chills in his bank account" that he wants to spend.

'I pay for my own stuff. You can spend money when you buy me presents.' I tell him.

'I can buy presents for you while you pick them?' He says, smiling at me.

'Mendes!' I smile at him. 'No, just let me buy the things here. You're already paying for this whole trip.' I hug him.

He wraps his arms around me and we stand there, next to a store, holding each other. I look around the village. I see a lot of people laughing and talking to each other. 

I hate shopping, but I like being here with him. Is this how it feels to be in love? Liking everything just because the person you love is with you?

'When did you start kickboxing?' He asks out of the blue.

'Uhm...' I think for a moment. 'When I was six or seven years old.' I answer.

He grabs my hand and we continue walking, sitting down at a bench in the middle of the village and he frowns.

'Why did you start kickboxing?' He asks.

'Because I was getting in fights with kids at my school all the time.' I say as if he was supposed to know that.

'You were fighting with kids at that age?!' He looks at me with shock and a hint of respect in his eyes.

'I have a temper.' As if that makes everything I did ok.

'What did you do?' He asks. 'Tell me about your first fight.'

'I was on a swing and this girl asked me if she could get on it after I was done. I told her yes... One thing, I was addicted to that swing so it took a little longer than she thought before I was finished. After a few minutes, she pushed me off the swing and I got angry, really angry.' I inhale, thinking back at that time, still getting angry over it. 

'So I yanked her off the swing by her ponytail and I sat on her, hitting her in her face... I don't know if I was hitting her or scratching, but anyway, she cried... hard and the teacher lifted me off of her and called my mum.' I look at Shawn's eyes.

'You were six years old when this happened?' He looks surprised.

'No I was five actually... then they put me in therapy because I kept getting into fights with different girls and boys from time to time. As you might guess, that didn't help, it only made it worse.' I run my fingers through my hair. 

'One day my dad was fed up and signed me up for kickboxing classes, hoping that this way I could let all my anger out there instead of on people's faces.' I smile. 'That didn't help at first.'

'Why did you keep getting into fights?' Shawn asks.

'My life was perfect. I had great parents, lovely siblings, but it was so perfect it got boring and the adrenaline rush felt amazing. It got addictive. I got addicted to it at a very young age.' I look at my hands.

I loved getting into fights. It was not the hurting other people I liked, it was all about the adrenaline that made me feel alive. For some people it's drugs or alcohol, but with me, adrenaline did the trick.

My dad always knew I had a temper and he could deal with that, but a daughter that liked getting into fights wasn't really something he liked. 

My mum always taught me never to start a fight, but I was allowed to hit someone if they started. I listened to her, I have never hit someone first, but I did provoke the other person to hit me first.

'Wow...'

Shawn is speechless and I think this is the first time I've seen him speechless.

'When did it stop?' He looks at me. 'The getting into fights I mean.'

'When I was fifteen I think.' I look at him too. 'It was hurting my family, always showing up with bruises, getting called to the principal's office almost every day, and I knew I couldn't continue like that if I wanted a future.'

'But wait... didn't the kickboxing lessons only make it easier for you to get into fights? Since you knew how to hit someone without hurting yourself?'

'It sure did.' I chuckle. 'God... it felt amazing hitting guys that didn't expect you to actually fight back.' I smile, thinking back to the feeling.

'Yeah... I can imagine...' He chuckles.

'Then we went to the doctor and she told me to stop fighting or they would put me in a mental institution. That scared me enough to stop getting into fights... forever. A mental institution was the last place I wanted to end up in. I wasn't even allowed to play contests when they allowed me to continue kickboxing. Hitting a punching bag was allowed, just to keep me in check, and that's what I am still doing today.'

Shawn puts his hand on my legs. 

'So yeah... an adrenaline addiction is real.' I chuckle.

'You're a badass.' Shawn smiles at me.

'That's what you got out of that story? That I'm a badass?' I laugh.

'Just looking at the bright side of your past.' He smiles before putting his lips on mine.

'I don't get why you're not angry with me. I did some horrible things.' I look into his hazel brown eyes.

'Your past doesn't matter. I'm with you now, and you're my future.' Shawn says, repeating the words I said to him a few days ago.

I roll my eyes with a smile and press my lips on his again.

'You never tell me about your past.' I look at him. 'I'm always the one telling you stuff.' I frown.

'What do you want to know?' Shawn says when we get up.

'What was your high school time like?' I ask him.

'Studying, pissing off my parents, doing fun stuff with my sister, fucking girls, hanging out with my friends, doing drugs and getting drunk, partying... yeah... that pretty much sums it up.' He seems satisfied with his answer.

'I said high school, not college.' I smile, hoping for a different answer.

'Yeah, I know. I did that in high school... and in college... and after college...' He frowns at his own words.

I start to laugh, trying to ignore the jealousy rising in my chest when he said "fucking girls".

'Hell... I stopped drinking a week before I met you.' He starts to laugh. 'And I don't know if that's something to be proud of.' He starts laughing harder as we continue walking.

'It's not.' I laugh too.

We enter a few more stores before we decide to pick a restaurant to eat something. He keeps asking questions about my childhood and I decide to return the favour when the food gets served.

'Tell me about the code you created for that app.' I look at Shawn.

'I can't talk about it. I signed a nondisclosure agreement along with a bunch of other contracts when my dad sold it, so I won't make it or sell it again.' Shawn explains.

Convenient... I know the power of a nondisclosure agreement and if he talks he can get dragged to court again and no matter how curious I am, I don't want that of course. 

I ask him something about Netflix.

'Can you do that VPN thing so we can watch American movies on Netflix while we're here in Madrid?' I ask him.

I have no idea how computers and all that other stuff works, besides the basic things everybody knows.

'Piece of cake.' He smiles at me. 

'When we get back to the hotel I can get that done within a few minutes. I can even teach you if you want.' I see the twinkle in his eyes when he talks about it.

'You really like computer stuff, don't you?' I ask, taking a sip of my drink.

'I do. It's like making and solving puzzles all the time.' He smiles. 'It's challenging all the time, but as you know. I like challenges.' He raises one eyebrow.

'What kind of puzzles?' I ask.

'I loved mining bitcoins by solving mathematical problems. That was like, a great Friday night for me and Brian back in high school.' He smiles.

'But aren't bitcoins fake money and very expensive?' I ask, remembering a documentary I watched once.

'No, they weren't back then. You just had to solve the mathematical problem to mine the bitcoins, it's like gold, but you can't touch it or spend it. It became quite a lot of money after five years.'

I smile at him. It's really beautiful to see how passionate he's about this. 

I never asked before because he doesn't have a job right now and I honestly forgot what he used to do. Not that he needs a job. He's a fucking billionaire for god's sake, and not even because his father, it's all because of his brains.

'You're adorable.' I smile as I look at the light reflecting in his beautiful eyes.

The shops are closing and the sun is setting as we finish our dessert. 

When we walk back to the car Shawn explains to me how we're getting to Morocco the day after tomorrow.

'And from Taifa Algeciras we'll take a ferry to Tanger, Morocco.' He says when he starts the engine.

'Awesome.' I say, fighting with the shopping bags.

I bought a lot of stuff. Some new jeans and a few nice tops along with a very expensive Gucci purse. 

I bet my soul would be less expensive if I sold it to the devil. 

I also bought some new earrings that look really good with my necklace. Shawn bought new sweatpants and a Givenchy beanie, which looked really cute on him. He also bought a new pair of shoes he refuses to wear until we're back in the Netherlands.

When we arrive at the hotel Shawn does the VPN thing. He almost started a fight with me because I kept calling it a "VPN thing".

'It's not called a "VPN thing"!' He said, looking up from his laptop with a death glare.

I'm not doing it on purpose! I just keep forgetting what Shawn calls it. When he finishes he chooses a movie you can only watch in the United States.

'Is this a horror movie?' I ask when I put my head on his shoulder in bed.

'Yes.' He says, playing with my hair.

'I hate horror.'

'Why?'

'The feeling I get at the jump scare feels horrible.' I tell him.

'That is also a form of adrenaline, you know.' He says, with a smile in his voice.

I swat his chest for using that against me.

'I'm here to protect you, Beth, you don't have to be afraid of anything.' He says.

'I think I'll do a better job at protecting you...' I whisper, soft enough for Shawn not to hear it.

I almost start to cry when the main character keeps seeing dead people in the mirrors of her mansion. 

Shawn chuckles at every jump scare, making it look like we're watching a comedy movie instead of a horror movie. I stare at him with a death glare when I hear him laugh because the scene scared the crap out of me.

'I hate you.' I say when I look at him.

'Come here.' He says, wrapping his arms around me, pulling me closer to his body.

'And we are not watching the ending!' I yell at him.

Shawn's POV

I climb out of bed in the middle of the night. 

As Beth shouted at me, we didn't watch the ending of the movie. I liked seeing her scared, holding onto me more than ever. She wrapped her arms around me as if I was a lifebuoy, saving her from the water. 

I suddenly think of water and the sea. I hate the sea, it creeps me out.

'What do you want?!' I whisper in my phone while opening the door.

Beth's still asleep when I look at her. I had fifteen missed calls from my father again, what does he want from me?

'I need you to deliver something for me.' He says.

'I told you I'm out!' I yell.

It's three in the morning, and here I am screaming in the middle of the night, probably disturbing other people staying at the hotel.

I take the elevator down to the lobby, still screaming at my father over the phone. I take a seat at the bar in my bathrobe.

Most people are drinking and smoking, one girl has passed out on the bar and when I see a man walking to her with a disgusting grin on his face, I stand up. 

I have seen that look before.

'Leave her alone.' I tell him, stepping between him and the unconscious girl.

'And who do you think you are?' He says.

'Someone who is going to break that glass and feed you the shards while watching you choke on your own blood if you don't step away now.' I tell him with a straight face, meaning every word I just said.

He puts his hands in the air and walks away from me backwards. I turn around and softly touch the girl's shoulder, trying to wake her up.

'Hello!' My dad screams in my ear.

'Just wait a goddamn minute!' I scream back.

The girl moans and I look at the bartender. He tells me that she's staying at the hotel for a few more days and that he's going to call someone to bring her to her room. 

I take a seat on a stool next to her waiting for the security guard to pick her up. When he does I continue the conversation with my dad. 

'I will hurt her if you don't do it.' He says.

'What do you need me to do?' I sigh.

'I put five grand in your bank account, I need you to withdraw it from the bank and deliver it to the address I'm sending you tomorrow.' He clears his throat. 'I know you're in Madrid. I know where you are every minute of the day. Don't try anything because I will find her.' He says.

I hang up on him and clench my jaw, trying to control my rising anger. I throw my phone on the bar and run my fingers through my hair. 

I look at my phone and I suddenly understand everything. Tomorrow, after he sends me the address I will get rid of this phone. This is the last thing I'm going to do for him. I know he will never hurt my mother or Aaliyah, he won't even hurt me, but I still need to keep Beth safe.

'One bourbon please.' I tell the bartender.

He puts the glass in front of me and I stare at the brown liquid in the glass. I shouldn't drink this, I promised to stop drinking the night it all went wrong.

I stand up, leaving the full glass and a few euros behind. 

I take the elevator back to our room and get into bed next to Beth, trying to forget the phone call with my father.

Thank you for reading! 

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