Elaris's POV
Dinner ended. Quote fast for me; I couldn't continue to sit still under Torren's continuous and intense stare. I pushed my plate back, and I stood up, turning for the exit.
"Goodnight, everyone," I said as courteously as I could manage. The goosebumps on my nape told me Toreen was still staring and drinking. The noise of the whiskey bottle hitting the table extra hard echoed behind me.
I'd expected the shatter of a bottle at that rate of force, but I didn't. The bastard was so skilled at being a drunk. He'd barely touched his meal at all.
I shouldn't even be thinking about him, I thought. I tried my best to change off every thought about him as I crossed into the corridor, stroking down the long time expanse of stonework.
There was a harsh grate of shoes behind me, and I turned slightly. When I realized it was him, I just turned back and continued on. I wasn't surprised he was after me again.
I'd known him never to be one to give up quite easily. He was determined to break me, and he was going to that every way, even by seducing me.
I wondered just how that would work for him. I hid my hate for him behind a not-so-benign smile. "What do you want from me again, Alpha Karl? I thought we agreed the date was tomorrow."
"Yeah. It was." He said, heaving his shoulders up. "I just wanted to walk you to your room." He said.
"Well, you shouldn't," I said. I nudged my head at Alex, who was already climbing down the stairs to get to me.
Something near a grunt escaped his lip when he followed my gaze to Alex's approaching figure, but it was quickly buried under a tight smile.
"Why do you have a bodyguard in here, doctor?" He grunted. "You don't need one; we have more than enough guards guarding the manor. Nothing is going to harm you here."
I wished he knew they were plenty, and he was one of them. Once he knew I was Elaris, he would also be after my head. It was forbidden for an exile to return no matter the circumstances, and that was punishable by death.
"I'll take my chances, Alpha King, and besides…" I drawled, while he and I both watched as Alex hurried to stand closely behind me. "...I already had him before coming here; I can't just send him away now," I said.
"But you can tell him to leave at least for a while; it is impolite for him to overhear our conversation."
"There is no reason to, if the conversation isn't important." I didn't look up to see the rage in his eyes, but I felt it through the silence that descended between us.
The soft crunch of our feet against the tiles as we climbed the stairs was the only sound between us. "The conversation is actually important; I want to inquire about your background," Karl returned after a few moments of silence, with a tone too clipped; it was obvious even to the deaf that he was bitter.
I turned around to him then, my grip on the balustrade hard. "What about my background?" I demanded. I tried my best to keep my voice from rising even a pitch.
I fixed him with a hard stare, brow drawn too high on my head, as he took a few moments to answer.
"I read everything about your background in the media and listened to whatever information I could scrounge up about you, but they all seemed to begin from two years ago, anything beyond two years ago. I couldn't find."
My nerves relaxed a bit then; calm settled over the chaos in my chest. For a moment there, I had almost thought he had found out the truth about me. I wasn't usually this worked up over something like that, but I don't know why I did now, perhaps because of his and Torren's stares earlier.
"I shouldn't let them get to me," I said to myself. Don't fucking let yourself, Ela. Don't.
I looked up at him, and I continued up the stairs. "You couldn't find anything about me after then because I kept it from the media," I said.
"Why?"
"Because it is none of anyone's business what happened to me or who I was before I became a celebrity doctor."
"But you should understand if we asked, it would be of importance to us. We need to know if you are from a rival or not, or if you are a spy or an enemy. We need to know."
"If you think of me as an enemy or a spy, then what am I doing here in your palace?" I said, trying to drum home a point.
The tug of light at the corner of his eyes told me he understood the point, but he dismissed it with a soft sigh. "The need came first for us, the venting second, so I would appreciate it if you answered the question."
"But I don't want to. It's none of your business. You should have stated it in your employment terms, then I would have decided whether I would take the job or not."
I quickened my steps on the stairs. I wanted to do my best to avoid the question.
"You should understand, Doctor Elara, that this is necessary—"
"I am not telling you anything," I retorted, cutting him off. I was about to climb onto the threadboard and completely away from him when his thick fingers folded around my wrists.
I was spun around as effortlessly as air itself.
I gasped as my back pressed into the wall, and I stared up into the heat in his eyes. For some reason, the impossible closeness of our bodies caused my chest to rise and fall. "I am tired of your arrogance, Doctor Elara Virrelle. Just answer the damn question: Who are you?" He growled, abandoning all of his earlier niceties.