035Eliaz's POV Nothing could describe how mad I was. Well, if I was being more accurate, I wasn't sure mad was the right word. More like irritated and it was all thanks to one person.Shadow. He was a pretty decent guy, when it came to his work ethics. He got the job done when asked, and at this point, I could say he was doing his job a little too well too. Never in a million years did I think I would ever come across the pictures he'd given me today. It was crazy, and I had no idea if it had anything to do with the fact that they were computer generated, or that I actually liked them. I gulped. I had missed Alora over the years, and terribly so too. I always tried to hide it, but even that was enough. At a point, I even had to look for other ways to satisfy my cravings, but why didn't I think of Shadow’s idea? The only reason I was mad at him for showing me those pictures, was because I hadn't gotten to them first. There was something about the way her blue eyes stared int
037Eliaz's POV At this point in my life, I think it was pretty obvious that I hated anything that would stress me, even the slightest. Mother nature must have thought it to be a suzi joke, because tell me why he decides to set me up with a woman who's second name could very well be trouble,babe everything else that encompassed it. I hated this. I stared at the woman in front of me. Get face held a tight scowl, and I wondered just how long she was going to keep that expression on her face. Her lips were drawn into a frown, and her eyes were wide open with anger. Pure, red hot and undiluted anger. “I'm tired, Cynthia.” I let out slowly. “I want to rest.” “You will.” Her response was quick and sharp. “Just answer my question first.” “No.” My reply must have shocked her, because for a tiny second, I watched a flicker of surprise make its way to her face, before disappearing again. “Let me go.” “No.” It was her turn to refuse. “why don't you want to tell me? It's just a harmles
038Alora's POV I was starting to regret this, and I was barely at my destination. Was this a bad sign?“Relax, Alora.” I let out a mouthful of breaths. For more efficiency, I even started counting to ten and back again. Anything to get my thumping heart come back to normal. “Just take a deep breath and relax.” No matter how many times I repeated that phrase to myself, it didn't particularly do much. With every turn I made that led me closer to our agreed meeting point, I felt my heart threaten to leap out of my body. So many times, the thought of turning back crosses my mind, but what kind of human would I be to pass out a potential opportunity to clear my name?“It's okay.” I muttered to myself. With my fingers clenched tight around the steering wheel I followed the GPS direction. “All you have to do is get there and ….” The rest of my words were replaced by a shrill cry as I slammed my feet into my brakes immediately. The tires screeched against the tarred road, and it took
039Alora's POV There was no way this could be my life, no absolutely fucking way. Recently, my life had been giving me pointers as to why I needed to believe that maybe, just maybe I had a bit of bad luck running through my veins. But with everything that had gone down tonight, I think I had been underestimating it all along. I wasn't just bad luck. I was cursed and it just had to be with one very powerful hex too.It was crazy, but that was the only logical and reasonable explanation I could give to all the events unfolding in my life. At this point, only a fool would still uphold my beliefs that bad things only happened to you because of a bad decision you'd made in the past. Here, I had clearly made a good decision, or was in the process of doing so, when the universe just had to show me that again, she was the boss and controlled every bit and part of my life. It was messed up. Really messed up.Even in a million years, I didn't see tonight coming. If someone had asked m
040Fredrick’s POV I hated traffic lights, or if I was being honest, not really. I just hated the fact that I had to see one right now, and just when I had pulled up to it and was seconds away from zooming past, it just had to switch to red. What the actual fuck?I wanted to yell out loud, but it was almost midnight, and the roads were close to being deserted. Throughout my entire drive that had led up to this point, I had counted only a handful of cars and while I wasn't exactly this erratic, I wished I was the only one on the road. That way, I could do whatever I wanted to do and when I wanted to do it. Like run through the many buildings standing in my way till I got to the station. I inhaled and exhaled a couple of times, willing myself to calm down. A larger part of me couldn't help but feel like the best way to let out all the stress was by probably yelling or punching something, but I wasn't about to ruin something in the car and delay me any further. I was already late
041Alora's POV It was official. I hated the police. They were dumb, unprofessional and inconsiderate. I knew it was just one of them who had been chosen to represent the vast majority, but it didn't make it any less better. In fact, if there was anything that could make me feel better, it was getting out of this hellhole, but it didn't look like I would be getting that wish of mine anytime soon. Or anything at all. Prior to this time, I had dreaded the silence that came with the room I'd been kept in. I honestly felt nothing could be more worse than that, but again, nature just had to show me another way of eating my words. I knew the officer who had walked in here was trouble, my biggest mistake was just underestimating him. “What could the famous Alora Henshaw be caught doing with a bag of drugs?” It had been some minutes since the officer left me alone again, but his words still rang in my ear, and for some strange reason, each syllable of his sent goosebumps racing down
042 Fredrick’s POV This was messed up, really messed up. I wasn't just talking about one part of it, but the whole thing as a collective. I blinked twice, willing the burn in my eyes to disappear. I'd been up all night, and even if I could have it any other way, I wasn't exactly sure it would work. How could I sleep when the one I cared about the most was locked up in Police custody? She hadn't left my mind since I laid my eyes on her in that room. It was barely twenty four hours, but I wasn't exaggerating when I said she was already looking pale. Stress had never been a good look on Alora and last night had just proved it. I was expecting the reaction she'd given when her eyes met mine. What I didn't expect, was how she reacted after. “Please leave.” Each syllable drove a stake deeper and deeper into my chest. It was a miracle how I didn't even break down into tears right in front of her. “You never should have come here.” Was she that mad at me that she refused to accept
043Eliaz's POV I hunched my back, making it a bit easier to shrink deeper into the black coat hung across my shoulders. An equally black baseball cap adorned my head and to match, I had on a nose mask that covered basically every of my facial features except my eyes. My eyes though, were on an entirely different level. With the emotions that ran through me at the moment, I was a hundred percent sure that my gaze would burn a hole through the glasses if i had decided to wear one. Plus it would be super uncomfortable. The fact that I was even dressed like this was an unwelcome surprise, and be rest assured that I wasn't going to spare the person who had recommended this to me. A frown made its way to my face as I stepped into a puddle. Despite the mask, I could still feel my anger threatening to rip the material into shreds. At a point, a thought popped into my head and I thought, what if I just took the damned thing off? What was the use anyway, it's not like anyone could see m
089Alora's POV The living room was crowded, but it didn't exactly seem so. Why? Four people was already a crowd for me and I didn't need any more people. If Laura or anyone in here decided to bring in another guest, then best believe I would either crash out,or lose it in front of the newest addition. Yes, I was that anti social.A small sigh slid past my lips as I pushed that lone thought out of my head. My hands were wrapped around a warm cup of hot cocoa, and while the others discussed, I gently sipped on my beverage. It tasted heavenly if I was being honest, and with the slightly loud and chartering noise in the background, it created the perfect ambience for a business woman enjoying her wealth and affluence, after climbing so many obstacles to get to them. I would be lying if I said I didn't relate to that. Well, only a part of it. I was yet to overcome all the obstacles in front of me. They were a lot, and sometimes, something inside me always whispered that I just w
088Alora's POV I'd lost count of exactly how long I'd been standing here for, but there was one thing I was sure of, it was a lot. My ankle ached and my knees buckled underneath my. My feet was this close to giving way, and while crouching sounded like a good idea, it was a risk I wasn't exactly willing to take. Stay strong, Alora. I muttered more to myself than anybody else. You can do this. I'd been muttering that for a while now, but frankly, I wasn't sure i really believed it. I was exhausted. I wanted to run back to the comfort of my car, but I knew I couldn't do that. If I did, how was I going to see just what that sneaky Eliaz was up to? He'd been in the bar for the past hour now, I knew because I took record of when he'd first walked in, and he was yet to come out. I had no idea what he was even doing in there. Did he come with someone? Was he waiting for someone?.A million and one questions ran through my head,but the more I asked myself, the more confused I got
087Alora's POV I'd messed up, and Ethan's smirk grin wasn't the only indication I was getting. I felt it all around me. Up until now, it felt like I was under some kind of spell. Well, maybe that depiction wasn't exactly correct, but I'd allowed my anger and desperation to get to me, and now, I'd just shot myself in the foot. Ethan wasn't supposed to know what I'd just told him. My business was strictly meant for the court and the court only, but now, I'd just gone to spill to him, that the potential evidence I had was nowhere to be found. Way to go Alora, fucking way to go. “Can't got your tongue miss?” He called out to me. “I've never taken you to be the quiet type, but I guess it's true what the saying says; situation changes people, a lot. It's so sad to see that this is what you've been reduced to.”“I haven't been reduced to anything and you know it.” I shot back. “I'm simply just in a bad spot and…”“You've been in a bad spot since I knew you, Alora.” He cut me off.
086Alora's POV The door swung open, after what finally seemed like forever. In fact, it was forever because I had waited a long time, and by the time Ethan waltzed into the empty seat behind his desk that waa supposed to be his, it waa safe to say that he had wasted approximately two hours, if I wasn't mistaken. My eyes trailed the physique of his back as he took his sweet time getting to his chair. Like that wasn't enough, he even made a show of finally settling down. “Are you going to romanticize picking up the pens littered on your desk now?” The question had caught him off guard, but he was quick to gather the hens of his composure again. “Or are you finally going to realize that you're wasting both your time and mine?!”“Me?” He gasped slightly, but I didn't miss the skeleton of a smile making its way across his lips. “Is that what you really think? Well, I understand why you would think that though; you've been waiting for quite some time now. Unlike me, I've just clea
085Alora's POV Was I crazy? Well, we were about to find out. This wasn't going to be the first time I would think I was a little mental upstairs. I mean, if so many people had told me that, I liked to think it was true, even if it was only by a fraction. I used to get mad when I heard the word crazy being used to describe me. It ticked me off in most ways, but not anymore. Instead of always getting upset over it and all the time, I trained myself to see it as a compliment somehow and use it to better myself. If you thought about it, it was better to be referred to as the crazy lady, or crazy Laura rather than being pitied whenever your name came up. If they all thought I'd been crazy all this while, then they were about to get the biggest shock of their lives. For the second time, and more than I would actually like, I drummed my fingers against the steering wheel, anxiously waiting for the lights to turn green. It was almost the same scenario as this morning, the only diffe
084Alora's POV No. There was no way this was happening. I'd lost count of the number of times I'd said that since my move back to Los Angeles and while I could swear that the previous time I'd said that would be the last, my life has a funny way of rubbing it in my face. Over and over again. It was one thing to be hopeless, and another thing to have no sight of things turning around for you, but you still decide to hold on to that tiny piece of faith, that somehow, something good would come out of it. In case, you were doubting the latter was worse, because if life decided to pull out the rug from under your feet, then you were going to fall, hard. My ears buzzed, and even though Laura's voice echoed in my head, I refused to believe that what she'd said was true. “They're gone.” Her words swarm all around me. “The messages are gone.” While I was in prison and especially after my conversation with Laura, that was the only thing I could think about. Those messages. I knew
083Alora's POV One would think that at this point, and with everything I've been through, I would have gotten used to it by now. But no matter how much shit I've been through, I like to think that's the last. That doesn't necessarily work, and the phone call I received last night, was all the proof I needed in the world to finally understand that. I drummed my fingernails against the surface of my steering wheel. An unruly rhythm reached my ears, but I tuned them out the moment they got closer to my earlobe. On the outside, horns blared and honked at the traffic light that had been stuck at the red light for the past thirty minutes. At this point, I was beginning to think it might be a malfunction, because I had no idea what was causing the holdup. The zebra crossing in front of me was as empty as could be, so why wasn't the light changing? I sighed. If anything, it gave me some time to think. I'd sworn I wasn't going to do that too often, but life obviously had other plans
082Alora's POV I had no idea which was weird, the entire moments that led up to me fainting and waking up in the hospital, or Fredrick's weird energy. If I was being honest though, I would say it was Fredrick. I watched him from the windows in the living room as his car pulled out of the compound. I wasn't sure why, but his departure just didn't sit right with me. It sounded weird, and funny in a way. My mind went in a million directions, and so many thoughts crowded my head, but no matter how frazzled my brain was, my uncertainty didn't hint at the fact that he was probably cheating on me. It didn't. At all. For most women, that would be their first thought, but not for me. Fredrick wasn't that type of man, and he never would be. But at the same time, he had never been the kind to keep something from me. It was pretty obvious at this point. Usually, whenever he saw I was in a bad mood, he would do everything in his power to cheer me up. But throughout the drive home, he'
081Fredrick's POV The drive back home was silent. I hated it, but there was really nothing I could do about it. I wanted to speak, to try and ease out the tension that brewed in the car, but no matter how hard I tried or wanted to, I just couldn't bring myself to do anything. It just didn't feel right. I let out a sigh. I'd been doing that for the past couple of minutes now, but Alora didn't seem to complain. In fact, she hadn't reacted to anything I'd done and I would be lying if I said it didn't bother me. I snuck a glance at the woman in question. She had her head tilted towards the window, with her eyes trained on the scenery whizzing past. I knew Alora well enough to know that she wasn't staring at anything. She was looking at it, but she couldn't see anything. Even after Eliaz had left the ward, the tension that once brewed between the three of us didnt just go away. I'd stared at her for a couple of seconds, and it was obvious something was wrong . Very wrong. I was