Chapter 179

I could see that Charles now fully blamed the Alpha King for the fall of his family. Thanks to the information we’d uncovered with Anthony Bellweather, we discovered that the Alpha King found the Rafe family too much of a threat.

With a young son and heir to their conglomerate and control over much of the media on the far side of Orlune from Packhaven, the king had decided to silence any opposition preemptively. And he’d employed Anthony’s services, or rather, forced Anthony into service, to accomplish that.

This totally made sense. From everything I had learned about the pack structure, who better to use than an alpha family who would otherwise have no possible way of competing with the Rafe family? It would be easy to get compliance when the one being taken out benefited Anthony as much as it did the Alpha King.

I’d never asked Anthony if he would have helped the alpha king take down Charles’ family, even if the Alpha King hadn’t threatened the Bellwether family.

It probably never occurred to such a violent Alpha King that he could manipulate people without threatening pain. But we’d never know because Anthony said that the king had come in with heavy threats right away, and there was never any question about whether or not Anthony would be helping. The king had never given him a chance to choose either way.

So, despite finding Charles’ chosen method of making a statement to the king by making a mess of this waiting room rather distasteful, I went ahead and let him have his moment. He was just acting like the angry young man that the king had left behind after destroying his father.

A new and surprising thought occurred to me, and that was that I wished I’d had a chance to give Charles an heir. If I’d had his baby, there would be no better way to foil the king’s original plan for the Rafe family’s extinction.

When I felt suitably dry in my neither regions, I went and found my underwear, pulling those back on just in time for the door to open and the mousey man to return.

“Miss Laurentia, you are to come with me. Master Rafe, you’re to be taken home. You’ve been assigned security. They will meet you outside the door, and they will ensure your safety on your way to return to your apartment.” He waved me out the door. “Madam, after you.”

I went in the opposite direction, back into the room, giving Charles one last big kiss and trying to hold back tears. I couldn’t imagine any good would come from us being separated. Why else would the king need to do it unless he was going to do something to me that Charles would try and stop?

Charles seemed to be thinking the same thing because he gave me a fierce kiss and whispered, “I love you, Elena.”

“I love you, too, Charles,” I whispered back.

Then I turned and went after the mousey man, holding my head high and willing myself to face my fate with dignity and pride.

He led me down more of those lonely halls and up stairs, at the top of which the floor transitioned from marble to carpet. This surprised me. I expected to be going to a jail cell. Old-fashioned dungeons had popped into my mind. But this looked like the sort of transition between public and private spaces inside a mansion like the palace.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked.

“Why, to your room, Miss,” he said.

“My room?”

The man didn’t answer and instead continued leading me through the halls, twisting and turning down corridors which I would never find my way out of again. Finally, he stopped in front of a door, holding it open for me to enter.

Inside, the frame of a massive bed took up a large chunk of the far wall. Downy pillows covered the top. The ceiling above it had been painted with an idyllic scene of swans frolicking on a lake so that when one lay in the bed, they would be treated to a serene picture. This room was clearly meant to be used, furnished with a dresser, a vanity with a little stool, and mirrors and lights for getting ready for evening parties.

“Why are we here?” I asked.

“This is where you will be staying while you are in the palace.”

“How long will I be staying?”

“That is entirely up to the Alpha King, Miss,” the man replied. “The dressmaker will be by shortly to see that you are suitably attired for your dinner with the king.”

“Wait, wait. I’m having dinner with the king?”

The man bobbed his head in a nod. “Do you require someone for your hair and makeup as well?”

“I don’t have anything to do my hair or makeup with,” I said.

“Very well. I will see that you are properly supplied. Until then, make yourself comfortable.”

He turned, leaving the room and clicking the door shut behind him. I hurried over to check the door and see if I was locked in. But it opened soundlessly on well-oiled hinges. I peeked out into the hall, and there were no guards or anything.

Suddenly, after having had bodyguards in my life for nearly half a year, being without Theo felt very empty and exposed. I wandered back into my room in a bewildered state. What in the name of the moon goddess was happening? Nothing that I had printed about the king had been good, so why was I being treated like a favored guest?

I sat down on the corner of the bed to ponder this. I’d have to be very careful around this man. He was a habitual abuser of women, masterful at manipulating and letting other people take the blame for his misdeeds. He absolutely could not be trusted.

Once I had resolved and hardened my wariness of the king, I tried to relax and enjoy the plushness surrounding me as best I could.

The dressmaker came in with a whole rolling wardrobe of garments in my size. I quickly learned that she wasn’t actually going to make the dress. What she did was let me try them on like my own personal Princess dress-up wardrobe.

After I had selected a beautiful cocktail dress in soft grey that made the highlights in my hair glow like polished wood, she altered the dress so that it hugged my body perfectly. Hair and makeup went much the same, so by the time I greeted the mousey man at my door to go to dinner, I felt quite pampered.

I could see that I had watched far too many movies when I arrived for dinner. Rather than a grand dining room with a huge wooden table capable of seating dozens of people, I was shown to a smaller room, much the size of the one that Charles and I had waited in earlier that afternoon. In it was what I would consider a large family-sized dining table, capable of seating about ten people.

The king sat at the head of this, and my first thought was that we didn’t see this man on live television anywhere near enough. When I saw him on TV, I always thought of him as a strong middle-aged king in the prime of life. What I saw without the lights and the makeup was a man entering his silver years, and not even with all that much style.

His hair held streaks of gray, and heavy lines covered his face and neck. His eyes sparkled but not with laughter or fun, rather a cold sort of ruthlessness. His gaze landed on me, and he gave me a serial killer smile: sweet on the surface, undercut with chilling deception.

He stayed in his seat as I crossed the room, though he did gesture to a chair next to him. I hesitantly took the offered seat and waited for him, not just because he was the king but also to see where I stood with this most dangerous man.

He continued to level that unsettling smile on me, and after letting it linger until I wanted to squirm, he finally spoke. “Welcome to the palace, Miss Laurentia. You have quite the way of gaining yourself an invitation to dinner with the Alpha King.”

“Thank you for having me,” I mumbled in reply. His initial words hadn’t done anything to let me know where I stood with him, and so I honestly had no idea how to proceed.

That crooked smile widened. “You really left us no choice, you know. But over the past few months, you have made it abundantly clear that if one seeks to disseminate the truth, you are the woman to deal with.”

“I do insist on the truth,” I agreed, still keeping myself back from the conversation and not wanting to stick my foot in my mouth. If I wasn’t already in trouble, there was no need to make it worse until I knew what his angle was.

“We’re glad to hear you value the truth,” he said, using the royal “we.” “Because we are in need of someone to share our truth.”