Chapter 19

I'm afraid, but inner Bitch tells me that there's no point being afraid. But I'm still afraid. I had never been so afraid for someone else's life before. I have never been so irrational, so unreasonably fearful for someone else's well-being.

He's just your employer. You're worried that if he dies, no one's going to pay your bills.

It wasn't the best thought to think at the moment -of Mr. Elxa dying -but I couldn't stand even the idea of it, even as I rushed into the room with the phone in my hand. It felt as if I was doing something illegal; something bad. Technically, having Mr. Elxa trying to shoot his wife's sister in whatever kind of revenge of her shooting him was illegal. But somehow, I knew it was more than revenge. It was more than saving Jon too.

This thing that was happening; it was larger than just Jon and Mr. Elxa being unhappy with Ms. Ellen. It was hard to imagine a woman so sweet on the exterior pulling the trigger on her brother-in-law, but she'd done it somehow anyway.

The hospital ward hadn't changed much since I left, but Mr. Elxa was pretty much all changed and dressed up. By dressed up, I meant that he had almost everything on, save the fact that he was struggling to get his injured arm into the sleeves of his dress shirt. Wordlessly, I went over to help him with as gentle hands as I could afford, but I could tell that he hurt by the way he suppressed his hisses of pain. I helped him on his jacket too, and soon he was became the businessman in the hospital.

Though now that such drastic things had happened, I was beginning to suspect that he was more than a simple businessman. Where I had previously suspected of him being involved in illegal activities, I was now quite positive on that fact, though the severity of it eluded me. For example, I knew enough he dealt with information possession that no businessman should have. Too many times; I have answered the door to deliveries of files with the official logo of the FBI, CIA, MDPD and Interpol. I have never been a person extremely interested in the spy world, but I knew enough that these bureaus were the big boys. Yet, I never did once question them, nor did I question his power out in the world. It was more than a businessman's influence but I could not, for the death of me, chart the exact strength of his reach and connection in that scary world of endless crimes and criminalities.

"Kaylen." He said my name severely again, and I forcefully suppressed a shiver, blinking to find him waiting by the door of the ward, uninjured hand outstretched. "The phone."

Barely reacting, I dropped the phone gingerly on his hand, earning a short nod from him before he turned back, quickly typing a number before waiting for the connection to ring through.

"Ellen." He greeted lowly after a short pause, and I heard the low tones of a dangerous beast again. This was a side of Mr. Elxa I had failed to see all the while. This was a face and tone of a man that scared me, but fascinated me. It was the other side of the man I cared for dearly.

The other side of the man I had come to love.

It was a stupid realization, given the dangerous circumstance, but as I rushed down to visit him at the hospital, I knew that the anxiety and fear for his life was irrational. I knew that his injury was merely a bullet wound, but yet I had been so deathly afraid for his life, so afraid of never seeing him ever again.

But it was pointless to hope for love, for it was unrequited. Besides, Mr. Elxa, for all his flaws and ambiguity in terms of vocation, was still a rich man, perfect in his manners and dealings with women and had the perfect Casanova face. There was probably no one who could ask for a better combination, and there wasn't any doubt that he had millions of better looking girls to choose from. Above them all, above me, there was always his dead wife.

"Don't." His voice suddenly pierces through the internal haze of thoughts, and I jerk back into reality to hear the dangerously angry underlying tone of voice happening again. "Don't try to say anything. You play this game with me; you will lose. Even with Jon, you will lose. But fine; you shall see. You will understand that if you try to attack a member on The Circle, I will make you suffer so badly that you ever regretted using Jon to your advantage."

The promise was so deadly that I shivered with icy coldness that my spine seemed to suddenly develop, and I held on to the doorway to stop from running away spontaneously. There must be a stumbling reply from the other side of the connection, for Mr. Elxa made a scary laugh that was the epitome of a super-villain’s laugh.

“You don’t need to threaten me, Ellen. I will be there. You should never need to doubt that fact. But while you wait for me to collect Jon there, I would suggest that you think of who you want to pass what little inheritance you have left once you are dead. It’s not too late to draft a will.” He seemed to advise with his whole heart and yet the mockery wasn’t lost. It must be Mr. Elxa’s confidence, for he never even tried leaving space for Ms. Ellen to reply before he hung up.

Then, before I could even think of a thing to say –even just a comment at his no-nonsense speech through the phone –Mr. Elxa flipped the cheap phone over in his palm, removed the battery and microchip. With cool efficiency, as if it wasn’t a newly bought phone, he wiped the entire phone clean with the bed sheets and dropped it in the bin without leaving a trace. Then he moved quickly over to the window, and pitched the microchip out with a strong uninjured left arm.

“Come.” Mr. Elxa instructed in his evened tone of voice again, as if he hadn’t laughed coldly and brought ice to my spine only moment ago. I wasn’t sure if this was the man I knew all this while, but I wasn’t sure if it scared me or intrigued me. My reaction to this new side that I knew had always existed confused me, but I felt myself equally curious as I was afraid.

Still, Mr. Elxa was my employer and when he told me to come, there was no way I could say no. I kept my eyes down, hoping to understand things later in the future, and let him walk past me through the doorway to the corridor outside. Though I was pretty sure he couldn’t be discharged yet, there was no question that Mr. Elxa could somehow get himself out of the hospital, so I offered no protest. I couldn’t imagine any nurses or doctors trying to force him back to his ward either anyway.

Surprise took me when Mr. Elxa stopped in front of me, standing just inches away from me. Up close, our height difference was only more defined as he looked down at me, his soft black eyes taking in my face as if it was the first time he ever saw my face. I didn’t know what I saw there, but if only I knew that the expression he held so openly in his eyes was love… then I would never have doubted him.

But I was a woman who never had a proper boyfriend or any man to declare their love or infatuation for me. I was a woman whose idea of love was built around drama, and where ‘love at first sight’ was the strongest kind of love that could glue even the most extreme of couples together.

So I didn’t understand his gesture as we stood there, almost chest to chest. Mr. Elxa’s face was so close that I could almost feel his breath on my cheek, and I felt the blush rise up my cheeks. He hadn’t tried getting so physically close to me before...

“I will tell you everything when this is all over. But until it is, I need you to listen to me. You mean something to me, Kaylen. So when I tell you to take Jon and run, you must run.” He said softly, in an almost gentle undertone. I swallowed once, and nodded, the guilt creeping up my heart again.

Why hadn’t I tried to run after Jon? Jon was the most precious presence in Mr. Elxa’s heart. No wonder he had been so pissed off and angry when I didn’t tell him where his son was. There was no mistaking –above everything that Mr. Elxa pretended to show, he cared for every bit of his son’s welfare.

“Come. The faster we finish this business, the faster you can be happier.” He said shortly, and I didn’t have the time to question his choice of words before his uninjured –more dominant –hand closed over my wrist and started pulling me along.

I was suddenly reminded by the day on the cruise, when Mr. Elxa had took my hand in the same fashion –no-nonsense and strong. I had been trailing behind him blindly then; and I was trailing blindly behind him now too.

I just could trust him with my whole heart, even with his obvious complex mysteries.

We weaved through the crowd and made it to the elevator without anyone recognizing the patient walking briskly down the corridor. I’d half expected for at least a nurse to stop Mr. Elxa’s journey, but it didn’t happen, as the elevator door closed. The lift ride down was spent in silence, but Mr. Elxa led us out with no words when we reached ground level. He didn’t stop –the confidence in his stride earning respectful indifference from everyone around us. He walked us all the way to the line of cabs waiting, and we got into an empty one.

The cab driver turned around to ask for the address, but Mr. Elxa saved him the extra effort by cutting off the imminent question with a strict tone of voice saying the address of my apartment. I didn’t question how Mr. Elxa knew my address, but only observed him quietly, noting his hand on my forearm that hadn’t removed itself yet.

Halfway on the journey back to my apartment, Mr. Elxa took out his phone and began to call.

“Get all that I’ve given you and give it to CIA and Interpol now.” His greeting speech was all business, and the reply was most probably made by a disgruntled person at being ordered so rudely.

“Jeremy should have already told you that Hayden and I are fine now. It is useless to hold grudges. Even if you should try, at least wait for when we step down from The Circle. Wars can happen anytime you want, but I don’t want innocents to get hurt.”

The reply made, though, was short and Mr. Elxa hung up the call as quickly as he made it. And then his hand came back to clutch over my free hand, which hung loose casually at the empty space between us. I turned quickly to look, waiting for some sort of instructions made to me, but Mr. Elxa wasn’t looking at me.

I bit my lip at the warmth of his fingers and tried my best not to spoil the mood, even as the blush must have already risen up my neck and taken over my face. I didn’t want to look in the mirror –for I was pretty sure a tomato would be an appropriate descriptor for the case.

The second half of the journey was spent with me trying to tame down the furious blush, forcing the redness to recede. I must have been fairly successful, for Mr. Elxa didn’t seem to find anything different when the cab parked by the roadside, and he turned to look at me.

“Go up, Kaylen, and close all windows and doors. Please just wait patiently, and don’t go out. I will get Jon to come here when I get him safe. If I don’t come back within a day, I will have someone empty my accounts and give you Jon’s inheritance. I will have to bother you to be Jon’s Guardian if I am dead.”

“Mr. Elxa…”

“Don’t say anything. Don’t worry about anything.” He cut off sternly, seriously. “But I just want you to consider a question while you wait. Will you ever accept a conman in your life? A conman who might not have been the most morally upright, who might not have thought too much about who they would affect in their lives?”

His sudden question shocked me, but he left me no time to pursue his question further as he let my hand go, and began pushing me towards the door. On reflex, I stepped out of the cab, and before I could turn back to wave, he was gone.

I bit my bottom lip and obeyed the instructions given.

But his question, as per requested, hung on my mind.

For all the wrong reasons.

I had never been acquainted with a conman ever before. The only person I knew relatively to be a conman was my father… Hayden.

It was a dangerous world –that was why my mother left him with me. Mr. Elxa’s and Mr. Hayden’s world was equally dangerous. Mr. Hayden had a daughter and wife that left him because of the dangers of his world…

I had thought it was all a strange coincidence before –since there were so many people in the world named Hayden. Besides, Hayden’s lover had been Kristen, but my mother had been Kathryn Hurst.

But Kathryn and Kristen were names not a too far a stone’s throw from each other. It didn’t help that my mother refused to tell me about her life before she met my father. She never told me how she met my father, how she became involved with a conman.

What if she had been a conwoman too? What if she had been lying all the while? What if her name was Kristen, and she changed it to Kathryn when she escaped my father –Hayden?

There were too many what-ifs for me to be sure, but now that the seed of doubt had been planted in my mind, I kept linking the different coincidences, trying to come up with a conclusion that I could never be sure with.

But what if. What if Hayden was my father?

What if everything was just a lie?

_____________________________________________________________________________________

I tried doing everything that could get my mind off the situation at hand. I collected my disgruntled cat Luna from my neighbor, cleaned up the entire apartment that had been neglected for months, and tried to look for things I could prepare for when Mr. Elxa and Jon came back home. But there was not enough food at home, and I turned to the releases of the television to take my mind off the worries.

But no matter how hard I tried, no matter how I tried to immerse myself in the world of drama, I couldn’t find myself concentrating as my mind simply drifted away to worry.

I considered calling Mr. Elxa, but at the same time I didn’t dare to –just in case I interrupted him in a dangerous situation. Mr. Elxa had left me nothing to do and loads of worry to think about. But that was what I didn’t want –time to think. I didn’t want to think. I was afraid. If I think too much… Then I would doubt Mr. Elxa.

“Edward…” The now-wheelchair bound Maya cried on the screen, watching as her boyfriend stepped into the room. “You lied… About everything. About how you came to me. About how you got us away from there, how you saved me…”

On screen, the actor acting as Edward walked forwards and smiled the same serene smile that I’d seen on Mr. Elxa’s face.

“You lied to me, and I lie to you, Maya.” He replied with a soft, loving look in his eyes as he knelt down to meet is girlfriend on eye level. “But it doesn’t matter what lie we come up with. As long as the love is true, I don’t care about anything else. I don’t care if you lied just to be with me. I don’t care that you lied to protect me from everyone else. If lying is going to keep us together, then I’m going to lie until I die.”

“But Edward…” Maya continued, crying now as the tears trickled their way down her perfect, made-up cheeks. “You hate lying.”

“For you, even the worst of cons cannot repel me. So what if you’re a con. I’m also a con now. I’ll con and steal your heart so that it belongs to me and me only.” He promised, and almost immediately my mind drift again.

It was such a sickening coincidence that cons was now getting to be a very real question in my mind. Mr. Elxa had asked me to consider if I would ever accept cons. Would I? My mother had always taught me to be truthful when I was young, but when had anyone kept entirely truthful throughout their lives? But could I accept anyone who was a con –who made people’s suffering their benefit? Could I accept anyone who took people’s hard earned money for their own?

At the sound of footsteps making up the stairs, I practically flew to the door. The warning about opening the door only to Jon or Mr. Elxa was entirely gone as I wrenched it open, sticking my head outside to meet the person coming up the stairs.

“Are you okay?” I asked anxiously, expected to see an expressionless face, or even an angry expression of the teenager I had come to know.

Who I saw standing at the top of the stairs was neither, as she made her way over to the door with posture so straight she could be walking down a runway for all I knew.

“Making up the stairs isn’t that hard, Ms. Kaylen.” She replied, but the expression on her face wasn’t exactly friendly as I struggled to come up with an appropriate reply. Ms. Hayley didn’t try to invite herself in, simply standing outside in front of me and giving me an expectant, but serious, no-nonsense look.

Almost instantly, I was reminded by the last time I met her, and how she told me that if I was planning anything bad on Mr. Elxa, she wouldn’t be afraid to take me on. But I hadn’t done anything to him, had I? Mr. Elxa getting shot, Jon running away, it wasn’t my fault, right? But if it wasn’t, then why was Ms. Hayley here?

“I’ll cut to the chase. I don’t need to be invited, for I need to leave soon. What is your mother’s name, Ms. Kaylen?” Her voice betrayed nothing, and it was by pure instincts that the reply rushed to my lips.

“Kathryn.”

“Your surname?”

“Hurst.” My honest reply escaped my lips, and I only remembered that I was supposed to lie about my real surname afterwards. If Ms. Hayley caught my sudden reaction, she didn’t show it. In fact, her face was as stony and unchangeable as Mr. Elxa’s, and I wondered if she was like him. How in the world did Jeremy find a woman so beautiful and charming, but so scary at the same time? Jeremy had seemed to perfect amiable and friendly man that any woman would fall for, but I never thought his type to be the scary, dangerous-looking women.

“Did you ever know your father?”

“Um… no. My mother told me his name was Hayden but never told me his surname.”

At the name Hayden, Ms. Hayley’s eyes narrowed on me, even more than she had done before. Her eyes looked me up and down, as if trying to ascertain that it was a woman standing before her at the other side of the door.

“You are 21?”

And bit my bottom lip, not exactly sure why I was so compelled to answering her questions honestly, but I still did. “Yes.”

“Give me your left hand.” She instructed in the same tone that Mr. Elxa had, and it was so alike that I had to obey. Quickly, she turned my wrist up against the light, as if she knew what she had been looking for all the while, and observed the little heart-shaped birthmark I had.

“So it really is you, Little Angel…” I heard her whisper softly under her breath, but she quickly masked it with a self-depreciating laugh. “Elxa, that son of a gun…”

“M-Ms. Hayley?” I stuttered, unsure of what to think about, what to say at all.

“When you see my brother the next time, do forgive him.” She let go of my hand, and turned away, back the way she came.

“Ms. Hayley, what do I forgive him about?” I stepped out of the apartment, trying to catch her back, but she was as quick as she came, disappearing down the stairs without a reply. There was no hope of waiting for a reply, so I went back and locked the door.

It hadn’t been Jon or Mr. Elxa, but it definitely had added even more questions into my mind. How had Ms. Hayley known about my birthmark, known where to look for it? Who was her ‘Little Angel’ that she called? Surely it wasn’t me?

I charted the questions in a list, just as Luna began rubbing my ankles for her meal. Why couldn’t the world be as easy as a cat’s? No worries; just food and sleep. All Luna did was meow for food, then laze around and sometimes let my cuddle her.

But the life of men were so hard, so complicated, so many secrets and mysteries. There were so many things to unearth, so many worries that couldn’t be explained.

All I could do was wait. And pray.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

I woke up to the sound of the doorbell ringing urgently. As I jerked up, realizing that I had fallen asleep in my fit of worry, Luna fell from my stomach to the floor and made an angry mew before she bound off angrily to curl up on my bed. I wasn’t very much concerned about my darling cat at the moment, as the doorbell continued ringing with insistence.

My heart pounded as I jumped up, rushing to the door and pulling it open.

“Jon! You’re alive!” I cried, the tears of joy and relief flooding my eyes to see him. He didn’t look that bad at all –perhaps just dirtied, crumpled clothes and a worried, unhappy and guilty expression on his face.

“Go in, Kaylen.” He urged quickly, pushing me back and stepping in with the no-nonsense attitude that he must have inherited from Mr. Elxa. “There are dangers out there.”

 Not exactly sure by what danger he meant, but not wanting to know, I stumbled backwards as I watched Jon close the door behind him and sliding the locks back in place before he looked around. He had never been to my apartment before, but something told me that anywhere with locked doors would work for him for he moved quickly to the small living area and sank down in the couch that I’d fallen asleep on.

“What happened? Where is Mr. Elxa?” I asked worriedly, getting him a cup of water before settling down beside him in the couch meant for two.

“He’s still with Ellen.” Jon said hoarsely. The expression on his face was one that was hard to decipher, with anger and worry and guilt all clashing and struggling to take over. “He might be in danger.”

“What happened?” I pursued again, a pit in my stomach starting at the knowledge of Mr. Elxa in danger. I had always known him to be a man in power of his surroundings at all time, but he had only been shot just earlier today. What if…

Focus, Kaylen.

“I tried to reason with Ellen, but she was bent on destroying Elxa. Then her men knocked me out with chloroform. I didn’t expect my aunt too be so cruel enough to have no qualms at all with using me against Elxa. When I woke up, Ellen was preparing for Elxa’s arrival. I tried to get a plan out of her, but it came out in bits and pieces. Elxa arrived –that stupid son of a bitch –and he made a deal with Ellen. His unconditional surrender for me. It was what Ellen wanted in the first place.” Jon explained, his hands shaking even as he clutched onto the glass, eyes faraway as if relieving the terror.

“Mr. Elxa will be fine…” I tried to calm him down, but it didn’t seem to work as he jerked at the touch of my hand on his.

“You don’t know that!” He raised his voice, then seemed to check himself.

“I can’t believe he was such an idiot. He knew she had a plan for him but still he came. Why couldn’t he just wait a little longer and come up with a plan to save both of us? Why did he agree to surrender?” Jon continued, quieter now as he left the glass on the low table and buried his face in his hands.

“Mr. Elxa loves and cares deeply for you. He’s not afraid of anything if it saves you.” I tried to console, but the impact of Mr. Elxa’s surrender for Jon’s sake was dealing a blow on me too. Yes, I’d expected Mr. Elxa to give up everything he had for his son’s sake, but sure he could manipulate his surroundings? Like how Mr. Elxa had manipulated me into working for him, how Mr. Elxa had manipulated many things through his evened, unemotional voice, why hadn’t he tried that on Ms. Ellen?

And then it struck me.

Ellen was his family.

No matter what he said, he had always given emotions when dealing with Ms. Ellen. Even if the emotion given were anger and hatred, it had been emotions. And I knew Mr. Elxa to be a man who worked the best when he was emotionless and detached.

That was what Ms. Ellen had used, and she’d succeeded.

The pit in my stomach grew bigger, as I wrapped myself around Jon’s prone form, trying to give him the comfort that I wasn’t sure if I had at all.

I will have to bother you to be Jon’s guardian if I am dead.

Mr. Elxa had known about it. He had known that he would be put in danger, and still he went. That was the length of his love for Jon, and it seemed to finally have gotten through to his son. But it was too late. If something had happened to Mr. Elxa already…

I refused to entertain the thoughts as I hugged Jon tightly, hearing him sob softly in guilt.

Mr. Elxa would survive.

He definitely had to.