As I descended from the stairs, I and Alexander's eyes met each other briefly before I looked away. But even when I looked away, I could still feel his gaze on me.
My father was not downstairs as well, and I wondered where he was.
"Mum, where's dad? Will he not be available for dinner?", I asked.
"No", my mum answered mischievously. "You would be having dinner only with your soon-to-be husband."
"What? Why?", I tried asking in a hushed tone, but I was sure that I asked loud enough for Alexander to hear.
"I think you should discuss everything with your husband over dinner, don't you think so?", she asked.
I was not give a single second to reply to her question. My mother gave a quick nod to Alexander before hurriedly excusing herself out of there.
I angrily watched as she walked up the stairs, probably off to her room. Then when I looked forward, I saw Alexander staring intently at me.
"What is this?", I asked.
I wanted to pull out one of the seats so I could sit down, but Alexander beat me to it, pulling one out like a gentleman so that I could sit down.
"What is what?", he asked, pretending not to understand what I asked.
"Why are you here, without your parents? Why are my parents not here?", I asked.
"I am here without my parents because I am the one who asked to have dinner with you. I had taken your parents out for breakfast and we had discussed everything that we needed to know", he replied.
"You know you could have just texted me to go out with you", I stated flatly.
"I could. But I didn't. I wanted to see what it felt like to have dinner with just you at your home", he replied, taking a seat.
That was suspicious and did not make complete sense to me.
"But–", I started saying, but he interrupted.
"I think you should eat. You overthink about things so much. I know it's not very much like me to come to your home and request to have dinner. But you know the kind of parents we have, they love to be respected. So in my bid to respect them, I had to be here to have dinner with you. No more questions concerning this", he said.
I kept quiet and began scooping some food to eat. I could not wait for the dinner to be over. Alexander seemed irritated by my questions, and I was irritated at my parents. If Alexander took them out for breakfast, they were likely the ones who suggested that he had dinner at their place with just me. They were cameras all around the house. I was pretty sure they were watching us, trying to see if we were getting along.
I should leave this place. I was getting fed up with the way they were controlling my life. I could leave alone. What was I doing here?
"You look really decent", Alexander stated blandly.
"Is that a compliment?", I asked in confusion.
"It's whatever you think it is, ba–Olivia", he said.
I looked at him for while. I could promise that I had heard him trying to call me babe or baby, but had stopped midway before calling me by my name. What was happening?
He avoided my gaze as he munched on his food. He knew I was looking at him, but did not want to look back. That made him more suspicious, and that made me confirm that was indeed trying to call me babe or baby.
"So, tell me, how was your business trip?", I asked, returning to my food.
"It was normal", he replied.
Normal? What did he mean by normal? I wanted him to give me the details of his illegal businesses, but as expected, he did not give.
"Also", he continued, "We will be going for a business dinner tomorrow. I want you to get familiar with some of my acquaintances, learn some few things about business and get some journalists to start writing about us. I don't want our marriage to come as a shock to anyone. It will not be proper if our marriage comes as a shock to people because they would speculate, and it would be known that we were forced to get married. That is not really appropriate for our businesses. But I am pretty sure if I take you for the business social event, they would be some journalists and gossip mongers around who will help us spread the news, because I don't take women for such events", Alexander explained.
This was the most that I had heard Alexander talk. It was fun to listen to him. I was glad that he was able to put his mouth into good use.
Another thing that caught my attention was the fact that he had mentioned that he had never taken another woman for the kind of social event that he wanted to take me to. I felt kind of special, but also kind of nervous.
"What kind of business social event is it?", I asked.
"It is a masquerade ball that will be attended by many successful businessmen and businesswomen, elites such as queens, princesses, kings, and princes from different countries, other high-profile individuals, including wealthy tech-savvy individuals, and many more," he answered.
I was happy that Alexander was doing a fair job in answering most of my questions. It made our conversation more civil, more interesting….
Back in my College, we had lots of business events were we, the business students, met with prominent businessesmen and businesswomen. I was used to such events, though I had never attended a masquerade ball.
I was excited at the thought of something new. The first time I knew I loved masquerade balls was when I was younger, about ten years old. I loved the Barbie shows, especially "Barbie and the Three Musketeers," where I saw what a masquerade ball looked like. I had admired it a lot, but had never had the opportunity to attend one. But now, an opportunity was being placed at my feet.
If Alexander was not so much of a narcissist, our short wedding duration before I successfully found a way to end it, may have been something that I would look forward to.
"You seem excited", he mentioned, smiling mockingly, his eyes scanning my entire body.
I laughed, feeling tensed. I did not know what emotion to feel. I was torn between feeling angry that Alexander was mocking me, happy that he was at least playing with me, nervous that he was looking at me with those eyes as though he wanted me, or feeling horny and sexy and just playing along with his intense gaze.
"Why would I seem excited? What's here to be excited about?", I asked, feigning ignorance.
"You tell me", he said, his voice getting hoarse, and his stare becoming more intense.
I felt my body getting heated up. I was getting hotter than I ever got with Ryan. What was Alexander doing to me?
"I think you should keep eating", I said, munching my food, and avoiding his gaze.
He cleared his throat as though he had just snapped out of his trance.
"Yeah, you're right", he said, as he continued eating. I could hear him murmur something that sounded like, 'I knew this was a bad idea.'
I did not bother asking him if I had heard correctly, or what he meant by that, because I knew that even if I asked, he would not give me an answer. I was beginning to understand that too many questions just irritated him.
We finished eating our food in silence, but we both remained tense. We avoided each other's gaze like the plague. This was the first dinner where Alexander avoided my gaze. Whenever he came with his parents, he had formed a habit of glaring at me, and even when I looked in his direction, he wasn't fazed. But now, he behaved as if he was not interested in looking at me, especially when he knew our eyes would meet. I had no idea if it was a good or bad sign.
"It was nice having dinner with you, Olivia", he said, getting up from his seat after about five minutes of complete silence.
"Uhm, it was nice having dinner with you too", I replied, getting up from my seat as well.
It was not nice. I had no idea what was happening to me now. I had no idea why I felt the way I did. I needed a cold shower to cool my head off.
"I assume you got a decent wedding dress as well", he said, still scanning my entire body.
I raised one of my eyebrows.
"I'm really confused if decent is a way of you saying beautiful or pretty. Because if you mean decent as in modest, then you should just say so", I said.
If he had paid attention to pictures I had sent to him, he would not be asking me about what wedding dress I got.
"If you want me to give you a compliment so badly, you can request for it instead of talking like you deserve the compliment", Alexander said, a smirk on his face.
"What the hell do you even mean by that?", I asked angrily, trying not to raise my voice, but I was failing at my attempt.
"Don't shout Olivia, as you can see, your parents planted cameras all around the house, they would definitely see you shouting, and you would be questioned later on", he said, his smirk still plastered on his face.
He was doing this on purpose. He used "decent" as a faint compliment, and since decent obviously meant modest and was a regular compliment to me, I wanted him to be precise in his praise. I wanted to know if he was masking the compliment – "beautiful," "pretty," or "cute" – as "decent." He knew that is what I wanted to know, but he was bent on just frustrating my life.
I could not control what happened next. Tears spilled from my eyes.