The Seductive Pretty Boy of the Matriarchal World-Chapter 79: The Dream That Wouldn’t Stay

Chapter 79: The Dream That Wouldn’t Stay

Giselle Frost opened her eyes and found herself back at Lucien Hart’s birthday party.

Only this time, it wasn’t the same.

The last time she had stood in this place, the room had been crowded enough to feel airless. Laughter, glassware, low music, the constant shifting shimmer of expensive clothes and expensive people. Tonight there was none of that. The massive venue sat hollow and silent around her, stripped clean of guests, voices, and movement until only two things remained in the world.

Her.

And Lucien, suspended on the giant screen ahead.

Giselle turned slowly, scanning the room on instinct. No staff. No attendees. No shadows slipping along the edges. No one at all. The emptiness pressed in from every side, unnatural in a space built for spectacle. A sharp throb split through her skull without warning, and she lifted a hand to her temple.

Something was wrong with her memory.

Not missing, exactly. Scrambled.

As though pieces of two different nights had been forced together and then broken apart again.

Before she could make sense of it, the image of Lucien on the screen began to change. It grew larger and larger until it no longer looked like a projection at all. It looked real. Close enough to touch. Then, impossibly, he stepped out from the screen itself.

He dropped from a height of seven or eight feet.

Giselle’s heart lurched. She moved before thought could catch up, lunging forward and throwing out both arms to catch him.

The impact drove into her chest. He landed against her body, light and warm, and for one suspended second she did nothing except hold him.

Lucien laughed in her arms.

It was bright. Soft. Unguarded.

Nothing like his usual cool stillness. Nothing like the distant, almost untouchable composure that had turned him into a myth in the first place.

Giselle looked down.

The person in her arms tipped his face up at her, lips parting and closing in a silent sentence.

You caught me.

She gave the faintest nod.

The world changed.

The ballroom vanished so abruptly it felt like being shoved underwater. In its place stood a lavish room washed in muted gold, every surface sleek and expensive. A pair of glasses sat empty on the table nearby. Beside them rose a ridiculous stack of assignments, piled high enough to look accusatory.

And the boy in her arms began to change.

No.

Not change.

That realization hit with the slow, nauseating force of a blade turning deeper.

He had never been Lucien.

Not once.

From the beginning, it had always been the same person.

Cheeks flushed pink. Eyes wet and half-lidded, seductive in a way that felt feverish rather than intentional. Lips parted. Breath damp. A thin line of saliva clinging shamelessly at the corner of his mouth.

Elias Kane.

Dream and memory collided for one raw, blinding instant.

Giselle jerked upright in bed.

Her breath came fast. Damp heat clung to her skin, sweat slicking her neck and spine beneath the sheets. For a moment she only sat there, shoulders tense, pulse beating too hard, staring into the darkness as if the shape of the dream might still be waiting for her somewhere in the room.

So it had only been a dream.

That should have settled it.

But even though she had woken only seconds ago, the dream was already slipping out of reach. The clearer she tried to make it, the more it dissolved. The story blurred. The details ran. What remained was only the residue, heavy and wrong and impossible to ignore.

That was the nature of dreams.

She pressed a hand to her forehead and shut her eyes.

Her head felt unbearably heavy, as if something dense and unseen had been packed behind her eyes. After a while, she turned toward the window and looked through the narrow opening in the curtains.

The sky was still dark.

Too early for morning.

There was no chance of sleep now. Giselle threw back the covers, got out of bed, and crossed the room barefoot. When she pulled the curtains open, the glass was freckled with water, clear beads clinging to the surface in crooked trails.

It had rained again last night.

She stood there quietly, letting the cool gray light settle over her while the pounding in her head eased by degrees. Fragments returned without warning. A jump. An impact. An embrace.

And Elias.

Giselle went still.

The last haze of sleep vanished in an instant. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

By the time Sloane Sinclair spotted her in the breakfast room, Giselle had already showered.

Sloane looked up from her seat at the buffet table, surprise flickering openly across her face. "You showered already?"

Giselle gave a small nod. "I woke up sweating."

Sloane’s gaze drifted over her from top to bottom, lingering first on her damp silver hair, then on the faint darkness gathered beneath her eyes. "Bad dream?"

Giselle paused.

"Yeah," she said at last.

If Elias had shown up in it, waking up startled out of sleep was hardly strange.

That counted as a nightmare.

"Then why are you up this early?" Sloane asked. "Why not go back to bed?"

Giselle picked up half a sandwich, took a neat bite, and swallowed before answering. "I have something to take care of. I’m leaving first."

Sloane blinked. "Wait. What about that guy..."

"You take him."

Sloane stared at her.

Seriously?

Was she just a convenient errand now?

Giselle didn’t bother explaining. She set the rest of the sandwich down, turned, and left before Sloane could object properly.

When Elias finally woke up, packed his things, and made his way to the breakfast area, he looked around once and immediately noticed who was missing.

"Where’s Giselle?"

Sloane was still annoyed she had been volunteered without being consulted, and that irritation showed. "No idea."

"Oh."

That one syllable told him everything.

Her face was practically broadcasting it. Giselle had clearly told Sloane to drive him back, and Sloane clearly did not want to.

Elias didn’t care.

If she didn’t want to drive him, fine. He had a driver.

And honestly, the fact that she thought she could pull that expression in front of him was bold.

In the startled noise from System Theta in the back of his head, Elias tugged one sleeve up slightly as though preparing to do something drastic.

Then he reached out and picked up a sandwich.

The system seemed to relax.

Elias took a big bite and spoke around it with lazy amusement. "What are you panicking for? The worst I’d do is complain about her to Giselle."

What he didn’t say was that if this hadn’t been a retirement world, he might actually have found a way to teach Sloane Sinclair a lesson.

But this was the final world. The mission came first. He had no interest in wasting energy on someone as irrelevant as her.

So he kept eating his perfectly decent breakfast while calmly constructing a very innocent, very effective version of events to repeat to Giselle later. Once he had the wording worked out, he glanced toward the windows.

The weather outside had darkened.

Elias’s expression changed at once. He slung his backpack over one shoulder, grabbed another sandwich, and made for the door.

He needed to move.

If he stayed any longer, it was going to start raining.

Sloane looked up just in time to see him hurrying off with food still in hand. She dropped what she was eating and stood. "Hey, what are you doing?"

Then, with a laugh that carried more mockery than warmth, she added, "If you want to take food with you, just take it. I’m not exactly going to call security over a sandwich."

Elias raised one hand. Half of it disappeared into his sleeve, leaving only four fingers exposed in a gesture that made him look weirdly obedient.

He pointed toward the sky outside.

"It’s going to rain."

Sloane hesitated, then finally understood. "So what if it rains? Why are you in such a hurry? Giselle told me to take you back."

His eyes widened slightly. "Really?"

The look he gave her was so open and unexpectedly bright that Sloane felt a flicker of guilt for a second she didn’t want to acknowledge. Still, she lifted her chin and said, "Obviously."

Elias smiled at her then, soft and warm enough to catch her off guard.

"Thank you."

Something about that simple little thank-you hit harder than it should have. Sloane had been unwilling five minutes ago, and now that she had agreed, hearing gratitude from him made her feel vaguely embarrassed about the whole thing. She was just about to answer when Elias suddenly bolted.

Sloane froze, then sprinted after him.

By the time she reached the entrance, he had already made it a good distance away. "What is your problem?" she shouted after him.

There was a thread of anger in her voice now.

Elias stopped just long enough to look back and shake his head. "I can tell you don’t like me."

That cut off whatever she had been about to say.

Because it was true.

She didn’t like him.

But what did that have to do with driving him home?

The words rose to her lips anyway, only to die there when she caught the expression in his eyes.

There was distance in them.

Not dramatic hurt. Not offended pride. Just a quiet, unmistakable wariness. A kind of refusal.

He didn’t like her either.

And first impressions mattered more than people admitted. Hers, with him, had been terrible from the beginning. Add in the impatient way she had answered when he asked where Giselle had gone, and it would have been stranger if he had wanted to get into a car with her.

This boy knew exactly who meant him well and who didn’t.

And his response to that knowledge was brutally simple.

Stay away from malice.

Move toward kindness.

Sloane’s face cooled by degrees. If he was going to refuse her over and over, there was no way she was going to chase after him and insist. "Fine," she said. "Then go."

She folded her arms and watched him.

She wanted to see how far he’d get.

They were out in the suburbs, not the city. No bus stop nearby. No easy transit. If he got lucky, maybe one of the private cars that occasionally ferried regular guests around would pass through. But with his level of caution, would he really dare get into some stranger’s car?

In the end, he would have no choice.

He would come back here and ask her to take him.

The thought cleared her mood instantly.

By the time Elias disappeared farther down the road, Sloane felt refreshed in a way that was almost absurd, like stepping outside at dawn and catching the first clean breath of morning air.