Chapter 125: Taking the Bait

Elias’s lashes trembled faintly.

Even in sleep, his eyes moved beneath the lids now and then, the small restless motion people made while dreaming. Serena lay beside him in the dark and watched it happen, her body still warm from fever, exertion, and the lingering heat he had left behind.

She lifted her hand.

Her fingers hovered over his face, close enough to trace the line of his brow, the bridge of his nose, the corners of the mouth she had stared at before sleep took him. The movement came so naturally that she did not question it until the moment before contact.

Then she stopped.

What was she doing?

Was she really about to touch this impostor with that kind of gentleness?

Had a few days of him bringing her water, handing her medicine, arguing with her until she sweated through the fever, and staying by her bed been enough to make her heart move?

Serena gave a soundless laugh in the dark.

Ridiculous.

Her hand withdrew at once. The softness drained out of the gesture, and the same hand landed against Elias with enough force to shove him awake.

Elias had been asleep for a while. Deep asleep, apparently, because when his eyes opened, they were unfocused, hazed with exhaustion and confusion. His voice came out hoarse, carrying a faint, drowsy softness that did not match the sharp-tongued menace he usually made of himself.

"Mm... do you want water? I’ll get it."

Serena went still.

Over the past few nights, while she was sick, he had stayed near her. Sometimes thirst woke her in the middle of the night, and he would get up like this, half asleep and barely conscious, stumbling out of bed to pour water for her before he was fully awake.

He was already moving to sit up.

Serena’s voice cut through the dark behind him. "Go back to your own room and sleep."

The words were cold enough to wake him properly.

Elias stopped.

He turned his head slowly and looked at her. There was no shock in his eyes, and no anger either. Only a calm that seemed to have expected this from the start.

The room was almost completely dark, but not dark enough to hide either of them. The windows let in a thin trace of city light around the curtains, and their eyes adjusted to each other in the shadows.

Neither of them spoke.

After a long silence, Elias reached for the thin blanket at the foot of the bed. He lifted it, clearly intending to wrap it around himself before leaving.

Serena caught the edge of it in one hand and yanked it back.

You have got to be kidding me.

Elias stared at the blanket, then at Serena.

He knew she was losing her mind. The only question was whether she realized how far she had gone.

Of course he knew why she had suddenly turned on him. System Theta’s earlier notice had explained enough.

Serena Blackwood had fallen for him.

Her feelings had moved.

Everyone showed attachment differently. Liora had gone from watching the show with foxlike amusement to getting jealous, and that was before accounting for the fact that her entire orientation had apparently bent around him like a luxury car taking a bad corner too fast.

If Giselle fell for him, she would probably express it as protection. No one would be allowed to hurt him, not casually, not publicly, and not without paying for it. She already leaned that way, but she had not yet reached the point where she would tear her relationship with Serena apart for his sake.

If that changed, she might.

Serena was different.

When Serena loved someone, she should have been the type to give. Money, shelter, access, clothes, safety, status, staff, medical care, entire doors opening before the person even knew they needed them. She had wealth so absurd it had become one of her languages, and she was used to translating emotion into possession.

Unfortunately, that did not work neatly with the two of them.

Their relationship had been built on sponsorship, transaction, and control. In Serena’s eyes, he was still the impostor who had stepped into a place he should not have occupied. How could someone like him deserve her feelings?

This was where the classic torment started.

She liked him, so she would deny it. Because she denied it, she would punish him. Punishing him would punish herself, and the two of them would keep digging until the pit looked deep enough to call fate. By the time someone finally woke up and admitted the truth, it would already be too late.

Elias almost wanted to applaud.

The genre was disgusting, but it did know how to season pain.

He stood beside the bed with nothing on, his skin pale enough that the darkness did not quite erase it. For a few seconds, he looked down at Serena in silence. Then he bent, picked up the clothes scattered on the floor, and held them in front of himself enough to make leaving the room possible.

Barefoot, he crossed the cold floor.

Serena’s breathing sharpened behind him.

Even when Elias closed the door, he did it gently. The latch slid into place without a sound.

For one irrational second, Serena wanted to call him back.

Then the room settled.

Only she remained inside it.

The bed felt colder than it had a minute ago. Serena pulled the covers around herself, but the chill stayed under her skin, making her body tremble once as if the last trace of illness had never left. She told herself it was the fever returning. She told herself it was only the room, the sweat cooling on her skin, the emptiness beside her after three hours of heat.

None of those explanations fixed the problem.

She had told him to get out with all the cruelty she could fit into the words, and he had still moved carefully.

As if, even when he was furious, even when he was hurt, even when he knew what she was doing, some part of him remembered that she had been sick.

As if he could be stubborn enough to make her want to strangle him, yet still care for her properly the moment she needed him.

That made him look gentle.

Worse, it made her look like the one lying to herself.

Serena lay back down, her thoughts tangling until they lost shape. Eventually, sleep pulled her under again.

When she woke the next morning, the first thing she did was raise her hand to her forehead.

Her skin was hot.

Again.

The private doctor looked at her with the restrained disapproval of someone who knew better than to scold a Blackwood too openly and was doing it anyway. "You had only just recovered. How could you be this careless?"

Getting sick twice in a row was not nothing. The body paid for that, even a body backed by private physicians, imported medicine, and a household trained to move before a bell was pressed.

Serena lowered her hand. "It’s only a low fever. It will go down soon."

"Still refusing to admit it?"

The cool voice came from the doorway.

Serena’s breath caught. She turned her head and saw Liora standing there with her arms crossed, mouth curved in a faint smile.

"What does this have to do with you?" Serena’s brows drew together. At the moment, she had a particular sensitivity to any suggestion that she was being stubborn.

Liora did not soften her tone. "That is the attitude you use when you need my help?"

Serena choked on the reply she wanted to give.

For a second, the room went quiet except for the soft movement of the doctor packing away a thermometer and making herself professionally invisible.

Serena shifted the subject with visible stiffness. "Where is that impostor?"

Liora’s smile did not change. "Back at school again. He also said he won’t be staying here for a while."

Serena’s eyes darkened.

Liora continued, unhurried and merciless. "Do you want me to bring him back again? Use a nicer tone, and I’ll decide whether I’m in the mood."

Silence spread across the room.

After a long while, Serena said flatly, "Rent him an apartment near campus. His dorm is inconvenient right now, and if he refuses to stay here, we can’t have him ending up at Giselle’s place again."

On the surface, the order was about keeping Elias away from Giselle Frost.

Underneath that, something more important had shifted.

Serena had not ordered him dragged back to the Blackwood residence.

Liora noticed.

Her eyes changed almost imperceptibly.

Was her sister really...

Liora tilted her head. "Do you still want people following him?"

Serena’s face remained composed. Her tone was casual enough to pass as indifference. "No."

Liora exhaled slowly.

Inside, she laughed.

Welcome to the abyss, sister.

At the Westbridge library, Elias was studying.

Or rather, he was performing the appearance of studying with enough competence that no one nearby had a reason to question it. Books were arranged in front of him. His notebook was open. His pen moved at intervals that looked natural. The afternoon light fell across the table, and the library carried its usual blend of expensive silence, keyboard taps, and students pretending not to stare at anyone who looked interesting.

A female student approached his table.

She lowered her voice. "Excuse me. Is anyone sitting here?"

Elias lifted his head slowly.

His glasses were off.

Without them, his eyes looked brighter, larger, and far cleaner than his personality had any right to support. He blinked once, the expression so pure it could have been bottled and sold to donors at a Westbridge charity gala. There was something almost fawnlike about it, soft and startled and harmless.

"No," he said gently. "No one’s sitting there."

"Thank you." The student nodded and sat beside him.

Only after she had settled in did Elias pick up the glasses lying on the desk and put them back on.

[Host, what are you doing?]

Elias’s mouth curved faintly.

Shh. The bait is set. Now we wait for the big fish to bite.

On the surface, nothing had happened. A student had asked for an empty seat in the library, and he had answered politely. It was the kind of small campus interaction that disappeared the moment it ended.

A little while later, the student turned her head again.

"Are you able to solve all of these?"

Elias glanced down at the page she was looking at. His voice stayed light and modest. "They’re pretty simple."

"I can solve this one too, but your method looks shorter." Her tone carried a careful request now. "Could you show me how you did it?"

"Of course."

He leaned slightly toward her, enough to let her see the notebook without crowding her. His explanation was quiet, patient, and annoyingly good. He broke the problem down with the kind of clarity that made people believe they were smarter for having followed him, which was one of the more useful lies in education.

Ten minutes later, the student looked at him with open admiration.

"You’re really good."

Elias lowered his eyes and bit his lip with just enough shyness to make the reaction seem unconscious. "It’s nothing, really."

"No, I’m not just saying that. Your way of thinking through it is genuinely different."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"Thank you."

They were still talking when a shadow fell over the side of the table.

Elias lifted his little finger and touched the corner of his raised mouth, hiding the first edge of his smile.

There it was.

The big fish had bitten.