Protection

Chapter Eleven

"Alayna, may I come in?"

Alex stood at her door, wondering what she could have been thinking. He knew it hadn't been good for Claudia to show up, especially with things the way they had been already. Their mess had been made even messier by the swift appearance of Claudia Burns.

No answer.

"Alayna?"

"Um, just a moment," came the response from the other side of the door. Her voice sounded wobbly, and he instantly knew that something was terribly amiss.

"Are you ill?"

"No, I just- Ellie had- I'm indecent," she sputtered, and he heard shuffling. A paper rumpling. A drawer being closed with clumsy hands.

What in the world was she doing?

"Well," Alex said, clearing his throat, "when you become decent, I shall be in the study."

What could she have to hide? It tore at him- it ate at him, causing his hands to flex in his growing dysphoria. Surely there was nothing amiss. Wouldn't she have told him?

Why would she trust you with anything after what you said to her?

He continued to go back to that. Perhaps, he had thought, it was because she had not plainly stated that she had forgiven him.

Forgiveness.

It was almost a foreign concept to Alex. Letting loose of anger had always been his Achilles' heel. And hurt. He didn't like to admit his hurt. He hadn't liked admitting hurt since Julia.The spike of anger prickling up his spine, Alex clenched his teeth painfully.

Maybe that was why Alayna annoyed him so. Her behavior reminded him greatly of Julia, though he hated to admit it. He despised the memory it beckoned, and yet, he found something particularly endearing about it.

He reached his study, pushing the door open. The darkness of the room was what struck him first. And it not only reminded him of Julia, but also of his unhappy childhood.

The thought brought a bitter taste into his mouth.

"Alexander, you'll never be anything but a wretched fool if all you ever think about is that girl. She's nothing but a simple-minded-"

"You told me that you needed to speak to me?"

He flinched, then turned and there she was, clad in a velvet dress the color of wine. Her hair was pinned back, with a few wispy, feathery curls escaping around the frame of her face. It softened the severely poisonous expression she always held- that scowl or that look of immense pain.

Was it her pain that endeared her to him so?

"Alex?"

"Hm?"

"You wanted to talk with me," she repeated, and that was when he noticed the tugging at his boot.

He looked down, seeing the small, round fur ball chewing vehemently at the black leather of his boots, growling quietly. "Mutt. Go back to your mother."

Alayna laughed, and covered her smile with her hand.

There was something eating at her. He could sense it by the way she stood. Her knees quivered beneath her skirts; but she kept her cool. He loved that about her.

Even though she hid her troubles well, he could see right through her. Her demeanor, her disposition, hid things about her. Alex found himself wanting to know what those hidden things were.

In one graceful swoop, she had leaned down and had Ellie in her arms.

"She isn't a mutt," Alayna protested, and buried her face lovingly into the sandy blonde fur, and sighed, relieved. "She's sweet."