E L L O R A
"I. Am. Not. Married." I say with clenched teeth, trying to drive the point home.
The lady gives Professor Langdon a confused look, before quickly turning back towards me picking herself up. "Sorry ma'am. Mr. langdon said he was your guardian so we assumed..."
I still completely. A memory from many nights ago erupts in my mind.
Night time.
Dark alley.
Drunkards.
And a man observing it all from a distance.
My house.
The porch.
Thirty two beats per nineteen seconds.
"Um, earliar you said you are my guardian. Did you mean my teacher? Or was it only to save me from the drunk frea - um, drunkards?"
A small smile lights up his face. "There are so many questions that you could've asked. Instead you chose the one, answering which would be a direct answer to all other questions. Impressive."
That night he hadn't answered my question properly. And today after weeks, there is that word again- guardian.
With all that has happened since then, how is that connected? How is he my guardian?
And then it dawns on me.
Now that I am living with him for God knows how long, he is my local guardian. My parents think I am gone for a research with my professor, handling all my responsibilities to said professor. Until I return back home, he will be signing in all places which requires my guardian's signature.
Damn. Brilliant actually, to think that all of this was planned right from the beginning. That night when he saved me from the drunkards, a.k.a Vittorio's men, he knew he was going to kidnap me eventually. All the times I attended his lectures in MU after that, he was very well aware of the fact that he would be completely ruining my life, spinning it off its axis right after. Goodness, even the time he asked me if I'd be willing to work as his assistant and called me home to work, he knew that eventually he would be trapping me in the same home against my wish.
He knew everything all along. Of course since it was this one big brilliant plan he has been conjecturing for God knows how long.
In the cliff in the forest, something huge is going on that much is clear. Something headed by Vittorio. Something of which Prof. Langdon is a part of.
And somehow they know papa. Some kind of notes they said they want.
My father had a government desk job before cancer hit him. What notes can a wrinkly, old, Itallian man, running an underground gang, litrally, want from my father? His job description papers? But he doesn't work there anymore. Data entry sheets he filled in for the think-tank he worked in? The point remains- he doesn't work there anymore.
~
The cars honk and crowds of people chatter as we drive by the town square. My eyes are fixed outside the window. This is the first time I've come out in public in what feels like weeks. Since the airport..... shit, I didn't want to think about the airport.
My eyes wanders back inside the car and slowly falls on the driver. His eyes are focused on the road, one muscular arm on the steering, the other on the gear. His muscles bulge as he pulls the gear and swerves the car past a slow vehicle.
My eyes wander up towards his firm set of jaw, and up, towards a sinful pair of lips.
Shit I definately shouldn't have thought about the airport.
I decide to focus on more pressing matters. "Um, professor,"
His teeth clenches at the endearment, I've started calling him by once again. For some reason it irks him when I call him professor- and that, ladies and gentlemen is exactly why I shall continue calling him so.
"I think there has been a slight mistake in you guys' plan." I continue.
He raises a brow, his eyes unwavering from the road infront. "How so?"
"I think you should have scammed the college of the daughter of one of papa's colleagues, and kidnapped her here. She should have been the one sitting here beside you, not me."
"Daughter of your father's collegue?" He asks, giving me one of his pointed looks.
"You heard correct."
"Would you care to elaborate?"
I smirk slyly, "Is that your question for the day professor?" There. See how your own dose feels.
Professor Langdon doesn't even spare me a glance. He swerves the car through a turning. And then, "No."
"What?"
"That is not my question for the day Ellora."
"So you don't want to know what I mean?"
"No."
I shrug before turning back towards the window.
One minute.
Two minute.
Three minute.
Three minute thirty seconds.
"Fine." I huff. "What I meant is, you and Vittorio clearly wants some kind of notes from papa. Something his work related."
I think I hear him mutter under his breath, "Work related indeed." But I ignore it.
"But you guys missed a point here. A vital point. Papa has cancer. He is sick. He has not been going to work for the past few years. Whatever you guys want from him, he doesn't have it. You should have kidnapped someone from another man's family who actually works in that think tank currently."
The silence that stretches in the car is defeaning.
A few minutes later he says, "So that is the explanation you came up with in that smart little head of yours?"
Wait, he thinks I'm smart.
What I wouldn't have given to hear him call me smart a few months ago, when I practically worshipped him and a single praise from him would melt me like ice.
Not anymore? A small voice says within me.
Absolutely not. I don't worship him anymore. About the melting part though....
"Yeah, well you won't answer me but keep me locked away whole day with only my thoughts as my companion, so I have to come up with my own explanations, don't I professor?"
"I gave you an opening Ellora." He says his eyes fixed on the road. "You're allowed to ask one question everyday. Use that to your advantage and ask the right questions."
"Or, you can save us all from this confusion and give me the explanation that I need and let the matter go once and for all?"
"You don't get everything you want in life. You have to work for it."
And that was apparently that. He didn't say a word after that as I busied myself thinking of an appropriate question to ask him. Because before this, whenever I had asked him he had gotten out with a vague answer everytime. I need to ask a solid question which can only have a direct answer.
"Since you're having problem thinking of a question, I'll make it easier for you." He says after sometime, breaking me out of my stupor. "I'll give a little piece of the puzzle pieces you're missing, every day, starting today, of my own. You won't have to ask."
I frown. "What's the catch?"
"You will behave yourself in the headquarters."
As if I am a dog he has in his leash and can order around to behave anytime he wants.
"Well, am sorry I don't trust you anymore professor-"
"The Dark Scientists."
And that's how he drops the bombshell right in the middle of my sentence. I freeze. "What?" I ask a minute later.
"We are called The Dark Scientists." His eyes are straight at the dense forest ahead, his face blank of any expression.
I don't say a word, heck, I don't even breath probably as I wait for him to continue. This is the first time he has opened up and I'll do everything in my power to make him continue speaking.
"Science is a very powerful tool Ellora. If you know how to use it, you can make or break the world. There are plenty of scientists around the world who are trying to make the world. And then, there are The Dark Scientists."
"But what's any of that got to do with my papa?"
"Your father," he turns towards me finally, "has never worked in the government think tank you think he worked at, Ellora."
"What? But that's impossible." Surely he must be mistaken somewhere.
"I know Samual Davis way before you properly even learned the alphabets, Ellora. So trust me when I say, he is not the man you think him to be."
The silence in the car after that is defeaning. I am completely at a loss of words.
"Now, for my end of the deal..." he gets out if the car, letting the sentence hang amidst all that intense silence. That's when I look around and realise we are in the Moonsville outskirts again. The car is parked behind a huge tree hidden from the main road.
He waits infront of the hood, motioning me with his head to get out. Always the gentleman, my professor. He knows so well how to treat a woman- you know opening car doors and maybe not kidnapping her.
I quickly get out of the car, and follow him through the trees. I don't try to run away or even look for a way to run. Because it will be useless. And extremely stupid to run away from Mr. Langdon, who would catch me within a minute without breaking a sweat with that fit physique of his, while I'll be panting like a dog and sweating buckets. The entire road I just do what I do best. Overthink about professor Langdon's words.
Soon we reach the cliff. And my anticipation reaches climax. Because the memories I have down there, are not pleasant. I have goddamn nightmares about this place every night.
I am broken from my stupor, with Mr. Langdon's hand at the small of my back, "what's wrong?" His voice is so serious with concern, but it doesn't help my situation much as I stare down at the cliff currently covered with fog.
We stop infront of it as I tell him in an almost faint voice, "Nothing."
"Ellora, what is wrong?" He asks again.
This time I simply shake my head.
"Alright then. Go ahead."
"What?" I ask finally focusing on his face.
He motions toward the cliff. "Jump."
My eyes widen. "W-What?"
"Ellora, remember last time? You're not going to die. There is going to be a net that's going to hold your weight perfectly. Don't fear the net breaking. The velocity of a falling body by its mass, the height of the cliff, to how much weight the net can hold, everything has been calculated by few of the best scientists in the world. And I have been doing this for more than ten years, trust me. You're safe."
"Are you going to follow after?" I ask in a timid voice.
His voice softens. "I'll be right behind you Ellora."
I look back down the cliff, an invisible dark noose creeping up my back and tightening around my neck. I can't breath.
"Ellora," Professor's voice sounds very distant, "I wouldn't ask you to trust me on anything because I will break it. But there is one thing I can guarantee you- your safety. Whatever I say or do, you're going come out safe of it. Trust. Me."
His voice feels like coming from over the shore as I am slowly drowning under water. He thinks I am scared of jumping off the cliff. I wish that was the only thing I was scared of. I am scared of everything this place entails. The thousand pair of hands....
"I-I don't think I can." I say faintly.
"-Ellora, Ellora. Ellora Davis, look at me." When I focus back, I realise I am turned towards him now, and his hands are holding me in a firm, surprisingly warm grip at my shoulders, preventing me from turning away from him. Even if I want I can't look away from him as his chocolaty orbs stares right back at me.
I know my soul is bare to him right now. I know, I can see it in his face that he knows something is wrong. Something far serious than jumping from the cliff, and he knows it.
"What are you sacred of Ellora?" His voice is several octaves lower than normal. His eyes tells a different story altogether. His jaw clenched. In a different circumstance I would have almost been scared of this look of his. But right now I am too shaken up from the memories that gives me nightmares every night since creating them, to think about anything else.
My eyes slip to the cliff in my periphery as dread pools in my stomache, "I-Just.."
His hands slowly cups my jaw as he tilts my face upwards, forcing me to look at him and him only.
And for the first time I realise how freaking close he is to me- how close his lips are to mine. My eyes involuntarily flicker down to his sinful pair of lips. The same pair that chewed on my lips in a random airport lobby once, eliciting intense feelings I had never before felt. A dark shiver rolls down my spine at the memory. Nothing I have ever experienced before this was quite as strong as whatever this is. This man knows exactly what he is doing.
And by the dark look in his eyes as they stare intensely at my lips, his thoughts are probably along the same lines.
This is soo wrong....
But God, how right it all feels.
"Ellora, if you don't jump right now..." he leaves the rest of his sentence hanging in the air as a form of warning. But all I can do is stare at his lips as they part. I simply can't help but remember how good, how right his hard, warm body had felt against mine as he had pushed me back into the pillar while ferociously biting on my lips. And I shiver again.
"Ellora..." his voice is filled with warning and something dark I cannot put my finger on. I know am playing with fire. I know he is hanging just by a string, and I don't allow myself to think what would have if I broke that string.
"P-professor...." I barely breath out the word, unable to form a single thought forget about a single coherent statement.
His eyes darken further. His jaw tightens. His hand previously on my jaw, slides back to hold the back of my neck in an impossibly tight, almost punishing hold.
I gasp as my head tilts back even further and his lips touch my earlobe.
Oh God....
"I am not going to touch you of my own again Ellora. If you want it, you have to ask for it." His words are impossibly slow and deep. It takes my muddled mind a second to process what he said and when I do a sense of slight regret washes over me as I recall my own words.
"Don't you ever dare kiss me again without my consent, professor." I say my voice colder than the temperature of Antarctica in the winter. Atleast I hoped that was the case. "You will not touch me. Period."
Damn him. Damn me.
Wait, what the hell is wrong with me? Shouldn't I be happy that he is not behaving like a rake but following my own words like a gentleman would do?
But God how I wish he'd be anything but gentle with me right now....
He lingers a second more this crazily near me, before taking several steps back from me and burying his hands deep in his pockets.
And I don't miss how his muscles bulge with tension and his jaw is taut, showing how much control this man has over himself. Although he schools his features and brings it back to the same blank look, his eyes reveal otherwise. That dark look still lingers.
I turn back around quickly, eager to escape him and the wave of uncontrollable emotions wrecking a havoc inside me. I close the distance between me and the cliff, and jump.
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Guys am back. How did you like this chapter? Thoughts?
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Yours truly,
Ms.AnyoneUpForDiscussingEvelynHugoWithMe?(HarryCameronHatersNotAllowed)