Chapter 5 FIVE

CHAPTER 5

ABRAM'S POV

I could not imagine how horrible things would be if I was still living in the Astor Estate. My mother would talk my ears off and my father would probably lock me in until I yielded, that kind of thing had happened one too many times in our little elite world- parents exercising their wills over their children far into their adulthood. I wasn't the first to break out of their parents' hold (to some extent), but when I moved out of the family estate and got my own place, it made waves in the gossip circles of our clique. A grown man wanting to live on his own, by his own rules was seen as some sort of rebellion, and I was happy to be among the pioneers of this. This made me wonder, almost with sympathy, how Anya would cope in her house. I didn't know them personally (of course not), but I knew enough to know that the relationship between her and her parents was strained to say the least. I knew that Anya's mother passed away from a strange illness years ago, and as soon as the sand was poured over her coffin, Arthur King had proposed to the woman I understood he had already been involved with for years. What a pathetic man. Cheating was not a big deal in our world practically everybody had extramarital affairs, but there was a way it was done to maintain a family's dignitas, and proposing to your mistress shortly after your wife died from unnatural causes was... questionable. What can I say? He was a King.

Patricia dialled my number for like seven hundredth time that morning. I had turned my phone off and went to sleep immediately after I got home from the exhausting wedding. Once I turned it on, a torrent off missed calls and texts from everybody in the world bombarded me. I scrolled to my settings and started to block Patricia's number, my parents, Patricia's parents, Patricia's parents' friends, my parents' friends, eventually I abandoned the blocking project and decide to put my phone on 'Do Not Disturb' and allow only Mark and Cassius. Patricia was having a meltdown in the texts she was sending me, talking about how she couldn't believe that I would hurt and embarrass her that way. I shook my head. You're telling me about embarrassment? Did she understand what had just happened? And it wasn't like we were officially engaged or anything. Our parents played matchmaker and I refused to be a pawn in their game. I would eventually reply her just so she wouldn't try to kill herself and make everyone see me as a villain (yes, this has happened, you would be surprised about the kind of stories we have to tell), but that would have to wait... I wasn't in the mood to hear her annoying voice just yet.

My electronic doorbell rang and I jumped from my bed to my computer to see who it was. Mark. Okay, my father had not sent kidnappers just yet.

"Mark?"

"In the flesh." He spoke into the transmitter.

I rolled my eyes. "You're alone, yeah?"

He laughed. "No, your dad is right here beside me. Say hi, Mr King."

I pressed a button to allow him walk in.

"What the fuck?" was the first thing he said when he walked into my bedroom.

I groaned, fell back onto my bed and covered my eyes with the back of my elbow.

"One minute, you're trying to kill me because she's at my party, the next thing, you're announcing your engagement?"

"Okay, just sit down-"

"What really happened? I saw you leave the party with her. Was the sex that good?"

"Hey, calm down now... There was no sex, although she is apparently pregnant with my child."

He laughed. "What?"

"That night, at the party, she asked me to marry her."

He laughed loudly. "What? So direct. Is that how you guys do it?"

I was patient in letting him have his laugh.

"She's supposed to get married to some old geezer, and so..."

"So wait, let me get this... She doesn't want to get married to the rich old man her parents selected for her, so she decides it's a better idea to marry her literal enemy?"

"Precisely."

"And you? You thought it was a good idea too?" His shoulders were shaking from his restrained laughter.

"Well... No."

"So why did you do it?"

"She kind of put me on the spot there. I... didn't want to embarrass her. She told her parents that I knocked her up."

He made show of putting his hand on his chest emotionally and sniffed. "So touching."

"Besides, I needed to get fucking Patricia off my back."

"Poor girl." He yawned and stood up.

"Please."

"So, what now?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean what happens now? You've announced that you and Anya are a thing, her parents are going to be watching her belly closely, your parents are gonna be on your neck, the world is going to be watching... How are you gonna keep this up? Will you come out and say it was all a lie?"

"No." I said quickly. "That would be too embarrassing."

"Okay, so..."

"I don't know, I guess I haven't really thought it through."

"You should probably... meet up with her..." He averted his gaze to avoid my eyes. "...to discuss it."

I sighed after a long pause. "I suppose you're right. But how am I supposed to reach her? I don't even have her number."

He smiled. "I do."

"What? How?"

"I suspected I knew who invited her to the party, and when I heard the news, I figured I should try... turns out I was right." He tossed me his phone. "Came with a heavy price though."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean her friend, Brenda, made me pay her for the favour."

I laughed. Lower class struggles. "Don't worry about it."

I typed her number into my phone and wondered what to save it as.

"What's the issue?"

"I don't know what to save it with."

"How about Anya King? Or maybe just Anya?"

I shrugged and wondered why I was thinking about it in the first place. It still felt very wrong, having her number in my phone, it felt as though someone would go through my contacts and find someone surnamed 'King' and I would be in trouble.

"Well what are you waiting for? Call her."

"I could just text..." I was suddenly so nervous at the thought of speaking to her.

"Oh come on. She won't believe it's you."

"Fine."

I swallowed some spit and pressed dial. It rang thrice before she picked up.

"Yeah?" Her voice was raspy from sleep.

"Anya." I wondered why my nervousness made me sound so cold.

"Who is this?" The sleep sounded like it had cleared.

"Abram."

There was a pause and a little shuffling.

"Abram?"

"We need to talk."

"I thought you wanted me to stay away?"

"Whatever. I will be coming to the King residence this evening."

"No, I-"

"Look, we did it already, okay? Your parents-"

"I'm not home."

"What?"

"I couldn't possibly return home yesterday."

That makes a lot of sense.

"Where are you then?"

"In a hotel lobby."

I chuckled. "You slept in a hotel? Don't you have any friends?"

"I have friends, but that is none of your business, and I didn't sleep in a hotel, I slept in a hotel lobby."

I didn't bother asking why, because I imagined I knew the reason.

"Well, I have a place you could stay in for-"

"Aww isn't that so sweet? I didn't know the Astors could be so generous."

"Tch. Where can we meet?"

"Meet for what?"

"What kind of question is that? We both know- Hello?" I put my phone down.

Mark was snickering. "She hung up?"

"She hung up."