Free Web NovelChapter 69: Chapter 69 His Proposal
_Rowena’s POV_
When everything had settled that night, I sat in my room with my hair piled on top of my head and my oldest, softest house clothes on when Velvet burst through my door without knocking, which was unlike her.
"He’s here," she blurted out, a smile on her face..
I looked up from the book in my lap. "Who is here?”
"King Alaric." She said it like the words should produce a reaction. "The Alpha King is here.. At our gate. And he drove himself here.”
I closed the book. "What?"
"He came in a black Mustang," she said, slightly breathless. "He just pulled up and the guards let him straight through because obviously they let him straight through, he’s the Alpha King, and now he’s standing in our entrance and my luna he looks......" She stopped. Pressed her lips together. "He looks very good. The maids are currently losing their minds."
I set the book aside and stood up.
"I’ll go down," I said.
"Don’t you want to change? And fix your hair or something?"
"Velvet."
"I’m just saying you’re in house clothes."
"I’m aware of what I’m wearing," I said, and walked out of the room.
When I got downstairs, I saw him, he was standing in the entrance hall.
Velvet had not been exaggerating. He wore a simple dark shirt and trousers, nothing formal, clearly also not dressed for an occasion. But Alaric had the specific quality of making whatever he was wearing look intentional. He stood with his hands in his pockets and looked entirely at ease in a house that wasn’t even his, which was very on brand for him.
Two of the younger maids were finding reasons to be in the entrance hall. I noticed that too.
He looked up when he heard me on the stairs. His eyes moved over me once, taking in the house clothes and the messy bun and whatever my face was doing, and something in his expression settled in a way I couldn’t fully interpret.
Velvet appeared at my elbow, visibly hoping to be included in whatever was about to happen.
"Rowena," he said my name like a greeting and a statement at the same time.
"Alpha King," I said. "This is unexpected."
"I know." He didn’t apologize for it. "Come with me. I want to show you something."
I looked at him in surprise. “Now?”
"Now."
"I’m in house clothes." I pointed out.
“Rowena, he can see.” Kyra laughed.
"I can see that." He proceeded to say without any mockery. "You look fine. Come as you are."
I glanced back at Velvet, who was doing an extremely poor job of pretending she wasn’t hanging on every word. She gave me a look that very clearly said go.
Celeste wasn’t even home, what was I supposed to tell her when she returned and hear of this?
I turned back to Alaric.
"Alright," I nodded.
He walked me to the car and opened the passenger door himself before I could reach for the handle. I got in. He closed it, walked around to the driver’s side, and pulled out of the Ashthorne gate like he had done it a hundred times before.
He drove without explaining where we were going and I didn’t ask. The city moved past the windows quietly. It was late enough that the streets were mostly empty and the lights reflected off everything in long lines.
He stopped at a bridge that crossed one of the older waterways at the edge of the city. Stone sides, wide enough to walk across comfortably, old enough to feel like it had been there longer than most of the buildings around it.
He got out and came around to open my door again.
We walked to the middle of the bridge and he stopped and looked at the water for a moment. Then he looked at the stone ledge along the side.
"Sit," he ordered.
I looked at the ledge. It was about waist height. "Up there?" I asked.
"I’ll help you up." He said and moved.
Before I could respond his hands were at my waist, steady and he lifted me onto the ledge in one easy motion and set me down carefully. He kept his hands there for just a second longer than was strictly necessary to make sure I was balanced.
I felt warmth move up the back of my neck.
“Oh my goodness, Alaric is so hot!” Kyra soowned, and I tried hard not to let her emotions get the better of me.
Alaric stepped back and leaned against the ledge beside me, looking out at the water once he was satisfied.
I looked at the water too and tried to organize my face.
"There’s a banquet being planned," he said after a moment.
"I know," I responded automatically. Then I stopped.
He glanced at me.
"My family is arranging it," I said slowly.
"Yes. To select a husband for you.” He said straight up and I almost choked.
“Pardon?”
He raised a brow, feeling confused. “You’re aware of the upcoming banquet and you have no idea it’s for you?”
I almost lost my balance. So that was why Celeste refused to say. They were planning to get me a husband? How ridiculous.
I sat with that for a moment.
Alaric chuckled beside me. “I’m guessing Celeste didn’t inform you for a reason, and here I am blabbering about it.”
I didn’t respond to that, I just tried to control my anger.
But, I wasn’t surprised, I realized that. I was annoyed, but not surprised. It was exactly the kind of move my relatives would make while I was occupied with everything else. A banquet dressed up as a celebration with an outcome already decided before the invitations went out.
"And you’re telling me this because?” I asked after a while.
He turned to look at me directly. "Because I didn’t want you to walk into it without thinking it straight."
I looked back at him.
"Rowena," he said. "I think you already know what I’m about to say."
"Alaric.....” I began with his name instead of his formal title, but he cut me shut.
"Let me say it," he said, not in a demanding way. More like asking.
And I closed my mouth.
He was quiet for a moment, like he was choosing the words carefully rather than just releasing whatever was there.
"I have been watching you for longer than I’ve said out loud," he said. "Not watching the way people watch someone they’re monitoring. Watching the way you watch someone you can’t stop thinking about." He kept his eyes on mine. "I handled your petition in four hours. I moved assets through your network without being asked. I started a rumor about us before there was an us because I wanted there to be one." He paused. "I’m not a man who does things without reason."
The bridge was very quiet now and I felt my heartbeat accelerate.
"I want you beside me," he said. "Properly. My Luna Queen. Whatever our children need from the Ashthorne title, it’s theirs. Whatever would make that life feel like yours and not like something handed to you, tell me and I’ll make it happen." He said it simply, like he had thought it through completely and was presenting the finished version. "I just want you."
I looked at him for a long moment.
Something in my chest pulled in a direction I didn’t follow.
"I’m not going to get married right now," I responded, my voice came out calm and clear. "Not to anyone. Not even you." I held his gaze. "There is too much I haven’t finished. Too much that still needs doing. I won’t walk into a marriage while I’m still in the middle of becoming who I need to be. That wouldn’t be fair to either of us."
His jaw tightened slightly. "I’m not asking you to stop becoming anything," he said.
"I know," I nodded. "But my answer is still no. For now."
The for now was the most I was willing to give and we both understood that.
He looked at the water, said nothing for a stretch. freewebnσvel.cѳm
Then he pushed off the ledge and offered me his hand to help me down.
I took it and he lowered me carefully back onto the bridge.
He didn’t let go of my hand immediately.
"I’ll take you home," he said.
I agreed and he led me back to the midnight colored Mustang. We drove back in a silence that was neither comfortable nor uncomfortable.
Somewhere in the middle. He pulled up to the Ashthorne gate and stopped the car.
"Goodnight, Rowena," he said begrudgingly.
"Goodnight, Alaric," I nodded calmly as I responded.
I got out and walked through the gate without looking back. But I heard him sit there for a moment before he drove away.
I stood in the entrance hall alone and breathed out slowly.
“What just happened?!” Kyra’s voice followed, startling me.
