Chapter 3

Chapter 3

This has sealed the deal. Alice had been replaced by some sort of alien who was holding her captive in a warehouse because what was she saying? Travis thought quietly to himself. 

“Life's too short to not take risks. Let's just get married now. Today even.”

Travis looks at her confusedly. A glimmer of home in his eyes but a faint trace of anger. 

“Are you not kidding?” He asked her. 

His deep voice travelled through her ears making her feel like she was in her own romance book. The thought of it made her shiver with anticipation. 

“I am being very serious. As serious as aardvark.” She put a finger over her chest looking at him solemnly. 

“Aardvarks are dumb animals.” He said finally. 

“Oh they are?” She asked with furrowed brows. “ You do get my point.”

“Elliott.” Travis calls. 

“Yes sir.” Elliott suddenly appears in the doorway of her room like he hadn't been eavesdropping on their conversation since and taking sly glimpses. 

“Please book an appointment with the therapist. Along with a full body scan with an added brain CT scan as well.”

“Okay sir. I'll do that at once.” He closed the door and began to go down the stairs. 

“So you think I'm crazy?” She folded her arms and looked at him with annoyance. 

“I didn't say that. You may have suffered a fall you can't remember and I'm just making sure you're safe.”

“That's not true. I didn't fall and I don't have a concussion. I am physically and mentally okay.”

“Mental illnesses don't necessarily show until it's too late.” He said quietly. 

“Great. You think I'm insane. What do you think I'm going to do next? Bite your hair?”

“Will you?”

“What?”

“Will you bite my hair?” 

She huffed and tried to crawl out of his lap. His hold tightened on her waist. 

“You're going nowhere.”

“Oh you'd rather carry a crazy woman on your lap?” She frowned at him. 

“You're not crazy.” He said,looking at her deeply. 

“Whatever you say.”

Her phone buzzed,telling her she had a voice message and it began to immediately play. It was Octavia and her sickly sweet bubblegum voice. 

“Hii. I hope the big bad wolf didn't hurt you,Ali. Grant said he was coming by to school to take you out for that Valentine's Day. Cover up and say you're coming for studies in my dorm. I'll dress you up. Bye love you.”

The room's air thickened with tension. 

“Big bad wolf huh? That's a very creative name.” He says dryly. 

“You've got it all wrong.” She said quickly looking at him and the phone. 

“You just said all this to lower my guard so that you can go on your stupid date with that boy.” He said angrily. He said the word boy with so much spite. 

“No,It's all a misunderstanding.”

“Make me understand then.”

“We were never together. It was all a silly joke to make you jealous.” She blurted out. 

“Excuse me?” 

“Yes. That's why you used to get all those stupid texts and ambiguous pictures and I always used to do outrageous things so you would get even more jealous.” She said in a rush. She knew about the texts because when she was in the cell Octavia blurted out she was the one who used to send those things to his phone to make him angry and he would get even more possessive and then she would in turn do more dumb things. 

In her past life, if she could remember clearly. Valentine's Day was coming up and Grant would take her on a date where pictures would be taken of them in the restaurant after she told him she was studying for her finals. He got so mad that he put her in his house and she took her finals there and had no way to go out until she threatened suicide a few times and he released his hold on her. 

“So you're saying it was a joke planned by you?” He looked at her in disbelief. 

“Yes. I mean a joke planned by only me. I don't know what my stepsister is doing instigating things like this. I didn't even plan anything like this. I don't know why she would tell me such.” Alice said self righteously. 

“So you don't love that boy?”

Again using boy like it was a derogatory word. “No silly, for someone who built a multimillionaire company and several others from the ground. You sure act dumb sometimes. Grant is just a silly admirer of mine. When you're as beautiful as me,” She said, flipping her hair. “People just want to talk to you.”

“Now let's go for breakfast.” She said planting another kiss on his cheeks and moving out of his lap to push his wheelchair. 

“You don't have to. I can do it myself.” He said. 

“I insist.” Alice pushed the wheelchair down the stairs, wondering why he kept using it even when he could walk properly. But that wasn't something he needed to know that she knows right now. 

She paused him to the dining table and moved her chair close to his and began to pile his plate with food. 

“That's enough.”He said but she wouldn't listen. 

Until she was satisfied she continued to fill his plate till her father finally came with her stepmother to the table. 

“Daddy dearest.” Alice smiles heartily at her father, moving from her seat to peck his cheeks. 

He looked at her in severe confusion. “ Alice, you looked different today.”

“Don't I look good Daddy?” 

“Yes you do.” He smiled at her,kissing her cheeks too. 

She totally ignored her stepmother going to sit by Travis. 

“Daddy the finals are coming.”

“I'm aware. That's why your sister moved to the dorm. Do you want to do the same?”

“Oh no daddy.”

“Okay. That's fine. Do you need anything?” 

“Can Travis drop me off?”

“Yes-”

“No,it's not right for a young girl to be alone with a man especially when she's at an age where her hormo

nes are rising.” Her step mother cut in. 

“But Travis isn't any man. Right after the finals. We're getting married.”