Filed to story: Watch Me Win Alpha (Olivia & Ethan)
Alexander and I shared a frustrated look. That hadn’t revealed anything useful.
“What are we even looking for?” Rose asked me. “Just your friend?”
“I’m not sure,” I told her honestly. “But I trust Ava. I just wish I knew why she was here in the first place.”
Alexander seemed lost in thought as he stared at the monitors that were showing nothing but static.
“You know, I bet a building as big as this one has private rooms that are hidden,” Alexander murmured. It seemed like he was talking to himself more than anything. “I bet to enter. You would need to turn your phone off. It would have to be very underground and secretive.”
With those words, the superintendent’s head shot up.
“You know a place like that?” Alexander asked.
“Not a place,” the man answered. “But a person. She’s a tenant who lives upstairs and always requires visitors to turn off all electronic devices when they enter her room.”
“What’s the tenant’s name?” Rose asked.
“Celeste Blair.”
I didn’t know why, but her name made a shiver go up my spine.
Then, the superintendent muttered something about a bracelet.
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” I said, my heart slamming against my chest.
The man’s eyes glanced down at my bracelet, and my stomach dropped.
A couple of months ago, Ava and I had brought two gold bracelets with a tiny heart as the charm. They were identical..
Had this man seen my friend?
After Alexander gave the superintendent a wad of cash, the man gave us directions on how to get to Celeste’s room, which was on the eighteenth floor.
There was no time to waste, and we immediately took the stairs up the high floor. Even though the stairs took longer, it was worth it because I didn’t trust any elevator in a building that was as old as this one.
As we neared closer to Celeste’s room, the lighting seemed to dim, and the hair on the back of my neck stood. It felt like someone was watching me. The four of us neared a large wooden door with a bronze door knocker that was shaped like an open eye. There were twinkling lights above the door, which was the only source of lighting in the dark hallway. What was this place?
I had my answer when a young woman in a maroon-colored shawl and a bright yellow head scarf swept out of the room. She had large oval glasses and black pointy shoes. Just from the way she was dressed, I could tell that she was a fortune teller.
She eyed us one by one. “Do you have an appointment?” she asked in a low, mysterious voice.
My mind flashed back to the superintendent looking down at the bracelet on my wrist. Now, things were starting to make sense.
I stepped forward and looked directly into the fortune teller’s eyes. “I was referred by a friend,” I said and flashed my bracelet that was identical to Ava’s. “I had heard that you were very spiritual.”
*Olivia*
The fortune tellers’ eyes shot down to my bracelet, and I noticed that her eyes widened with recognition.
My pulse quickened as I waited for her response. Had Ava been here, too?
Then, Celeste nodded. “I know of the friend you speak of,” she said in that mystical tone of hers.
My shoulders relaxed slightly with relief. “I’m a friend of Ava’s,” I explained. “I’ve come in person to ask about the bracelet because I couldn’t reach her directly.”
That seemed to spook her because she took a step back and shook her head. “No, Ava isn’t here. And I’m fully booked with appointments for the day. You must go.” Her head whipped around, and she looked around the hallway with panic in her eyes.
That only increased my determination. Because of her reaction, I was certain that my friend was inside. Was she in trouble because of what she had discovered?
I looked back at Rose, Alexander, and Richard, who were looking between Celeste and I with interest. Thinking that the girl would be more comfortable if we spoke alone, I gestured to her to follow me a little bit away, and I lowered my voice.
“Listen, if you let us in, we can pay you. We can pay a lot,” I muttered.
Celeste bit her lip and seemed to be thinking my deal over. Then, she sighed.
“Alright, you can come in,” she finally said.
My heart lifted with hope. I was one step closer to finding Ava. I discreetly handed her a stack of cash from my purse, which she pocketed quickly. I didn’t even think that my friends had noticed that I had paid her.
Before the young woman opened the door, she turned to us and narrowed her eyes. “Everyone must shut off any technological devices before they enter, or they can’t come in. That’s the rule. The technology messes with my psychic abilities.”
I wanted to roll my eyes. Yeah, right. She just didn’t want us to record any evidence of their illegal behavior.
Celeste watched us warily as all four of us powered down our cell phones.
Once we were done, she nodded with satisfaction.
“Good, now follow me,” she said and opened the big wooden door.
She led us down a long, dark corridor that was lit by long white candles that had been fixed on the wall. I almost tripped twice from the
BOO dim lighting.
Alexander walked beside me. I could feel his body heat radiating off of him, and it gave me a small amount of comfort.
He lowered his voice and leaned toward me. “How did you get her to let us in?” he asked.
“I paid her,” I whispered in a low voice so that the woman wouldn’t hear.
Alexander leaned closer. “What?” he asked.
“I paid her,” I muttered.
He shook his head in frustration. “I can’t hear you. You’re barely moving your lips.”
I rolled my eyes and repeated myself again, but he still couldn’t hear me.
I stopped walking, and he did too. Richard, Rose, and Celeste didn’t notice that we had stopped walking and kept moving down the corridor.
I leaned up on my tiptoes and moved close to Alexander’s ear so that he would be able to hear me.
Right as I began to talk, he suddenly turned his head until our faces were only inches away from each other. My heart skipped a beat when Alexander’s dark eyes shot down to my lips, and his eyes sparked with desire.
The room spun as his warm arm wrapped around my waist, and he pressed me against his muscled body. He put his lips right beside my car, and his warm breath made me shiver.
“I heard you the first time, Olivia,” he whispered. “That was smart of you to pay her. She wouldn’t have let us in without a cash bribe.”
My breath hitched from his closeness, but my anger spiked because I realized that he had tricked me since he had heard me the first time. He had just wanted me to get closer to him.
I pushed him away roughly from me even though my body immediately became cold from the loss of his warm one. Why did my body crave his closeness? It wasn’t fair.
Richard and Rose looked back and snickered from our antics.
New Book: Veiled Desires of the Alpha King Novel
Dayson was the alpha of the largest pack in North America. Powerful figures from other packs sought to offer gorgeous girls as potential mates for Dayson. He steadfastly rejected these advances, he was not a pawn to be manipulated. But eventually there came a mysterious girl he could hardly say No. Who was she?