After an awkward breakfast with (half-asleep)Isolde and a bashfully-smirking Alexander Sear in an (echo-filled) dining room(which might as well have been a ballroom in the medieval times), I was transported to the company I worked for by a driver who worked for the Sears.
The driver was a bubbly, motley fellow called Frank with enough charm to be used to incite jealousy in Alexander. But Frank was happily married with five daughters and I was too timid to manipulate others for my games with that malicious dragon.
The agency I was signed to was called Dazzle Entertainment. It was the second-best company you could work for in England. I was still a rookie wet behind the ears but I had big hopes and even bigger dreams of the dizzying spotlight and the radiant stage. I had even dyed my precious golden hair brown so that I would be less connected to the heiress Aisha Ergot even though I had, in my earlier days as Aisha, avoided tabloids like a man with leprosy.
After entering the esteemed building, I headed immediately to my Manager's, Juliane's, office. Her full name was Juliane Yuichi; she was half-English, half-Japanese and had a honey-sweet smile that could attract bees from every corner. Juliane was the one who had scouted me three months ago and had helped me get signed to Dazzle Entertainment. However, even she was unaware of my true identity.
As far as Juliane and my agency knew, (all thanks to my hacker friend and second best friend, Dylan Vett) I was Selena Fawkner, a former florist turned actress-wannabe. I, 'Selena', was from a middle-class family in Oxford and had enjoyed a fairly good education in the arts. I hated to lie to the world, but the world itself was full of deceit towards me. My true identity would also only deter my path.
In the quiet elevator, my thoughts roamed through the infinite possibilities in my (hopefully) star-studded future. Unlike my messy plans and against my every expectation, everything was going so smoothly that I felt anxious.
Suddenly, tearing me away from my miscellany of musings, a summery voice sounded beside me.
"Excuse me, miss, you've arrived."
"Oh," I stuttered as I finally noticed the open elevator doors. Hastily, I thanked the person beside me and hastened past the gradually-closing doors without turning back once.
***
[Alexander's POV]
"My Lord, are you certain about Miss Ergot?" Bernard suddenly asked. I had always known that he was reluctant about letting that little lamb reside with me, but I had given his worries no heed.
I smiled slightly, staring at the stack of documents upon my desk. All of the documents contained intriguing information about my deceitful little lamb. Information that I had chosen to give a cold shoulder to, for my own entertainment.
I longed to explore the depths of her which were not available on paper - those burning depths that I'd glimpsed as she responded to my sweltering heat. I wanted to do to her unmentionable things that I could not do with pen and paper. My child-like excitement had been aroused the moment I first set my gaze on her face as she muttered in her deep slumber.
"Do you dislike her?" I asked, playing with the pen in my right hand, swiveling it at the tip of my thumb and then flexibly motioning it through the spaces between my fingers.
Bernard shook his head with a somewhat chagrined look. "Not at all, my Lord, but your deep interest in her is...peculiar, I admit. Isolde's affection for her is also..." He promptly paused, belatedly realizing that he had misspoken, and cleared his throat upon noticing the iciness that had surfaced in my eyes.
Despite the roaring frigidity I could not suppress in my heart, I sent him a reassuring smile. "Isolde is allowed to feel that way," I said.
"Isn't it because my Lord has limited her interaction with others for too long?" Bernard inquired with nebulous rebuke in his calm gaze and tone.
"I don't care if my daughter hates me," I said emotionlessly, "She will come to understand that everything I've done - isolating her from the human race and everything that followed - was for her own good. Letting Aisha remain here is also to both our advantages."
I dropped the pen back onto my desk and leaned into my seat with a sigh, complicated feelings meshing in my chest. It had been decades since the taste of winter had been replaced by the heat of summer and the wistfulness that comes with spring. I knew I would fully enjoy the coming season and my little lamb would bask in my heat. Hopefully, she would not die out from the burning sun...
Bernard sighed deeply at my remark. "But is this to Miss Ergot's advantage? She might have deceived you but you are doing the same thing," he said, "You might just be disconcerted by Miss Ergot's resemblance to Lady Gwyneth, my Lord."
I smirked lightly, my eyes veering to the stack of documents again. "You're right. Their outer resemblance is striking, but that is all it is to me. However, for you, it is quite different, isn't it? No wonder you wanted to make her vanish from the premises before I could see her. You are quite the sly fox," I said casually, but with enough frost in my voice to make the air in the room cool.
No matter how many centuries Bernard had served the Sears for, I could not effortlessly condone the thought that he would have been so sneaky behind my back. I would have killed him right then, but I knew better than to erase a good retainer.
The elderly butler apologized. My feelings calmed down upon discerning his remorse. To him, Isolde was a great-granddaughter, though not of his blood, and I was somewhat of a grandson and a son at once, yet also his revered master. Everything he did was for my 'good', though not always the 'good' I pictured.
I shut my eyes. "I need Aisha. I might be lying to her, but I'll grant her adequate remuneration after everything is said and done," I said with finality in my voice and Bernard nodded wordlessly, successfully quietened.
I dismissed Bernard with a wave of my hand. After he'd left me alone in the study, I finally had a chance to replay my earlier little encounter with my little lamb. I wondered how I could best surprise her the next time we met.
"Ah. I think she would love something like that," I decided after an interesting musing blitzed through my mind.