Chapter 146: Who in the world are you? The water was scalding hot, and she stood under the spray until her skin turned pink, willing herself to be numb.
To not think about anything.
No Hardy. Caroline. No Priscilla. No Matriarch. No Dawin. No... Hades.
Not even her own spiraling thoughts.
Tonight is just water, she chanted in her mind. Just steam and silence. Tomorrow is for thinking.
She stepped out of the bathroom swaddled in a plush, cloud-soft bathrobe, tugging the belt tightly around her waist and vigorously scrubbing her damp hair with a towel. The mirror was fogged, obscuring her reflection, and she was grateful for it. She didn’t want to see the face of the girl who was in over her head.
Padding back into the bedroom, she felt a semblance of calm. The ritual of it had helped.
Until she froze mid-step, the towel falling from her hands to the floor with a soft thud.
Someone was sitting on her bed.
The lights were off, only a wash of moonlight falling through the curtains. She hadn’t turned off the lights when she went to the bathroom.
The silhouette told her it was a woman.
She took a cautious, silent step forward, her voice a dry crackle in the quiet. "...Paula?"
The figure moved, flicking on the bedside lamp. "Surprise," Suzy said flatly, her voice as bland as burnt toast.
Alice’s initial shock curdled instantly into a spike of raw irritation. "What the—?" she blurted out, clutching the collar of her robe closed. "Why are you here? How did you even get in?"
"The door was unlocked. I came to see you, obviously," Suzy replied, her gaze crawling over her face, too steady, too deliberate.
Alice instinctively clutched the towel over her hair like it could hide her bare face. Her makeup-less face. It wasn’t like Suzy hadn’t seen her natural face before, but somehow, under that scrutiny, Alice’s skin prickled. She forced a weak smile. "R-right. Of course. Uh... how are you holding up? Tonight must’ve been... rough for you." She grasped for the script of polite concern, a safe, expected topic.
Also, Suzy looked like she had cried. Which also made her genuinely concerned despite this... unexpected entry.
Suzy didn’t answer immediately. She just stood, a fluid, unhurried motion, and drifted away from the bed toward the small sitting area in the corner. She reached out and switched on the main overhead light.
The room was suddenly, brutally bright, every detail exposed. Alice squinted, feeling utterly naked under the glare.
"Yes," Suzy said finally, her back to Alice as she surveyed the room, taking in every detail. "It was rough. And it’ll get tougher from here." She turned and sank onto the small velvet couch as if she owned it, crossing one slender leg over the other. She looked utterly at home. "So I’ve decided. I’m spending the night here."
Alice choked on air. "Wh-excuse me? Here?"
"Here," Suzy repeated, nodding like it was already settled. "This room. With you."
Then, Suzy’s head tilted, her eyes half-lidded, her voice dipping into something low and almost taunting. "Don’t you want me to?"
Alice’s stomach dropped to the floor. Her robe suddenly felt as thin as tissue paper. Every instinct screamed that something was profoundly off, not just with Suzy’s uninvited, bizarre presence, but with the cadence of her words, the way they slithered into the space between them, seeking a weakness.
She forced a laugh, brittle and strangled. "O-of course. You can stay. This room is open for you. You can... have the bed."
But her mind churned.
Why was Suzy here? What did she want? And why... why did she feel like she had just been cornered in her own room?
Suzy didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just stared at her from across the room, her expression utterly placid.
Alice’s palms grew damp. She hugged her arms around herself, the towel forgotten on the floor. This wasn’t normal. This wasn’t friendly. This was an incursion.
Suzy’s voice cut through the silent, bright room, sharp in its simplicity: "Why give me the bed?"
Alice blinked, wrong-footed. "Because... you’re my guest. Where else would you sleep?" It was the only logic she had.
Suzy’s lips curved, a minute, calculated movement that never quite reached her eyes. It wasn’t a smile. "Then where will you sleep?"
The question hung in the air, simple and devastating. Alice faltered, her throat parched. It felt like bait. A trap laid in plain sight, but she couldn’t see the mechanism of the snare, couldn’t understand the rules of this new game.
Suzy rose slowly from the couch, her steps soundless on the thick carpet. She advanced, not with aggression, but with a terrifying, deliberate grace, her presence expanding to press down on Alice like a physical weight.
"Aurora," she murmured, the name sounding like both an endearment and an accusation on her lips. She came closer, until Alice could see the faint, perfect lines of kohl still rimming her eyes from the evening’s event. "Do you know what you should do in this case?"
Alice’s breath caught, trapped in her chest.
Now, she really had an insanely bad feeling about this.
"You should tell me to leave," Suzy continued, her voice soft, almost tender, as if she were explaining a fundamental rule that Alice had stupidly, naively broken. "Or, if you were feeling generous, you might ring for one of the housekeepers to prepare a proper guest room for me. That’s what we do around here. We don’t inconvenience ourselves. We command."
She leaned in closer, her eyes glinting in the brutal overhead light. "That’s what Aurora would do. She would never offer me her own bed. Not unless she was trying to appease me. Unless she saw me as higher. Far, far higher. And Aurora..."
Suzy’s whisper became a blade, honed and deadly, "...Aurora would never bow that way to anyone. Least of all to me. It’s why a lot of people in the circle hate her. Because to them, she didn’t know her place."
Alice’s skin prickled with a cold sweat. Her tongue felt like a lead weight in her mouth, useless.
Suzy’s gaze locked onto hers, seeing everything Alice was trying so much to not show.
And Alice... she expected the question before Suzy asked them.
"So tell me..." Suzy whispered, the words sliding, cold and sharp, between Alice’s ribs and curling around her frantically beating heart. "...if you’re not her, then who in the world are you?"