Ryder was pretty sure in the exact moment he heard his mother’s voice, that it was becoming too common of an occurrence for her to interrupt whatever he was doing with his day. He loved his mother, appreciated her efforts at the best of times but lately, she’d been grinding at his gears in all the wrong ways. This little interruption right here, just happened to be one of them. Taking a deep breath, his eyes practically rolled back in his head while he was still facing away from her, but were right back in normal position as he slowly turned his head towards her.
“Mother,” He responded, brow quirking up almost expectantly, particularly when he noticed that she wasn’t even looking at him now. She was looking at Val because, well, of course she was. They were standing arguably too close to be normal for friends, even if that’s what they were, and his mother had always had a habit of holding an opinion about such things. “What is it?”
“Your father wants to speak with you. He’s to host a conclave, he wants you to be there, of course.”
“Well where else would I be?” Ryder pointed out, body finally turning slightly to match his head, stuffing his hands into his pockets, “I’ll find him later, I’m sure it’ll be much the same as the others we’ve hosted. He’ll tell me to stay quiet but present, he’ll do most of the talking and this time, Jade will be the one on his arm, not you.” As Ryder expected, Lydia sighed at that, stepping further into the room.
“Can we discuss this alone, Ryd-”
“Anything you need to say to me can be said in front of Valentina.” He sighed, though he did spare Val a glance, wanting to make sure that she was okay. A few moments of silence passed, before Lydia spoke again, this time on a sigh.
“Very well. He wants you to bring someone, to look… put together, I suppose. Stronger. More like a future baron. He’s suggested Val, though I asked him to speak with you first.”
Okay, that left Ryder silenced, words failing him completely. It sent a chill through him, mind failing to put together even a single syllable in response. His father knew… Of course his father knew, he knew everything, he knew-”
“You two were always good friends growing up, I think he believes that’ll make it easier to fake a relationship. Val, your mother is looking for you, you should hurry along before the day flies by too fast.”
The girl had far more respect for Lydia than she did for Quinn, and that was because the woman had her good moments where she tried to keep a sane and hospitable relationship with Ryder since they were both evidently losing sense and track of their Baron. With that respect for Lydia came the embarrassment when Lydia’s expectant look hit Ryder too and he countered her request for Val to show them some privacy.
But Ryder had other plans and Val felt rooted in her spot slightly guarded by Ryder himself. “Anything you need to say to me can be said in front of Valentina.” And she herself couldn’t help but wonder why? Since when? And of course, not wanting to cause anymore tension on Ryder’s behalf, she stayed put and bowed her head out of respect for their conversation. She wasn’t going to stare at the other two as their conversation only deemed to grow more private and made her regret not walking out when she had the chance.
It was what followed that made her heart skip a beat and retaliate with a thud in her chest at the mention of her name. She said what? Ryder was silent and Valentina looked at him, expectantly waiting for his rejection of that idea. “M-me? I’ve never-” But Ryder turned his face to look at Valentina with a promising, quite pinning look that told her to stay put and quiet, a wave of his hand was barely seen.
Fake a relationship? What? As if her showing up to an event she had no business in attending wasn’t enough, they had to host a facade and make people believe that they were anything more than childhood friends?
“I-I have to go find my mother.” Her head was spinning with questions left unanswered as well as possibilities of how and her why her name had been used in the same sentence as conclave. The Baron couldn’t know about her lessons already, right? They’d barely just begun.
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