The Illusion

Seven

Alara sighed in her spot beside me, holding her finger between the pages and closing her book before turning to me for the 4th time in the past 20 minutes.

"Lar, you've been trying to ask whatever it is like 6 times. Just ask it." She scrunched her face up.

"Does he really have to sit there the whole time I'm here?" I laughed. This was the first time I'd been able to see Alara since I left hers nearly a month ago. I was so accustomed to seeing her at the least of every other day, but mentally, I just hadn't been strong enough to be seeing people outside of the family. I realised yesterday that it had been 28 days since I'd seen her and now I could finally read again, I invited her over. I'd had to warn her that there was some changes here now but hadn't gone into details. We'd covered briefly what happened to me but not in an awful lot of detail. Just that Zane abducted me, hurt me pretty bad and had me there for 12 days and now I had Leo.

"Even when you're not here Leo's around. Like a third arm."

"I'm going to take that as a compliment Miss Parks." I turned around, sitting on my knees and crossing my arms over the back of the chair.

"You do need to be here. I get it. But you don't need to watch us like a hawk."

"There's nothing else to do up here unfortunately for you."

"Look around you Leo, there's over a thousand books in here."

"I don't read."

"Don't or can't?" Alara sat up beside me. I smiled at him, very important question.

"I can teach you if you want. I might have The Hungry Caterp-"

"I can read."

"Good. Get a book." He stared at me, eyes softening a little as I stood up. My eyes ran over the shelves.

"ACOTAR's on the other side Freya."

"I'm not looking for-" I pulled the ladder over, climbing up, fingers tracing spines carefully. I've seen it around here- "Got it." I grabbed the book, slowly walking across to Leo. "Dystopian. Army. World in chaos. Supernatural powers and it's a series so if you like this there's more."

"Is this a soppy romance book that's going to make me throw up?"

"Shatter me?" Alara laughed. "Yeah, real happy ever after."

His sea green eyes peered up at me, ignoring Alara rambling on from the corner we'd sunk ourselves into. He swamped this chair. One that when I sat in it, I could comfortably pull my feet up and nestle in, he now looked like he was spilling out the edges, about to make it burst at the seams.

In the 2 weeks I'd had Leo here, after spending every waking minute with him, I had found there was 2 sides to him. The first was straight backed, head high. He never looked down at me. Not properly. His eyes would move down but never his head. Bare minimum responses and he'd only address me if he needed to. When it was just me I wasn't Miss Parks. I was Freya. The darkness in his eyes always faded a little, his stern face would fade into the smallest smile it was almost unrecognizable as a smile.

"There's some romance in the series. Enemies to Lovers, don't know if that's your thing but it's not really the main story line in the first book." I half turned, leaning and grabbing him one of my spare bookmarks from the shelf beside me and slipping it into the first page. "Just don't dog ear the pages or break the spine." He rolled his eyes, taking it from me slowly. "You'll love it."

"I highly doubt that."

"Careful Leo, I'll be using that to say I told you so when you come begging me for the second book." He smiled and I turned, almost skipping back to Alara and slipping back into my spot.

"You guys are so Twisted Games coded." Alara whispered, smirk on her face as I grabbed a pillow a thwacked it over her head. "Bodyguard and princess." Again, harder. "OW."

"Shut your mouth. We are not. Are you joking?" Alara cackled, taking a sip from her drink. "You're disgusting."

"I am just stating what I'm thinking." She looked up at him, bringing her voice down lower. "He's really hot."

"You think I don't see it?" She smirked. "Read dipshit."

The rain pattering against the window only got harder, cracks of thunder in the distance as a cool breeze blew through the room. My reading playlist played in the background. This. Right here was my idea of heaven. I pulled the blanket up a little, sinking deeper into the sofa as Evermore by Taylor Swift began to play. My day had officially peaked. Alara peeked over the top of her book and snickered.

"What?"

"I just know how perfect this moment is for you." I rolled my eyes, blocking her with my book as she laughed quietly. She wasn't wrong. This could single handedly fix everything that has gone wrong this month.

We read like that for hours, just the music and the sound of rain scattering the sound of turning pages. No talking. Just peace and company and my silent mind. I felt like I was finally regaining some kind of normality now. When we were alone, Leo had me talking about the 12 days over and over again and he was right, it didn't make me feel like I needed to sob anymore. I could talk about it with him without shame or feeling dirty or like I was looking for a way I could have stopped it all happening or seen the signs before something happened.

At the end of the day, it was always going to happen. If I'd have turned him down, chances are he wouldn't have been as 'nice' as he had been. I turned my head, looking over at Leo as he let out a sigh, shifting in his chair. The scowl he had plastered across his face told me he was a lot more into it than he'd ever want to admit. I knew it was the perfect series for him.

He looked up, eyes reaching over the top of the book for just a second before going back to the pages. He blinked and looked back, book slowly lowering a few inches. I looked away, pushing myself down into the sofa and pulling the book up to cover my face from view. No one needed to see the burning red that was covering my cheeks right now.