(Free Book): Will You Marry My Groom?

21

“Who is this?” I replied, extremely confused. 

“Is this Hazel?” 

“Who is this?” I repeated.

“Bye.” The call ended. 

‘Confused’ couldn’t express what I was feeling. Who the hell called someone just to say 'hi' and ‘bye'?

I tried calling again but the phone was switched off. 

I tried to recall if the voice sounded familiar for a few minutes, but it wasn’t. “It’s probably just a stupid prank call.” I shrugged, refilling the glass of orange juice I had placed on the table at the center of the three large grey sofas, opposite his main leather chairs behind the mahogany table.

Taking a gulp of the juice, the door was pushed open at the exact time my phone rang again. 

I answered the call grouchily, feeling frustrated by Tristan just returning after such a long time and the probability of it being another stupid prank call. “Hello?” 

“Hi, Hazel.” 

My frustrated expression transformed to a wide grin. “Is this who I think it is?” 

“Yes, it’s Indy. Please don’t say my name.” 

“Uh? Why?” I raised an eyebrow in confusion. 

“Is Tristan there with you?” 

“Yeah…he just walked in.” I glanced at Tristan who quirked an eyebrow at me then sat on the mahogany table with his legs crossed in front of him. 

“Okay, please don’t say my name.” 

“Did you try to call me a few seconds ago?” I asked. 

“No. Why?” 

“Oh…never mind. How are you?” I asked with a smile of relief. Heavens knew how much I missed her as my best friend.  

“I’m very fine.” Her voice was as cheerful as ever. 

“Where have you been?” I glanced at Tristan who had his arms folded across his chest and his enchanting electric blue eyes were fixed on me like I was a hard math question he wanted to find the answer to. 

“I’m very fine. You shouldn’t worry about me. I know I haven’t updated you about anything, but I was trying to fix everything in my life. Anyway, I’ll be returning soon.”

“Really?!”

“Yes, please don’t sound too excited, Tristan shouldn’t know. And please, don’t let anyone know I’m returning.”

“Uh…” I glanced at Tristan again, “... that’s weird but, okay.”

“Great! I’m doing really great, expect to see me again very soon. I miss you so much, more than you can imagine.”

“I miss you too.” I let out a sigh.

“Indy,” a voice called from the other end of the line. 

“Okay, bye. I have to go now. I’ll call you again soon.” She didn’t give me a chance to respond to her before hanging up.

I inserted my phone into my purse, turning my gaze to Tristan. He was still staring at me, but his face was very blank this time. 

“Are you just going to keep staring at me? What’s the point of making me come with you if you’ll work and leave me here? Do you know how much work I’d have done in the bakery? Do you know how happy that would have made me?” A frown returned to my face. 

He didn’t say a word but sauntered to me with his hands locked behind him. 

“Who called you?” 

“Who called me? How is that important? Do you know how frustrated I am?”

His blank expression transformed into a frown, his hands raking his silky hair in frustration. 

How the hell was he mad at me just because I didn’t let him know who called me?

“Tristan, you—”

“I feel so pissed off. I brought you here with me in order to avoid thinking about you but I was stuck in several meetings and couldn’t stop thinking about you. Have you mixed something in my food since you arrived? I didn’t expect to have a lot of work to do, okay?” He let out a frustrated sigh. 

“So…”

“Let’s leave, okay?” He walked away, grouchily arranging different files into a briefcase then clicked on a button. 

Shortly after, a man came running in. Tristan handed his briefcase over to the man, staring at the man like the poor man had killed his dogs. 

“O-okay, sir.” The man said then left the room. 

Returning to me, he grabbed my hand without saying a word and started walking out of the office, still frowning. 

I was certain he couldn’t be angry because he couldn’t spend time with me— that sounded too good to be true. 

I waited till we were out before asking, “what has made you angry?” 

“If you’re trying to make me confess anything more than I already did then you’re definitely going to be disappointed.” 

“I’m certain you’re mad at something that happened in a meeting, not because you didn’t spend time with me. So, what made you angry?” 

He stopped in his tracks, turning to me with a glare. He opened his mouth to say something but no words rolled out of it so he continued walking. 

Different bodyguards surrounded us as we walked out of the company. 

I could feel the gaze of different people around us and it was making me feel strange. I couldn’t tell but it felt like some of them were taking photos of us. 

“My hand isn’t a rock, you know?” He said with a smirk, indicating that I was tightening my grip on his hand. 

“Sorry,” I cleared my throat, letting go of him. 

“I have to admit, you look really good. Don’t worry, there’s always a next time.” He said with a mischievous smirk that made me feel rather confused than blissful. 

*** 

I had spent my entire day responding to customers for the bakery, trying to arrange their orders in order to prepare myself tomorrow before going to the bakery.

After successfully doing that, I shut my laptop then left for our bedroom. 

Tristan was fast asleep and was for some reason, hugging a pillow. If I were in the pillow's position, I was certainly going to have felt like I was in heaven.

I tiptoed to the bathroom, had a nice and long bath before getting out of the bathroom in a towel. 

Tristan was still asleep, so I took the advantage of that to quickly change into a nightgown and dried my hair before sauntering to our bed and dropping my body on its beautiful softness. 

“Gosh, this pillow is so lucky.” I chuckled, covering myself with a duvet.

He looked really handsome while he slept, his face still looking so cold as always. 

“I’m so glad you aren’t so mean anymore. I love you so much.” I said with a smile, hoping to adore his handsome face for a while before going to bed. “Goodnight.” 

“Goodnight, Hazel.” 

His voice made it feel as though my blood drained from my body and my heart was thrown out of me. 

Wearing a stupid smirk, he opened his eyes and threw the pillow from between us. 

“H-how are you possibly awake?!” 

“I wasn’t sleeping.” He shrugged and my eyeballs popped out of their sockets. 

“You— you haven’t slept? N–not at all?” 

He nodded positively. 

I gulped, already feeling breathless. “So… you were awake when I got out of the bathroom? And…”

“Calm down, I didn’t see anything.” His smirk didn’t make me believe him a bit. 

“Why on Earth would you be pretending to sleep?”

“I wasn’t pretending, I was only trying to sleep.” He chortled, brushing my hair with his hand. “I just couldn’t sleep because I was thinking about you.” He smirked again, his voice was deeper than normal. “Anyway, let's forget that.”

“Forget it?” I let out a scoff, my mind was racing through different thoughts already.

“Don’t overreact or feel shy, I’m your husband. Since you were so jealous of the pillow and your so-called cuddling made me feel really calm last time, can it happen again?”

I didn’t respond to him, but he kept his arm around me anyway, wearing a smug smile. “Your smell is intoxicating.” He commented, placing a soft kiss on my cheek and obviously wanted to give me an actual kiss but I turned my face away and turned around so my back faced him.

“You don’t kiss someone you’re only friends with.” I reminded him of that. 

He groaned and let go of me, making me feel the need to regret my decision immediately. 

We maintained silence for a while before he finally broke it, “you claim to be 'in love' with me but then…” he trailed off. “It’s fine, it really is.”

“You—” 

“Anyway, we’ll be going over to my parents' house next week.” 

“Your parents?!” I swiftly turned to him and sat up straight. 

“Yes. Do you have a problem with that?” His face had returned to its normal frigid form. 

“Your Mom clearly hates me, everyone does!” 

“Mom doesn’t hate you.” He stared at me in confusion. 

“Oh, really?” I didn’t want to but I had to scoff. 

“Don’t be dramatic. You won’t stop me from going over to my parents' house, will you?”

“I won’t, you can go on your own. I can’t bear to be insulted again.” I frowned.

“I won’t go if you don’t.” He also sat up straight, holding my hands. “And… you shouldn’t care about what others say about you.” 

“Do you know how hard it is for a pain that you’ve been dealing with for so many years to have salt rubbed on it? Do you know how hard it is for me to deal with insults every time? Just because I’m poor or because I’m facing a particular challenge? Do you know how hard it is to deal with being—”

He cut me off by covering my mouth. “You’re raising your voice.” He looked really puzzled, staring at me intently. “You realize you haven’t told me anything about your past or about yourself? Did anyone hurt you?”

“I don’t like talking about anything that has to do with my past.” 

“That isn’t fair.” He frowned, and surprisingly pulled me into a hug. “It’s obvious that Mom’s insult, as well as mine, affected you a lot.” He began to stroke my hair. “I won’t force you to say anything to me, you’ll do so whenever you want to, right?” 

I shut my eyes, letting the calmness from his embrace run through my restored blood. 

“We’re still going over to my parents'. I can assure you that everything will be fine, you’ll just have to trust me. I think this is another misunderstanding that needs to be fixed.”

He pulled away from the hug and placed a short kiss on my forehead before rising to his feet. “Just so you know, this isn’t something I’ll normally do.” His face returned to its normal unfriendliness. 

“But that face is something you do all the time. Smiling at first then you suddenly change it to a dangerous glare.” I chuckled.

“I don’t smile at such short intervals with other people except my sister and Kye. You’re already getting on my good list.” He smirked. “I also never admit how I’m actually feeling to anyone, but I’ve been constantly letting you know how you make me feel. I don’t know how or why. You ought to feel really special.” He grabbed a red pillow I assumed was his favorite. 

“Where are you going?”

“I’m sleeping elsewhere tonight.”

“Why? Did I say something to offend you?” 

“No, I just remembered I have to attend to something urgently. Go to bed.” He took his leave afterwards. 

Does anyone else agree with me that that was very strange?

I laid on the bed, covering myself with a duvet while pondering on why he had left so abruptly. Could I have said something that offended him? Was it because I didn’t like his Mom? Was it because I didn’t let him kiss me when he clearly wanted me to? Was he never going to share the same room with me again?

I continued pondering on different things for a while until my phone chimed and snapped me out of my city of thoughts. 

**Hi. Dear Hazel Evan— oh, sorry, Hazel Hendrix. Don’t worry, sweetheart, it’s just the beginning.**

Without wasting any more time, I deleted the message, panting for a while first. 

“It’s okay.” I said to myself.  I was definitely going to forget it by tomorrow, so I decided to go to bed immediately.