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Hazel
I know I said I wasn’t going to talk to Axel.
But how the hell was I supposed to stay silent after this?
I pushed myself up off the floor, brushing dust off my palms and shaking with fury.
“What is wrong with you?” I snapped at him. “I just fell and you're what...? And how did I even fall?”
My eyes locked on him. His face was that same carved, unreadable mask he always wore, expressionless, cold, impossible to decipher.
“This was you,” I said, pointing straight at him. “You did this. You did this. I didn’t want to sit where you wanted, so what...you broke the chair so I’d learn my place?”
My voice rose, sharp and trembling with disbelief and rage.
“I could’ve broken my neck, Axel. This is serious. You don’t do this. It’s dangerous.”
Then, quieter, more to myself than to him, I muttered,
“Why am I even talking to you…”
He didn’t flinch.
He didn’t blink.
He didn’t move.
Just that same mask, staring back at me like he was watching a storm he’d summoned on purpose.
And that made it all so much worse.
He just sat there, elbows resting lightly on the armrests of that oversized throne-like chair, his fingers steepled under his chin as if he were watching a show he’d paid for. As if my humiliation was entertainment.
My chest rose and fell too fast. My pulse was thundering in my ears. I could still feel the sting on my palms from hitting the floor. The shock had faded, but the anger... oh God, the anger was a living thing.
“Say something!” I snapped, breath shuddering out of me. “You can’t just sit there like...like a statue and say nothing! I could’ve been hurt!”
His head tilted. Slowly. Deliberately. That alone sent a shiver up my spine.
“First rule,” he murmured, voice low and even, “if you’re going to accuse me of something… be very sure what it is.”
What?
My heart thudded unevenly.
“What does that even mean?” I hissed.
Axel didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t look irritated. He didn’t look guilty. If anything… he looked like someone waiting for me to keep digging my own grave.
“The chair was inspected earlier,” he said calmly. “It wasn’t broken.”
“Then why did it collapse the second I sat on it?” I demanded.
His gaze dragged over me. Slow. Sharp. Assessing. Too intimate and too cold at the same time.
“Because,” he said, “you didn’t sit properly.”
I blinked. “What....”
“You threw yourself onto it,” he added, matter-of-fact, like he was commenting on the weather. “Anger makes you reckless. Your body doesn’t follow your mind. You collapse into things. You don’t lower yourself.”
Oh, hell no.
“So now it’s my fault?” I shot back. “You sabotage the chair, I fall, and somehow I’m the problem?”
A muscle ticked in his jaw.
Ah. So he did feel something.
“Hazel,” he said quietly, “if I wanted you hurt, you wouldn’t be sitting here yelling at me.”
That shut me up.
My breath snagged midway up my throat. But at the same time... God, what was wrong with me? The warmth under my skin only increased. Like my anger and fear were tangled up with this… awareness of him. Of the way he spoke. Of the way he controlled every inch of this air.
He leaned back slightly, eyes still pinned to mine.
“You fell because you were too busy being furious,” he continued. “Not because of me.”
“You’re lying,” I whispered, but it didn’t sound confident.
It sounded… small. Pathetic.
I followed his gaze, swallowing hard. The chair lay on its side. One of the legs was splintered, cleanly. Too cleanly. That was deliberate damage. Someone had done it. Purposefully.
My eyes darted back to Axel.
“You expect me to believe this just magically happened?” I demanded.
His brows lifted, slow and dangerous. “I expect you to use your brain. Something you don't seem to be capable of right now.”
I opened my mouth, then closed it.
You know what? Fine, I thought to myself.
He thinks that just because he made me fall off this chair I’m suddenly going to sit next to him?
Ha.
He’s delusional.
So I sat on the next seat to the broken one. Thumped into it again, a whole statement of defiance in the motion.
And what do you know?
Down I went. Hard.
I hit my ass on the floor so fast and so unforgivingly that a scream tore out of me, not because of pain, but because of the frustration, the helplessness, the realisation that I couldn’t do anything about this.
I pulled myself up slowly after a while. This time, Nico didn’t even come running.
I looked straight at Axel, accusation burning in my eyes.... And he smiled.
A smug, amused, "I win" smile.
So this time, I didn’t sit in the next chair. I pushed it first, tested it. Then the next. And the next.
Three chairs in, I realised he had tampered with them all..... I looked at him again, angry, shaking, humiliated.
That’s when Angela walked into the room. I was still standing, glaring at Axel when she entered, and of course, she noticed something was wrong. She looked at both of us but quietly went about her business, serving me in the chair next to Axel, serving Axel, setting everything down with her usual quiet efficiency.
Then, as if she hadn’t seen a single thing, she murmured, “Enjoy your dinner. Call me if you need anything,” like she always did.
I must have looked like a wreck.
Fallen twice.
Sweat on my forehead.
On the verge of breaking down and crying.
Angela slipped out quickly, and then it was just me and Axel again.
“Sit,” Axel commanded in a voice he used with his soldiers.
Was I his dog? Who the hell did he think he was? I wasn't one of his men.... He wasn't the boss of me.
I don’t know where the courage came from. I don’t know where the idea came from..... But I reached out, grabbed an empty plate from the table, and threw it at his f*****g smug face.
- Writer
