The Cursed Pharaoh's Bride

Chapter XXXVIII

Carolina

“I don’t know why I have to attend this business dinner. I know nothing about business. A soon-to-be nursing student would not be helpful to Elijah Seka Corp. at all,” I grumble as I struggle to place a contact lens into my eyes.

It takes a minute, but I’m finally successful. I take a moment and look at myself in the mirror. Elijah had a makeup and hair-styling team come to get me ready. My curly locks are pinned back in a low ponytail. I had on light makeup with some simple eyeliner and dark, nude lipstick. I’m dressed in an expensive-looking black fitted long sleeve shirt with a wide neckline that exposed my shoulders a little bit. It was paired with a long tan pencil skirt and black belt along with black heels. Elijah has gone all out with my new wardrobe and I can’t help but sense that he’s doing so out of guilt. He knows he can’t give me freedom right now, so he’s trying to make up for it by spoiling me with expensive things. While I understand he means well, I can’t help but get frustrated with him over it. I usually turn down his expensive gifts and refrain from wearing any of the new clothes he buys me. The only reason why I’m wearing something he’s bought me now is because I don’t own business clothes that are appropriate for tonight’s event.

I walk out of my bathroom into my room where I find Charles sitting on my new love seat that is in the new mini media area of my room. Elijah can be really over the top sometimes. A new TV with new furniture is unnecessary. I would be a liar if I didn’t admit that I didn’t enjoy that gift, though. If I’m going to be bored in my room all day, I may as well watch all the movies and shows I want to fill in my time.

“Business dinner?” Charles asks, his eyes focusing on the TV that’s showing some rom-com I left on. I’ll be sure to tease him about his sweet, romantic side later.

“Yeah, that’s what Elijah told me. Is that not what this is?” I walk towards him, placing a pair of simple gold earrings on to complete the outfit.

“I guess, technically, it is a business dinner. There will be multiple corporations in the same restaurant tonight,” he says, though his tone sounds a little dark.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing. Should I be worried?”

Charles shakes his head as he turns off the TV and starts to lead me out of my room. “Not at all. Just, believe me when I say you definitely belong there tonight.”

“I don’t understand why I couldn’t go with Elijah,” I say with a huff as I slip into my coat. Charles leads me out of the penthouse to the garage. We get into the car, and he rushes us off to the venue.

“You know he wanted to. But he had something at the office he had to take care of,” Charles reminds me, “He’s going to be there when we arrive. And if he’s not, we’re going to wait for him. He wants to introduce you to everyone himself, and he definitely doesn’t want you to be without him by your side tonight.” I let out a sigh of relief at that comment.

We arrive at a very fancy looking Mediterranean restaurant. The outside is decorated beautifully with a variety of plants and lights. The entrance has large glass doors and leading up to the door is a red carpet and velvet ropes. There are valets outside parking cars. The people walking in are wearing suits or elegant cocktail dresses. I’m almost glad I decided to wear something Elijah bought for me. A simple pair of jeans and blouse weren’t going to cut it. Even Charles is dressed up, and thinking on it now, I think this might be the first time I’ve ever seen the man in a tux. He has a dark gray suit with a perfectly pressed white dress shirt, a matching dark gray vest, and a black tie. He is cleanly shaved, and his blond hair is slick back. He looks like a scary businessman or lawyer or something. He has said he’s handled aspects of his family business before. If he’s fierce as a warrior, I can’t imagine how formidable he would be in an office.

He offers me his hand as he leads me out of the car into the restaurant. I’m happy to be in the warmth of the indoors seeing as the icy cold winter winds are threatening to make this autumn night even cooler than it already is.

I notice the restaurant is packed with various people. But instead of going to the crowd, Charles leads me to a small private room, which I can only assume is for staging purposes. The room at the moment is empty with a few seats stacked in the corner. Lorenzo is there, his eyes glued to the phone.

“Nobody noticed us,” Charles says to him.

“Which means my illusion worked,” Lorenzo replies, his eyes still focused on his phone. I glance at his earring.

“Keeping me a secret?” I ask.

“Of course,” he says. “Elijah wants to be the one to introduce you. And the last thing anyone wants is for you to get swarmed and for people to ask you questions you might not know the answer to.”

“What do you mean introduce me? Why is that important? And what questions? If I don’t know something, I’ll just be honest about it. I don’t think these businessmen care about some college student,” I respond.

Lorenzo’s eyes suddenly shoot up towards me. “He didn’t tell you.”

“Tell me what?”

Lorenzo lets out a groan before putting his phone away. “I guess I may as well tell you seeing as how Elijah was too chicken to,” he groans. “Tonight isn’t about his company. Tonight is about the Order of the Eye. It’s about you. Tonight is your debut. Everyone has suspected for some time that El-Hasekrah has awakened because he had found his soulmate. He’s put it off as long as he could, but he has to introduce you to the society now. He’s going to introduce you to everyone as their future queen.”

My heart skips a beat at the news Lorenzo tells me. Tonight is my debut? I’m going to meet the members of the society that still worships Elijah? And they’re going to see me as their queen?

I cross my arms over my chest and start to pace around the room. “Where’s Elijah? Why wouldn’t he just tell me this? How could he just throw this on me and expect me to go along with it once people suddenly start calling me ‘your highness’?”

“I’m to going to defend his decision to not tell you. He should have,” Lorenzo agrees. “But, knowing him, he thought he was protecting you in not saying exactly who you were meeting tonight. He didn’t want you to be nervous and he just wanted you to be yourself.”

“There goes the 'me not being nervous' plan!” I snap at him.

Lorenzo puts his hands up in defense. “Okay, maybe I should’ve kept up the lie. But I thought after everything you’ve been through that you can handle meeting a few people.”

“These aren’t just a few people. These are people who worship Elijah! Who knows what pedestal they’re going to put me on. And when they find out how ordinary I am, they’re going to doubt me. Heck, what if they start to doubt Elijah,” I groan.

“They’re not going to doubt you. And if anyone dares to doubt me, I’ll be sure to put them in their place.”

My head snaps to where that luscious, deep voice came from. The voice that belongs to the man that I’m currently slightly annoyed at right now for lying to me. Elijah’s long, muscular form is covered by a perfectly fitted black suit. Like Charles, he’s cleanly shaved. But his hair is slightly messy in the front as if he ran his hand through it a couple of times. Instead of it looking unkempt, it just looks sexy. He gives me this tender look and his eyes look a little apologetic.

“I didn’t mean to keep what tonight was actually about from you,” Elijah says as he step towards me and wraps his arms around my waist. “It’s really not that big of a deal. It’s a formality, if nothing else.”

“Not a big deal? Elijah, I know that I’m your soulmate and that means I’m supposed to be…someone. But I haven’t actually thought about that means until right now. The idea of meeting people who see me as some royal person makes this way too real,” I say as I try to pull away from him.

Elijah removes his hands from my waist and places them on my face, keeping me close. “Trust me, it isn’t a big deal. And I always hated the royal formalities and putting on a face for the crowd, too. Which is why I don’t expect you to do that. I didn’t tell you about this because I want you to be yourself. I want everyone to know who the gods picked for me, and I want them to know why they picked you. Don’t be afraid. Those who are loyal to me and our cause will respect you and understand why you’re right for me. And anyone who disagrees won’t dare say anything in my presence.”

I look deep into Elijah’s eyes as if to see if I can find a trace of uncertainty in them. But I don’t. He’s looking at me with so much confidence and assertiveness I can’t help but believe what he’s telling me. I give him a small nod, letting him know I’m ready to do this. He places a soft kiss on my forehead and that gives me the boost I need to follow him out of the room.

Lorenzo leads us at of the holding area and Charles trails behind us. People are standing around a few empty tables holding glasses of champagne. There are no chairs in this room. Servers are going around with trays of horderves as light chatter floats through the air.

As we walk past all these people, the chatter starts turning into whispers as people stare at us. While I know Elijah is getting a good amount of the stares considering he’s the pharaoh, I can’t help but feel like more eyes are on me - a face they’ve never seen before.

We stop once we make it to the center of the room. A server comes around and hands each of us a champagne glass. Lorenzo barely has to tap his glass to get the room to quiet down completely seeing how many people already started to quiet down the second we entered the room.

Once the room falls dead silent, Lorenzo looks to Elijah, signaling that he’s allowed to speak.

“Good evening, Order of the Eye. I wanted to thank everyone for being here tonight. Tonight is a particularly special night because you will all finally have the pleasure of meeting the one woman who I owe my current life to, my soulmate and my soon to be queen. Allow me to introduce Carolina Mercado. She’s the reason I am here tonight and she’s the reason your waiting can finally come to an end. We look forward to mingling with all of you one on one throughout the night. So for now, continue to enjoy the company and enjoy the food as we make our way around to speaking with everyone.”

Lorenzo then raises his glass and everyone in the room follows his lead. “Long live the king,” he says.

“Long live the king,” everyone in the room repeats.

Conversation resumes as everyone turns their attention away from us. I clutch onto Elijah’s arm, and he automatically pulls me closer to him.

“Where do we start?” I ask.

“How about the people we’re definitely not going to be sitting with during dinner,” Elijah whispers in my ear.