Chapter 325. She Wanted to Play Rock-Paper-Scissor Again (But I Want It Intimate)

The Silver Rest’s common room was empty at this hour, which was the specific emptiness of a space that had been occupied until recently and would be occupied again shortly. The morning service didn’t start for another three or four hours.

Rex located the lamp behind the bar and lit it. The room exuded the atmosphere of a well-run inn during a quiet hour.

Elaris sat at the eastern table, which Rex usually sat at, and took off the hood of her outer layer like someone who was changing from one situation to another.

She looked at Rex from across the table.

"The expedition..." she said.

Rex was sitting across from her.

"Iris is going in." Elaris said, "And Aurelia has been in the system with five other people for two days now."

She held his gaze with the warmth and steadiness that had been growing since they were on the training ground.

"I know what you’re capable of," she said. "I’ve seen them..."

"I’ve seen what you do with Therion’s sixty years of experience, and I’ve heard the reports from Alexander’s assessment."

She was quiet for a little while.

"Iris doesn’t show it." Elaris said, "But she hasn’t had many people in her life that she trusts."

"The one she trusts the most has been in a cave for two days... Aurelia and Iris are my daughters, so I hope that you could..."

Rex stared at her.

"Please... bring them back," Elaris said, and the simple words carried the weight of everything. "That’s why I’m here to talk with you..."

"It’s just to make sure that you’re going to promise me that yo’ll bring back my daughters safe."

"And, of course, I’m not here for politics or strategy."

She paused.

"Just please... keep them save."

Rex stared at her for a long time.

"I will," he said.

The way he said it had the quality of a statement of fact rather than a reassurance, and she received it that way.

"I know you will," she said with a smile.

Rex looked her in the eye.

The common room was illuminated by a lamp that cast a warm glow typical of the last hour before dawn, when lamps served as the sole source of light. Outside the window, the city existed in a state of transition, caught between two realities.

He didn’t break the stare.

Rex said, "You came all the way here in a disguise that took you a long time to make."

Elaris’s face changed a little. "That’s right."

"You’re going to leave before anyone wakes up," he said. "And you’ve already made up your mind about how this will go, and you’re just waiting for the other person to catch up."

She kept looking at him.

"You’re... very right about most things," she said, and the way she said it had all the things that statement could mean when someone was looking at someone from across a table with their hood down.

"Not all things," Rex said.

"No," she said. "Not everything."

He got up from his chair.

He offered his hand.

Elaris looked at it, then at him, then took it, and they went upstairs.

...

Rex’s room was dark when he pushed the door open. He lit the small lamp on the side table without hurrying, and the lock clicked behind them.

Elaris stood near the window and looked around the room with the careful attention of someone taking inventory.

"Smaller than I expected," she said.

"Well, it’s just a normal bedroom," Rex said. "At least the bed is big..."

She turned at that, and he was already looking at her with the expression he used when something had two meanings and he was waiting to see which one landed.

She caught both.

"You’re doing that on purpose," she said.

"I do most things on purpose."

Elaris moved to the chair by the window and sat down, achieving the composed distance she preferred. Rex recognized her strategy; she had been employing it since.

She maintained the level she chose, rather than allowing him to dictate the space between them.

He pulled the writing desk chair and sat across from her. They were seated close enough that the distance became uncomfortable for both of them.

"You’ve been thinking about last time, right?" Rex said.

"H-How do you know that...?"

"Well, it’s not surprising for any woman who only gets a small feeling of my cock, and it was only in the mouth." Rex laughed, and then she pointed at her crotch. "That right there... it’s probably anticipating it, huh?"

"Ggghhh..." Something shifted behind her expression. "We’re going to play your game again, but this time... I’ll make sure to win this one for my family."

"Your family, yeah, of course... more like my cock."

"N-No! I meant this time...! Just one round!"

"Okay, one round it is," Rex agreed. "And then you had to leave because Therion was probably looking for you."

"He wasn’t looking for me."

"Good then, that means we have all the time for ourselves," Rex licks his lips. "I’ll make sure you get the taste of it today because I still have some hours before the expedition."

"You perverted man..." The corner of her mouth moved. "You’re very confident about what my husband was going to do."

"I’m confident about most things," he said. "Including the fact that you’ve been thinking about that round since you walked out the door."

Elaris looked at him steadily. "You won that round."

"I did."

"And I told you what the winner gets."

"Whatever they were thinking before they played," Rex said. "Your exact words."

She held his gaze with the look of someone who had walked into a room fully aware of what kind of room it was.

"You’ve been thinking about it too," she said.

"Since before you knocked," Rex said. "Except you didn’t knock."

She laughed, short and real. It was the same laugh she had given him at dinner.

"You’re terrible," she said.

"People keep saying that," Rex said. "And yet here you are."

Elaris looked at him across the small distance the lamp carved out between them, warm and present and completely finished pretending she had only come to talk about the expedition.

"Alright, I’ll just finish it with one more round," she said. "And this time... there’s probably not going to be a lot of draw results again!"

"Oh?" Rex raised an eyebrow. "Confident, are we?"

"If I win this time," she said, "we discuss it like adults."

"And if I win again?"

"I think you already know." She met his eyes. "Especially in that perverted mind of yours."

"It’s ironic for someone to say that to me, hahaha!" Rex leaned forward and raised his fist.

"One," he said.

Elaris raised her own fist. The lamplight caught the look on her face, which was the look of someone who made a decision a long time ago and was only now giving herself permission to follow through with it.

"Two," she said.

They both said three.

Rex opened two fingers.

Elaris opened a flat hand.

She stared at the result for a moment.

"Scissors beats paper," Rex said pleasantly. "I win."

"Easy, hahaha!"

Elaris looked up at him with the expression of someone who had just lost on purpose and wasn’t entirely sure whether to be embarrassed about it.

"Best of three," she said.

"Heh, nope~!" Rex said. "You said it only once."

She held his gaze for one long moment.

"Gugghhh... what should I do for me to continue the game to the next round?" Elaris said with a pitiful face. "I’ll do anything except that..."

"Hehhh... no fun, but..." Rex smirked. "You need to be honest with me by telling me what happens after I leave the house."

[ELARIS MORR NIGHTWING — DESIRE LEVEL: 75 → 79/100]

Rex noticed the notification, and it seems like he just hit a jackpot. It’s probably something that is related to her frustration.

"If you lie... I’ll make sure you regret it." Rex said with an intimidating look.

Elaris’s body froze, seeing that look on his face. "O-Okay... I’ll tell you everything as long as we can continue the game without having to be intimate with each other."

She cleared her throat and then told Rex everything, including some private things in order for the game to continue.

--Flashback--

Elaris sat on the edge of the bed with her head down as she heard Therion laughing in their bedroom. Every laugh felt like a knife twisting in her heart, a painful reminder of how much they had grown apart over the years.

She had been brave enough to say what she wanted and how badly she needed it, but all she got was ridicule and dismissal.

Therion sat next to her and put his hand on her thigh. He was trying to comfort her, but Elaris thought it was cold and distant.

"Now, now, my dear," he said in that condescending voice that always made Elaris’s blood boil. "You know we can’t do things like that anymore..."

"We’re not as young as we used to be."

Elaris bit her lower lip, feeling the sting of unshed tears threatening to spill over. She knew he was right, in a technical sense.

Time had not been kind to either of them, and the fiery love they had for each other when they were young had long since died down to embers. Elaris, on the other hand, couldn’t help but feel very disappointed and angry.

Was this life really all there was left for them?

A life of quiet desperation and unspoken longing?