The sharp clicks of the keys shattered the silence of the room like a heartbeat and blended together with the other soft whirring of the computer components. Layla studied Aidan while he worked—his gaze fixed at the monitor, striking as deep in thought as she had ever seen him. Aidan's promise was coming to fruition; he was indeed sending the files to the media, law enforcement, and every other person who stood a chance at obliterating Kamal's rejuvenated presence.
Things were adjusting to her even if a part of her plan was an illusion. Still, she felt deeply perturbed about something. It certainly was not the worrying of Kamal's vindictive response—she absolutely knew that was bound to happen. Rather, it was the faint persistent feeling which dangerously nestled itself the instant she decided to take up an Aidan sponsored offer. The reason she agreed the first time was because there weren't a lot of trusting alternatives. With time passing her by, she realized this was not what she had bargained for.
His Aidan gaze did not need any shifting. Acceptance melted away confirmation of Sid's expression as Aidan refused to drown himself in frenetic scanning outside activity. Aidan's deadpan stare overwhelmed half of the office's insanity veering towards 'everyone's-watching-a-sudden-winner' aura, locking his expression into focus dead set on being devoid of an audience. Sid too understood that half turn of exhibiting unease as policy failure: from this angle it was appliable blunt force to guarantee all stimulus escape sprang the standard issue winner's corner scrutiny.
She placed her trust in him.
"Aidan," she said, steady but composed.
Aidan did not look up, his fingers deftly continuing their dance over the keyboard. "What is it, Layla?"
The question levied a considerable amount of focus, and she had to prepare for her focus to not drift away mid-conversation.
"Your endgame," she whispered, slowly exhaling the last word. "Your endgame."
He stopped, his fingers scrambling to retrieve whatever words remained. "What do you mean?" His gaze was now stuck on her.
"Overly helpful? No one is that eager to take out Kamal so easily. Awfully suspicious, Aidan."
Layla did not blink at Aidan frowning for the first time ever. An annoyed jolt of frustration that fluttered across his facial features, but quickly went back to Musk's pokerface.
"Remember my first words?" he started from zero and up. "I want control, Kamal has been a tyrant for too long."
Exposing too much certainty struck arching alarm bells that went off overhead, leaving bare truth intertwined with fiction in one swift motion to suffocate any warmth available, but any acknowledgement of something now just enhanced the surprise. Amid all truth, facts of reality, there had to be. Something.
"You're lying," she uttered softly, likely only to herself and not him.
Aidan smirked now, just a fraction, but it was the type of grin that spoke volumes. "You believe I'm lying?"
Layla roughly had a heart rate standing still when it felt like it was racing her. Sass dripping from her words, "You don't care about revenge. You don't care about my father, or anything else for that matter. You just want to use me, bend everything I've worked for, to usurp Kamal."
While Aidan's smile didn't waver, knowing at this point the gloves had to come off, he wore a colder gaze, stripped of any warmth, which was now sharper than before, more calculating. "Do you really think I need somebody as useless as you for me to take Kamal's place?" His voice low, almost mocking, further hissing. "No, Layla. I've been in this game long before you. You are nothing more than ready-made fodder and a useful pawn, if I'm being generous. But don't let yourself become delusional with the idea that you're anything more than that."
Anger which had previously simmered below the surface was now coming to a boil, and hadn't Aidan painted a rosy picture untrustworthy from the start. A slap still stung, as Aidan had the audacity to speak so bluntly to the girl.
"Don't you dare think of me as your pawn," she insisted, fury intertwining with each syllable. "I will not be a means to your end. I fight Kamal for my father, for my family. Not for you."
Aidan didn't respond on cue. Instead, he rose from the desk and started walking toward her, slow as if premeditating each step. His stature emanated mix dominance and smothering suffocation.
"You don't get it, and that is your downfall," he murmured, deathly soft. "You're in way deeper than you thought. Other factors encapsulated in this will come after your life. Will not cease until what is Marked is claimed. And you, do you suppose stand a chance against him? Against me? Alone?"
With a weight she had never anticipated feeling before, she backed away from him, allowing all the gravity of her decisions to pull her in. Realistically, Aidan was merely a fragment of the plan, perhaps even the one in control.
"I am not mortally terrified of you, right now," her voice did not shake whereas her heart was leaping. "You are not allowed to my kill so called Kamal to assume his reign."
The abounding silence was abruptly cut through as Aidan sprang forward with lightening speed, catching her wrist. She could feel the death grip tightening on her wrists as all else melted away at the sensation of his constraining hands.
"You don't have a choice, Layla," he snarled. "What I'm trying to say is, you're in this now. You aren't leaving until this is finished. And if it takes using you to get to Kamal, then so be it."
Adrenaline coursed through Layla's veins. She yanked her hand out from under his wrist, conjuring feelings of anger and terror. In this case, Aidan had been the biggest tactical blunder.
Deciding to be blunt, she remarked, "I'm done with you," using a more rageful tone.
From the look of it, Aidan could care less. With an unbothered intonation, he continued observing her, maintaining that same detached outlook, her bravado carrying no significant meaning.
"Oh, fine," he spoke in what felt like too-soothing of a dialed down voice. "Just recall, as of this instant in time, you are unable to stop what is already in motion. Kamal is going to come, and when he does make an entrance, don't say I didn't give you fair warning in hindsight. You will regret not siding with me."
"I might not be your side, and yet I am in control," she heard tampered shouts from the other end as Aidan swiftly went back to the monitors. In under a second, she glanced toward the screen to ensure her assumption wasn't wrong. There it was—a tampered scream on her. The final move was always in sight.
Wordlessly she pivoted and strode out of the room. The fire of rage and betrayal smoldered in her chest, but there was something more─something calculating and icy. She wasn't finished. Aidan was still out there. And so was Kamal.
He wasn't reliable. But, she could still exploit him.