The Knight's Mysterious Maid-Chapter 209: Lean on me (1)

Annalise returned to the manor just in time to get back to her work at noon. She was still in disbelief that she got Thomas to agree to her deal and not try harder to make her not go anywhere with Rafael. fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm

Annalise looked over her shoulder to double-check that Thomas was not secretly following her. She wouldn’t put it past him to say he was going out of town, but actually follow her to make sure nothing happened between her and Rafael.

If they were to catch Thomas lurking around, Annalise wouldn’t be surprised.

Annalise walked through the gates, ignoring the border guards who came every day to request a meeting with Rafael. If only they spent more time looking around the town, they would find where she left the two men. Unless something hungry sniffed them out and dragged them away or Thomas had hidden their bodies.

"It must be nice."

Annalise sighed, not in the mood to deal with Aria. "I honestly thought you were fired. You’ve been fading into the background so much that I don’t notice you. It is a nice day," Annalise answered.

"That is not what I meant-"

"I don’t care what you meant," Annalise interjected, walking by Aria who wasn’t doing a very good job at sweeping.

"I’ve been warning you not to get caught up with him because you won’t end up in a good place. These men don’t marry their maids," said Aria.

Annalise ignored Aria’s words and continued to walk into the manor to go upstairs to do her job as Rafael’s maid.

After having to deal with Olivia turning out to be a spy, Annalise was hardly in the mood to deal with Aria since there were more important things on her mind like going home and dealing with the man named Travis who made the mistake of targeting her.

If she didn’t need to go home, Annalise was starting to feel petty to play the role of lady of the manor to ruffle a few feathers. See the faces of people who talked bad about her or were jealous as they had to serve her. They were lucky she would never give in to her pettiness so easily. Well, not now when she had other things to do.

"Hello my new friend," Logan greeted her as he closed the door of Rafael’s study. "He’s not in a good mood so be careful. I hear that you will be leaving the manor soon. Don’t miss me too much."

"I’ll try," Annalise sarcastically replied. "Are you saying that because you are one of the knights going with the Callahans?"

Logan smiled since he had been caught early. Rafael hand-picked a few knights to join his family on the trip. With his uncle in town, Rafael and River were being careful with how they moved so knights would be joining to keep Beatrice safe.

"You are too smart for your own good. You should consider yourself lucky that I will be joining you. Christian was a possibility, but Rafael is leaving him to watch over the manor. I look forward to being out of the manor with my new friend-"

"You don’t need to keep calling me your friend because it is starting to feel forced and that will slowly become annoying. Just call me Annalise. You don’t need to keep repeating what I am to you. You are already better in my eyes since you are not calling me that foolish name. I will heed your words and try not to anger Rafael any further. I will see you later," Annalise said, waving goodbye to Logan.

Other than him stressing that they were friends when he saw her these days, he was slowly changing her opinion of him.

Annalise walked to Rafael’s study and knocked on the door.

"Come in."

Annalise opened the door and as she entered, she found him with an annoyed expression as he read a paper in his hand. Her curiosity quickly grew to find out what he was reading. Annalise closed the door to give Rafael back his privacy.

"I have returned from meeting my brother. He did not get too angry with me telling him at the last moment that I would be out of town. Is there something wrong? You seem different from how I left you this morning. Forgive me if I seem to be prying into your personal affairs," Annalise said, stopping at a good distance from his desk to look at the papers spread out.

She saw the seal from the royal palace, the town guards, and one with a falcon. The one time she left to meet with Thomas, Rafael was swamped with letters.

"It is fine. Have you finished packing?" Rafael asked, gathering the letters to put them away. He had nothing to do with the missing border guards, but after how much he was being questioned because of assumptions that didn’t make sense, he was tempted to kill all of them who were currently in town, creating a headache for him.

"Yes. There wasn’t a lot to pack so I finished last night before I went to bed," Annalise answered. It wasn’t like she had a lot to pack.

"I’ve informed Mavis that you are to be served your dinner early so you will be ready when it is time to depart. We need to leave in time to meet with my parents. We will be riding in my carriage unless you want to ride with my mother?" Rafael asked, leaning back in his chair to take in Annalise’s appearance today.

"I will stay with you. I can already hear your mother’s questions about you if I ride with her. She is a wonderful woman, but those questions and her trying to be secretive are a bit..." Annalise trailed off. There was only so much smiling she could do before her cheeks started to hurt and she started to mutter curses.

"If we ever find ourselves alone on this trip, it is not all my doing. I hope you understand that soon. My mother is a lover of plotting. I will have my father keep her distracted for as long as he can during the trip. She will be busy talking to old friends, but her attention will come back to us. It is my fault for telling her about my feelings," Rafael said, wishing he had not revealed them.

"She would have assumed one of us liked the other that day. I don’t mind if she plots something. It will be a fun game for me to try to avoid her traps. It will also be entertaining to see you try to stop her from doing something. What do you need to do now?" Annalise asked, looking around the study to see if it needed to be tidied.

"I am in need of more water and a few of the apples we just received. I will be here for a little while so I won’t need you. Find Mavis to see what if she needs help keeping an eye on the new maids. It seems some of them have taken your place at turning her hair white," Rafael joked.

"Impossible, but I will get what you need quickly and save Mavis. Excuse me."

Rafael tapped his fingers on her desk as he watched Annalise leave. Last night, he left out that he had one more gift for her. She was to stay close to him during the trip and during the trip, there was a party to attend.

Instead of having to endure being set up with young women he did not care for, he had a dress he thought would suit Annalise prepared in case she would agree to accompany him. Telling her about the dress last night might have ruined her excitement about the helmet so he kept it a secret.

Rafael looked away from the door to the letter he folded up. The one with the palace requesting his presence to talk about the border.