Chapter 62 A Desperate Search For The Truth
Vanessa
I don't look back the moment I brush past him. It's not just because I don't want to...I can't. Unless I'm willing to succumb to the fatigue and deep sense of betrayal weighing down on me for the past days.
A family heirloom isn't something that's easily picked up from the floor of a street on a random fight night between wolves - especially not one as powerful as this one, if my earlier preview is any indication.
So I wait five days from the date of discovery; five days of carefully avoiding him, five days of replaying the images of the gemstone and conversations over and over until it's now permanently etched into my mind, and five days until suspicion starts to turn into fear.
On the sixth day, I move.
My first first point of contact is his private office. The mansion is quiet as usual - most of the pack is probably asleep by now, except the guards stationed outside, but I have no business with anyone outside the four walls of this place.
I look around quickly once I place my hand on the door knob, surprised to find it open already, then I slip inside like a shadow.
The first sniff of his musky scent tells me he's been here not too long ago; and so is the still warm fireplace, and the familiarity of it all already unsettles me.
I pull out his drawers and dig through, shuffling random papers about, but there's nothing that tells me anything. The small table in the centre of the room is almost bare, but I still run my hands through it, making sure not to miss anything.
I run a frustrated hand through my hair when nothing out of the ordinary pops up.
Maybe I should try searching his room instead.
With that thought in mind, I march into his room.
I've been there enough times to know how to unlock it without him.
The room is cloaked in darkness as usual; the curtains have been pulled closed with only a silver of moonlight filtering through the space. I close the door as soundless as possible behind me, and move quickly around; searching with controlled urgency: bedside drawers, closets, and even the bathroom, but I don't find anything there either.
Had he taken it from the rival? Or it was slipped in without his knowledge?
But then, why hasn't he said anything up until this moment? Why keep it?
A small black box sits locked in a corner of the bedside table. It looks very familiar and I pick it up.
It opens immediately.
Does this man ever keeps anything really locked or he feels that much invisible?
I recognize the picture inside: an image of him with his mother. The very one that had made him warn me not to stick my nose up in his private business.
Too bad I don't listen.
I overturn the box, letting every of its content to spill out on the bed until it's empty; all pictures of if him with his family at different stages of his life.
There's only one other person in one of the pictures I don't recognize. A frail-looking girl about seven years old. She has long black hair and wide, innocent brown eyes, and contrary to her appearance, there's a hidden fierceness that's just settled there, waiting to unleash into the world. My lips tilt up without permission at the way I can sense her even if it's just through a still photo.
I wonder who she might be and how she's related to Xander...
"What are you doing in here?"
My body tenses up at the sound of the familiar voice, trying to stop my hands from trembling by clutching the photo tighter.
"N-nothing. I'm just searching for something I lost," I reply. It actually isn't a lie, but half-truths won't hurt anyone. I think.
"Alone? In the dark?"
I don't respond.
He sighs. "Turn around, Nessa," Max says.
Slowly more than ever, I turn to face him and watch his arms fold over his chest. He's quiet and has an unreadable expression on his face; and that doesn't settle well with me in any way.
A quiet Max is a scary Max.
His green eyes flicker over to the bed, and the photo in my hands, and he nods towards it.
"What have you got there?"
I look down, as if just realizing I have something there. "Just something interesting I found," I mumble, then shove the picture in his face, pointing to the girl. "Who's she?"
Max squints and takes a peek, his body going rigid as he does.
"Put that back down, Nessa. He's not going to be happy to know anyone touched that," he tells me, his mouth twisting to the side.
What's with this place and it's never-ending mysteries?
It better not be another case of a long-lost lover.
I make sure to place everything exactly as I found them before, and Max gives me a wary look when I turn to leave.
"What exactly did you come here for?"
The slightly distrust in his voice makes me bristle and I give him a sharp look.
"Is there something I'm not supposed to find then?" I counter.
"You shouldn't be here, Nessa."
"And you should get the fuck out of my way," I snap. "unless there's something you're hiding, of course."
"I don't know what you think you know, but you're probably wrong about all of them," he says calmly.
"Oh really, and how would you know that?" scoff.
"The look of mistrust in your eyes says it all, Nessa. I don't know what it was you saw that day, but you're looking in all of the wrong places."
"What the fuck are you talking about, Max?"
He opens his mouth to speak, but the sound of approaching footsteps echo in the hallway, and I sense him, before I see him.
His frame appears in the doorway, his dark eyes are intense and intimidating even with the subtle limp as he walks towards us.
His eyes flicker from me to Max, the tension thickening in the air, ten times over.
"What's going on here?"
Without a word, I reach into my clothes, hesitating for just pull out the sapphire-colored gemstone from my back pocket, dangling it in front of their faces.
"You mind enlightening me on why this was with you on the day of the fight?"
The silence hangs thick in the air, and neither one of us dares to even breathe.
I look at both men. "You have five seconds to come clean right now, or I'll fucking make someone bleed right here, right now."