Chapter 14 Eruption
Elara was out of the truck before it fully stopped, running toward the house while police officers turned to watch her approach.
Then one of them stepped forward with his hand up.
"Ma'am, this is an active crime scene, you can't..."
"My son was in that house," Elara said, her voice breaking. "Adrian, he's two years old, is he okay? Where is he?"
The officer's expression shifted. "You're the mother? We've been trying to reach you, the woman inside had your number listed as emergency contact but calls weren't going through."
"My phone broke," Elara said. "Please, where's my son?"
"The boy is safe, he's with Child Protective Services right now being evaluated," the officer said. "He wasn't physically harmed but he's traumatized, and won't stop crying for his mother."
Elara took a deep breath, as her body was already shaking so bad.
Kai held her, while she tried to process that Adrian was alive.
"What about Sarah?" Elara asked. "The woman who was watching him?"
The officer's face went grim. "She didn't make it, I'm sorry, she was shot twice in the chest, and she died before the paramedics arrived."
"No," Elara screamed. Sarah had saved her life countless times in the borderlands, she had taken care of Adrian when Elara had nowhere else to turn, and now she was dead because of Elara's choices.
"There was another victim," the officer continued. "An older male, Marcus was the only name we could find on him.
He was found in the backyard with a single gunshot to the head."
Elara felt like she was going to be sick because Marcus had given her work and protection and helped her escape with newborn Adrian, and she'd repaid him by getting him killed.
"Who did this?" Kai asked from behind her.
"We don't know yet, neighbors reported hearing multiple gunshots around 8:15 PM and called it in," the officer said. "By the time we arrived the perpetrators were gone and we found the victims and the child hiding in a closet upstairs."
"I need to see my son," Elara said.
"CPS took him to the hospital for evaluation, they'll want to speak with you before releasing him," the officer said and handed her a card with an address. "
"Detective Morrison is handling the case, she'll need your statement about what you heard over the phone."
Elara took the card and turned back toward the truck, her mind numb from everything that had just happened.
Kai drove to the hospital in silence and Elara stared out the window seeing nothing, just replaying Sarah's scream and the gunshot over and over in her head.
The hospital was small and outdated and the CPS worker who met them in the waiting room looked exhausted, holding a clipboard and studying Elara with the kind of suspicion that came from dealing with too many bad parents.
"I'm Elara Whitmore, you have my son Adrian," Elara said.
"ID please," the worker said.
Elara pulled out Sera Seahawks' driver's license and handed it over, her stomach dropping as she realized the names didn't match.
"This says Sera Seahawks," the worker said, frowning. "The child's emergency contact listed his mother as Elara Whitmore."
"That's my legal name, I go by Sera," Elara lied quickly. "It's a family thing, my documents haven't been updated yet."
The worker didn't look convinced. "I'll need to verify this before I can release the child to you, do you have any other identification with your legal name?"
"No, I..." Elara started but Kai interrupted.
"I can vouch for her," he said. "I'm Alpha Kai Silvercrest from Crescent Falls pack, she works in my household and I've verified her background."
The worker looked at Kai and her expression changed, immediately she recognised him, fear gripped her.
"Alpha Silvercrest, I didn't realize you.. I'm really sorry.
Then it's not a problem if you're vouching for her identification because that's sufficient."
She made a note on her clipboard. "The child has been sedated due to extreme distress, he kept screaming and trying to get to the door, the doctors felt it was necessary for his safety."
"You drugged my two-year-old?" Elara demanded.
"We sedated a traumatized child who witnessed a violent crime," the worker corrected coldly."
"He'll sleep for a few hours and when he wakes up you can take him home, but Detective Morrison will need to interview you first about the circumstances."
A detective appeared from a hallway, middle-aged woman with sharp eyes and a no-nonsense expression. "Ms. Whitmore? I'm Detective Morrison, I need to ask you some questions about tonight."
Elara followed her to a small consultation room while Kai waited outside, and the detective pulled out a recorder and a notepad.
"Tell me everything you heard on that phone call," Detective Morrison said.
Elara recounted it all, talking to Adrian, then Sarah mentioning Marcus being missing, then the screams and the gunshot and the silence.
"Did Sarah mention anyone coming to the house? Anyone following her or making threats?" the detective asked.
"No, nothing like that," Elara said.
"What about enemies? Anyone who would want to hurt her or Marcus?"
Elara's mind went immediately to Mandivus but saying his name meant explaining why an exiled Alpha from the borderlands would hunt her son, which meant revealing her real identity and the fact that she was working under a false name in Kai Silvercrest's mansion.
"I don't know of anyone," she lied.
Detective Morrison studied her for a long moment.
"You're lying, I can tell, but I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you have reasons, so let me be very clear."
"Two people are dead and a child was traumatized, if you know something that could help us catch whoever did this and you're withholding it, you're obstructing justice."
"I don't know who did this," Elara said, which was technically true because she didn't have proof Mandivus was responsible even if every instinct screamed that he was.
"Fine," Detective Morrison said and stood up. "You're free to go but don't leave the state, we'll have more questions."
Elara walked back to the waiting room where Kai was on his phone, and he looked up when she approached.
"They're letting me see Adrian," she said.
A nurse led them to a pediatric room where Adrian lay in a hospital bed looking impossibly small, his face still tearstained even in sleep and his hand clutching a stuffed bear that Sarah must have grabbed for him.
Elara sat beside the bed and took his tiny hand in hers, feeling tears finally spill over because he was safe but Sarah and Marcus were dead and this was all her fault.
"I'm so sorry baby," she whispered. "I'm so sorry."
Kai stood by the door watching and something in his expression looked almost like recognition, like he was seeing something familiar in her grief, but then it passed and he looked away.
"We should let him sleep," Kai said quietly. "The nurse said he'll wake in a few hours."
Elara shook her head. "I'm not leaving him."
"Then I'll get us coffee," Kai said and left the room.
Elara sat there holding Adrian's hand and staring at his sleeping face, and somewhere in the back of her mind a thought formed.
Mandivus Swathi had just killed two people she cared about and traumatized her son.
She was going to destroy him for this, but first she needed to finish destroying Kai, and then she'd have the resources and power to make Mandivus pay for everything he'd done.
Her phone—the broken one—was still in her bag and she pulled it out, seeing the cracked screen and wondering if it could be repaired because the last thing Adrian had said to her was recorded on that phone.
The door opened and instead of Kai returning with coffee, a man in a dark suit walked in with two others behind him, and Elara's blood went cold when she recognized Mandivus Swathi's right-hand man.
"Ms. Whitmore," he said with a smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Or should I say Ms. Seahawks? Alpha Swathi would like a word about his missing heir."