Chapter 137: Screaming possession
JAXON’S POV
Orion didn’t knock when he came in.
He walked in briskly, like someone was right behind him, chasing after him with an iPad held tightly in his grip.
“Boss,” he called from outside my study before his figure emerged in my line of sight after the door slammed open.
Nathan, who was sprawled out on the sofa, sprang to his feet immediately.
Earlier, he had been huffing and pacing around my study, repeatedly asking what I intended to do to save Nancy. He had tried to leave a couple of times too, wanting to rush back to New Jersey to save her, but I dissuaded him from doing so.
Eventually, he’d listened and stuck to waiting, albeit impatiently, and had eventually fallen asleep on the sofa.
He apparently wasn't deep in slumber because the moment the door flew open, he jumped to his feet as well.
“What? Did you find out something?” He questioned Orion before the latter even got a chance to speak.
“Have you seen Nancy? Is she okay? Can we go save her now?”
Orion shot me a helpless look, silently requesting my intervention.
I sighed then stepped forward, clasping my hand around Nathan’s shoulder.
“You need to calm down.”
“That’s the thing; I can’t calm down,” he shot at me. “My sister is in danger; how the fuck am I supposed to calm down?”
Even though he’d barked his response in my face, I didn’t get angry. I patted his shoulder instead.
“That’s all the more reason why you should calm down. You just said it yourself, she's in danger. We can’t act rashly if we want to ensure her safety.”
Frankly speaking, it wasn’t easy being a voice of reason in a room full of anxious people while I was going crazy internally myself, but I managed it.
Because I knew that at least one of us needed to keep a rational head on their shoulder.
Nathan breathed in deeply, then let out an equally heavy exhale that suggested that he had regained some measure of calm.
Finally, I turned to Orion, who was watching on.
“What is it?”
“Boss, there’s something you need to see,” he said, turning the iPad to me. It flickered to life, showing the lock screen.
My gaze lifted back to him, riddled with questions.
“It’s not a location,” he explained quickly, reaching out to swipe it open. “It’s a footage.”
The word alone made something cold settle in my gut.
A footage.
Even after thinking about it, I didn’t have an inkling of what it could be. Nathan was even more curious than I was because he reached out to grab the iPad from me and hurriedly worked his way around it.
Before Nathan even played the video, I had a feeling that I wasn’t prepared for what I was about to see.
Who knew I would end up being spot on.
The video began to play.
At first, it was just a dark screen and noise, but then the screen lit up, and a hall came into view.
The video panned to some people, and also, it showed briefly the arrangement of the hall, and based on that alone, I guessed that it was some kind of event.
There was a large banner on the stage that had too little fonts to read, but I did catch the words fundraiser.
“A charity event,” Nathan mumbled out loud, confirming my guess.
Just then, Nancy’s figure appeared.
Nathan gasped while I could swear my heart skipped a beat.
I found myself inching forward to get a better look.
It felt like ages since I last saw her, even though it was just a couple of days ago, but I guess the saying that distance makes the heart fonder was true all along.
Because the instant I saw her on the screen, I found myself wishing she were right here so I could pull her into my embrace.
My fingers curled slowly into fists when I recollected that it was an unattainable desire at the moment.
She stood in the middle of the room, looking around like a lost puppy, but she wasn’t the only one who caught my eye.
The man next to her did too.
Hudson.
He stood really close to her and seemed to have his hands wrapped around her waist. I couldn’t see Nancy’s face, but her demeanor spoke volumes about the fact that she wasn’t comfortable in the position she was in.
My hands curled even harder, and I found myself wishing I was right there so u could rip off his hand that was holding her.
The camera panned, catching another scene.
It was a man this time.
An unfamiliar man who looked like he was barely standing upright. There was another man next to him, who seemed to be holding him and another planted to his side.
The man by his side suddenly stepped forward and punched him.
I frowned while Nathan swallowed. “What’s going on?”
That was what I wanted to figure out, too. A couple more seconds played out, and I finally understood what was happening.
In the video, Nancy stepped forward like she wanted to stop the assault on the man, but Hudson pulled her back.
A couple more minutes into the video, and I saw her shoulders tremble.
My eyes widened at the same time Nathan inhaled sharply.
“Is she…Is she crying?”
“She’s crying,” he whispered in confirmation right after.
I didn’t respond.
I couldn’t.
Because I saw it too.
Her shoulders trembled some more, and my fingers crackled from how tightly I was holding them in a fist.
Just then, the scene changed back to the man who was punched again.
Nathan sucked in a sharp breath. “What the fuck…”
He was hit again, and right before another landed, Nancy rushed forward with panic written all over her face.
She was saying something, begging.
Even without the sound, I could see it.
Hudson stepped into the frame. He grabbed her and pulled her back to his side, and his lips moved.
When he stopped talking, Nancy was still for a minute, then her shoulders trembled again, harder this time.
If it wasn’t obvious before, it was glaring now that she was crying.
Nathan's grip tightened on the iPad. “That swine! I’m going to fucking kill him. I swear I will…”
I didn’t catch the rest of his words because I was no longer listening. My gaze was fixated on Hudson’s hand that was holding Nancy.
That grip, it screamed possession.
It looked like a declaration, and it seemed like he was loudly announcing something.
Mine.
That was what his body language said.
Something dark twisted in my chest.