Chapter 62: Another Suspect
Kaelric’s POV
"That’s a backstory, even though it is also needed, I’m interested in knowing what happened next and how you found out about the dungeon."
"Well, I stayed awake that evening, and I noticed that neither of them came back to the apartment. I became worried. That was when I felt the mate bond pull. It wasn’t painful at first, I just felt anxious," he explained while pacing around my office.
"It would be much better if you sat down, Zade," I suggested, offering him a seat in front of my table.
"I’m much comfortable pacing, and you are interrupting my speech," he snapped at me, and I felt a little bit amused at his tone.
"If you say so," I shrugged and then relaxed into my chair, raised my hands in a gesture that urged him on.
"I sat up straight, following the mate pull to the casino, where I met Wayne and Lucas at the entrance. They were distributing currency among themselves, suggesting that they had conducted the business.
I attacked them immediately, asking for Aria’s whereabouts. And just then, Aven, Damon, and Tristan joined in. They hesitantly directed towards the dungeon, claiming that they saw her walk in with some guy." he paused, his face looking irritated, then he shifted his gaze towards the Alpha successors.
"We hurriedly rushed into the dungeon, just to find her in the midst of..." he continued, but I was already getting agitated with the whole story, and I had questions.
"Why didn’t you alert the school when you overheard them talk about abducting a student in this Academy?" I asked, cutting him off.
He looked me in the eyes as if he was expecting me to know the reason why, and when I didn’t budge, he said, "Well, it’s because I won’t be believed, every wolf thinks that the sigil is safely sealed, therefore there’s only a five per cent chance that any vampire can be in this kingdom."
He made some sense, but was that the actual motive or was it because he felt he could handle it alone with the Alpha successors?.
But I kept asking my wolf why I wasn’t able to feel the mate pull when she was in danger. Could it be that all I felt was a mimic mate bond? No, that can’t be, it felt so real and intense. My mind raced; I had no explanation for that.
Even now, the thought of her being harmed made me want to hurt the perpetrators so bad that they feel the kind of despair I’m currently in.
"Sorry, continue your report." Even the word sorry sounded off coming from my mouth to Zade.
"We found her in the midst of vampires; they were beating her. We managed to get them off her, but before we could get to her, she had passed out.
On the chair by the corner of the same room was Becca, her friend; her mouth was sealed, her hands bound, and she was tied to the chair. She had already passed out, too; it seemed like she had passed out a while before Aria."
"We carried them to their dorm," he continued, directing his gaze to the Alpha successors, suggesting that they were carried to the Alpha successors’ dormitory.
"They would be safer there, so why not. Then I called the Academy’s headmistress to inform her of what happened. I feared what happened would affect her campaign."
"Of course, it would have affected her campaign if you hadn’t called. She didn’t attend classes today, which makes her ineligible to participate in the contest. However, because there is a tangible reason for her absence from school today, she might be pardoned, and the elections may even be postponed."
"Zade, you may go now," I said, waving at him dismissively. He hesitated, looked me straight in the eyes, then rolled his eyes before leaving.
I think I even heard him murmur something under his breath, but I cared less; he had already given me the pieces of information that I needed for this investigation.
I turned to the Alpha successors this time. "Do you have any reasons why you didn’t inform the Academy’s authority when you heard from Zade before springing to action?"
They were all silent, and for a while, an awkward silence enveloped the room, the atmosphere around them becoming tense. I could tell that they were trying to pass a silent message.
Aven broke the silence, "Why else do you think we would want to inform the Academy’s authority before we sprang into action. First, it could be a prank or a lie, and when it wasn’t a lie anymore, it was too late to let the authorities know, and like Zade said, a story about vampires in the kingdom is highly unbelievable."
"How is Aria doing?" I lowered my voice. I hated asking this question, but I needed to be sure she was not so bad.
"She is with us, so she is very fine, I bet you want to see her," Damon answered with a smirk. I’m sure he must have noticed my desperation.
"I’ll start the investigations based on your reports. Inform Aria and Becca that there would be a hearing, and they would need to present their case before the school council," I quickly masked my concerns under a firm tone.
"What happens to Tracy, who plotted, or Lucas and Wayne, who are the prime suspects, what happens to the conspirators?" Tristan asked, with a slightly disturbed countenance.
"They are suspects now, so we have to trace their movements. They would be put in a detention room for questioning. I hope that soothes you," I replied to him sarcastically, mirroring his earlier response when I asked about Aria.
"Since that’s all, I believe that we can go now," Aven said, making his way to the day, not waiting for my response.
There wasn’t any need for my response either.
When they left, I headed to the security room to preview the surveillance camera. I had to review incidents that had occurred in the Academy from the announcement of the election to the present date.
Staring at the scenes before me, I discovered that there had been multiple altercations between Aria and Tracy, some of which were very violent.
At some point, Aria beat up Tracy so severely that she passed out. That same day, Aria was seen walking into a hidden corner with a male wolf in a hoodie.
I tried to see if there were other incidents not centred on Aria. Then, I looked into Tracy’s movements and noticed a lot of suspicious and sneaky activity, especially after the election campaign was announced.
She was spotted entering her dorm one night, and another female student emerged with the same walking posture. On a closer inspection, she was the one. She walks to the gate, exchanges some currencies, and moves out.
I needed to expand this inspection to the street surveillance camera. I sorted out the code, and yes, she appeared on the street surveillance camera. She was walking down a lonely alley, almost close to the casino, but she took a left turn instead of getting into the casino.
Before she made the left turn, she signalled to a male figure standing at the entrance of the casino; he seemed to communicate with her in coded body gestures, and she appeared even more conscious of her surroundings.
The male figure walked with her to the left corner of the alley, away from the street’s camera’s eye.
And then she was spotted returning to the Academy’s premises.
She is a prime suspect, yes, but her dealings are also unclear. She looks like she was there for another illegal business, because the male figure in front of the camera didn’t seem like a vampire to me.
Shortly after, another she-wolf I’ve seen to identify as Larissa, Aria’s flatmate, walks into the casino, and she stays inside the casino for a while before she comes out.
What a surprise, so I have another suspect. What is actually going on, Tracy and now Larrissa? I really can’t tell who carried out this movement.
But Larissa doesn’t seem like an enemy to Aria; she is more of a friend than an enemy. Judging from footage from the surveillance camera, they haven’t had a major altercation compared to Tracy’s. It was only noticed that they stopped hanging out as often as they used to.
Maybe she could be there for some other reasons. A few hours later, just as Zade had said, Lucas and Wayne also entered the casino.
There are no surveillance cameras inside the casino. I would have loved to monitor what really happened there.
"I’ll plant one there by tomorrow," I thought out loud. "It should give me some clue to what must have gone down inside the casino."
I left the security surveillance room, wondering if it was okay to detain Larissa as well, which I felt was the right thing to do.