Paris's POV

"Jackson, where on earth are you?" I barked into my phone as I waited for him on the porch, he and I were supposed to visit the prisoner's grounds to find out what on earth had happened to the man we had captured. There had been guards, the man had been in a compromised state. How the hell had he gotten away?


"I'll be there soon, sire. Just got carried away with work."

"got carried away. Got carried away, please be here as soon as possible, we need to get to the bottom of this." I said, and ended the call, without waiting for his reply.

My hangover had relatively reduced, but I was getting worked up, and the mental stress was simply not good for the rest of the headache that I had.


"If you weren't a werewolf, I would be worried if perhaps you had managed to make yourself hypertensive," Jackson said as a way of greeting when he arrived. I was seated on the porch and rose when he started up the stairs,

"Tell me you don't plan on going in."


He stopped in his tracks and shrugged, "I planned on hugging you. You seem worked up."

I looked at him through narrow eyes and he smiled like he had achieved a great goal,

"Let's just go," I said and started walking down the stairs.

~~~~~

"I didn't know we had an armory here," I said when we got to the prison grounds.

"It's new," Jackson said, looking around as though he was trying to get a measure of its functionality. He was literally the most meticulous and observant person I knew. It was why I felt safe leaving things in his hands. But this case was different. This time, I really needed to be here, to understand what had gone wrong.

"This was the building that held the attacker." Jackson pointed at an infirmary, "It's for the guards who work here, as well as the prisoners who fall ill."

"So we don't let the prisoners die?"

"No. We prefer to keep them alive so we can make them suffer again and again." Jackson said with what seemed to be some measure of glee, and I simply shook my head as he led the way into the infirmary.

"This is the room we put the man in. The one he escaped." I scanned the area and shook my head. The bed was neatly set in the ICU room. Every machine and tube to keep the man alive was as it was. So where the hell had the man gone? How the hell had the man escaped in the condition that he was in?

"So where is he?" I asked, truly concerned,

"That's what is beyond me. We've taken in all the men that were supposed to be with him for questioning. They all don't have a proper answer to give. The thing is, they aren't pretending. They really don't know because they were all found unconscious. " I looked at Jackson in surprise and he nodded slowly,

"God's truth." he said to my look of shock," and very hard to understand."

"We must have surveillance cameras, do we not?"

"ah, yes. We do. We certainly do. I don't know why it has not occurred to me until now. I only thought of giving you one piece of information at a time. Come then." he led me to the monitor room where the cameras were shown on every monitor, and we went to the monitor that displayed the cameras in this particular prisoner's room,

Jackson spoke to the tech man about what footage we were looking for, and while he played I watched until something wild and nonsensical took place before my very eyes. Because, one moment, the prisoner was there in his bed, being a prisoner, and the next moment, he wasn't, and it all happened without him moving or being moving.

"Wait, play that one again," Jackson said, voicing my thoughts, and the tech man did so,

"What is this?" I said, leaning toward the monitor, as though doing that, was going to make anything make Sense. Because it was obvious. It was more than obvious that someone had not just taken me prisoner. They had messed with my security cameras too. Which told me that whoever did any of this, knew what they were doing, and knew all of the right places to go to them. They had been able to bypass all of the necessary roadblocks, they had hurt the right people, or maybe even tipped them off, because my security guards, though they were unconscious, were incomplete. Or had the person killed them? I didn't know. So much about this situation was widely unclear. And so, for the first time in forever, I finally felt unsafe in my own home.

"Jackson?" I said,

"Yes, sir?"

"you do realize what this means?"

"I do, sire. It means our own people have turned against us."

~~~

While Jackson tried to get to the bottom of things, using his own means, I was determined to use mine. Since all of this seemed like it was done by someone who knew the inner workings of my home, I decided to begin with no one else but my mother. she more than anyone else detested Ember. I felt betrayed, rightly so. But I was not ready to let my emotions run ahead of me. I was going to be as diplomatic as I could.

"ah, look who's come out of the little hole he has been hiding in?" my mother said, looking up from the book she was reading. She took off her reading glasses at the sight of me and smiled, "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"to save your time, and mine, I'll be as quick as possible. Where is the prisoner?"

"Excuse me?" she asked, and genuinely looked blank. But I wasn't ready to be fooled,

" the prisoner, mother. The man who attacked Ember, the one I brought in for questioning. Where is he?"

"Well now, if that brat had gotten attacked recently, that's actual news to me, to tell you the truth. So, if you happen to be looking for her attacker who you imprisoned, and think I know his whereabouts, I'm sorry to inform you. But I have no idea."

"you have no idea?"

"to be very honest with you, I wish I knew where this man is, so I could break him for doing a terrible job." I sneered at my mother, but she just shrugged.

"Far be it from me to ever pretend as though I have any sentimental or maternal feelings toward that girl."

"This where you have it wrong Mother. It's not about sentiments. Or having maternal feelings. In the end, it's really just about being a human being."

"Well, as the good Lord would have it, I am a werewolf," she said with a satisfied smile, and I shook my head.

"you're simply irredeemable."

But she only shrugged, "I have only decided to not pretend as though I feel anything good. I'm not a bad person for that."

"Of course not." I said and paced the floors of her room, "so if you have no idea where the man is. If you had no idea that the man had tried to hurt Ember. Who had? Because whoever did, actually knew what to do. "

"And you choose to believe it's your own people? Have you stopped to consider the possibility that these could have been the work of the men who work in the prison or something?"

"Even then, what could be their incentive? Why would they do it? They've never done it."

"So that's why you believe it's me. Now that you know it isn't, who is next? Your sister?"

"my… Christina? " I slapped a hand over my face. Of course, Christina. Why didn't I think about that girl? Could it have been done from a place of vengeance? I simply had no idea.

"mother? Where is she? Where is Christina?"

"she looked at me through narrowed eyes, and shook her head at me, "You imprisoned her and she managed to run away, so all of a sudden she might be guilty? When was the last time you saw her?"

"It's not impossible for her to be guilty. She hates Ember almost as much as you do. So, she's not out of the list yet. So, if you can give me information about her whereabouts…"

"You have some nerve, boy. It is not enough that you have separated a mother from her child. You've even chosen to delude yourself that I would actually tell you where she was if I truly knew. "

"It's not a matter of if. You truly know. I had all her accounts blocked. But wherever she is. I can bet anything she still leaves comfortable. I'm sure you've made sure of that."

"Perhaps I have, as every other mother would. And whether or not I know where your sister is, that's my business. You'll just have to figure it out on your own."

"And if she hurts Ember the next time?" my mother shrugged,

"then it would be justice."