Ian:
Once we entered the mansion, we saw all the preparations. They must have done everything in the last few hours after we inford them. I gave Haiden a dry look as he stood there, staring at everything. I felt his pain.
His energy had shifted into sothing heavy, likely because all these preparations and all the power Patrick held were supposed to belong to Haiden.
"Co on, have a seat," Patrick continued, pointing toward the living room.
They had decorated it with unnecessary things. All the flashy decorations were too much. I preferred a minimal setting, sothing darker, but this man clearly had no understanding of that. So might call it aesthetic, but to , it looked pathetic.
I sat on a separate sofa, spreading my arms with my elbows resting on the armrests. One leg crossed over the other as I shook it, forming a visible gap between my thighs and knee. One finger rested on my temple while the other sat under my chin as I observed everything.
"I am so glad you ca back. I thought you had left," Fauna whispered to Haiden.
That caught my attention, but it was Haiden’s response of lifting his nose in disgust that kept my eyes on them.
"Fucking stay away from ," Haiden grunted at Fauna in a whisper, stepping away to sit on the sa couch as Troy.
There was genuine sadness on Fauna’s face whenever Haiden treated her badly. However, I could not feel bad for her because she was forcing herself on him. If he told her he did not like her, I thought she needed to let go.
"So what brings you here?" Patrick questioned. "I know I’m not that special for the headmaster to bring in his best crusaders. One is missing to visit ."
He paused just to add that last phrase, likely ntioning Clentine since she was not with us.
"I ca here to ask you about Nook," my father replied.
As soon as my father said that, I watched Patrick straighten his back in his seat.
"The man who goes from one pack to another selling goods," Patrick remarked. "always busy with his big business. What are you trying to sell? Is it academy equipnt? Is the academy really shutting down and going bankrupt?"
Patrick kept asking questions, sliding in information he knew about Nook, though not too intimately, only through business. I caught all of it.
As for his wife, she was glued to her phone, as if her real life existed behind the screen.
Then there was Mariana. She sat on the couch with her father, paying close attention to every detail.
Fauna, on the other hand, drifted like a butterfly. I noticed her slip into her thoughts before looking back at everyone. Her eyes lingered on Haiden, filled with desires she did not need to speak, as they showed clearly on their own.
"No, I just want to know if you know where we might find him now and where he typically resides when he is not moving from pack to pack," my father continued to question while my fingers clutched the couch’s armrest.
I was deeply disturbed. My mind kept going back to Clentine and how disappointed she must be in . She must have thought her mate would find her, and here I was. I could not even find a single fucking man.
"Oh, I’m not really sure," Patrick replied, "but I can get you the information if you want."
As Patrick gave us a positive response, I watched Troy and Haiden share a happy, excited glance before they looked at . I gave them a nod, letting them know I was listening to everything.
"Great," my father remarked. "When can we get it?"
"Right now, the man who keeps the digital data is away on a family vacation," Patrick explained, "but he will return in two days. I hope that is okay."
The mont he said that, I began to shake my head. I unwrapped my leg from the other and straightened my posture before placing my arms over my thighs, hunching forward.
"Can’t you contact him and ask him to do it now?" I asked anxiously, noticing my father give a hand gesture to stop looking so panicked.
But two days was a lot of ti. We needed to find Clentine. Every second counted. It had already been days since she went missing. I was losing my fucking mind.
"I understand that you have co here for sothing urgent," Patrick explained, "otherwise you all would not be here. But the thing is, these are sacred matters, and we keep that data in a secured place. He has to physically co here to retrieve it. It will only be two days."
He continued, "He was supposed to co today, but the weather is so bad that he probably has to wait. Do not worry. I will get you a good result. Until then, you can stay here."
Patrick added, "I will prepare a big dinner for you. It will be like celebrating the academy as it once stood, as a prestigious building and organization that killed monsters and protected the mainland from invasion."
Patrick welcod us, and at this point, we could not force the information out of him. He was not refusing to give it to us, he just wanted us to wait, while I began to lose my mind.
"Um, by the way, should I show them their rooms?" Fauna asked, clapping her hands happily, clearly too excited to have visitors.
Haiden rolled his eyes the mont he heard her voice, and I watched Fauna’s excitent fade a little.
"Yeah, sure," Patrick replied. "Mariana, Fauna, go ahead. Children, show them their rooms."
Patrick announced this while watching the three of us get up. I knew my father would stay behind to speak with Patrick about casual matters, just to make it seem like we had not co here in an ergency looking for Clentine.
At this point, we had to hide our intentions. If Patrick knew too much about Nook, he would most definitely know that his mansion had been attacked and that he was connected in so way to the leaders, or possibly involved in buying soone and might as well tell the leaders we are here for it.
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