Chapter 53 – Robert Delaney (Ansel Conrad POV)pt.1

"Did you get everything disabled?" I demand from Angela, as Kalenah, my mother, father and I search the go bags that everyone from my grandfather's home brought onto the bus. As far as we were traveling it only made sense that we stopped and let my grandfather travel in his own motorbus with those that had been living with him.

Snorting, Angela narrows her eyes at me.

Palms out, I retreat.

One by one, my cousins boarded the second bus with their meager belongings but at least I knew they would be safe. Once we arrived in Asheville, I'd give everyone an allowance of sorts to make up all that was left behind.

When they were settled, I called on one of the three boys that were following behind Liam in a smaller motorbus. Jamal.

Not quite at Angela's level, his expertise was coding, program creation, but he'd be handy and able to help Angela with what I had planned ahead for.

Once we board the bus, dad goes behind the wheel once again. Kalenah sets out to make everyone something to eat since most of the food from the house had Berty's brain matter on it.

On the table, Angela sets Jamal up with headphones and the system put in place as she "checked" Lewis' bus, putting hidden devices around the bus to keep a lookout on that bus. It was not that I did not have faith in Lewis, but at the same time, he was not one we expected to bring along, I needed to know before we arrived to North Carolina if he could be counted on.

Sure we forced him from his home, saving everyone there from an impending doom, but that does not mean he was automatically loyal.

I'd be a fool to assume such a thing.

With Jamal set up nicely, listening in, I waved Naomi forward, taking a seat at the front, in the passenger seat next to dad.

"Okay, can you please explain what just happened?" I asked exasperated with myself. It was as though Naomi had this information that she had gathered that was more than even I knew.

"Please, because right now, I'm literally going through the names of everyone I know trying to match them up to this 'Betray No Elder' thing you wrote," Angela added and sure enough, on a blank sheet of paper in front of her were names just written.

I had sent Michelle with Lewis, but wanting biased information on Berty, I kept Peter, her oldest son on the bus with us. He had remained silent after telling his mother that Berty was up to no good, but silently, begged to be given information.

One minute I had met his eyes in the house and the next, I came in and took this man he had not been able to trust out.

Peter had a good read on him. Whether it was because he was protective of his mother and siblings, I did not know yet.

"I don't understand," he mumbles and really, I wanted him to be on the same page as the rest of us. He wouldn't know all information easily, nor would I tell anyone where we were going, but at this point I wanted to know what Peter knew. Why had he watched Berty with this look of distrust? Could this be something we had to look out for?

"Actually," I stop Naomi, focusing on Peter, "What happened with Berty? Why the glares?"

My cousin, twenty years younger than myself, scoffed, "Where do I begin? He was just – we as werejaguars do not have chosen predestined mates, I mean not that I've ever been told," he says and I nod, wanting to follow his train of thought.

"Okay but I felt as though Berty came into the house like he was trying to get a job," Peter says nodding to himself, thoughtfully. He runs a hand over his face, lids closing over sky blue colored irises.

"A job interview?"

Peter nods, brown hair falling over on his forehead.

"Like instead of mom saying she likes this one band, he said it first. Then he talked about pies, and before mom can say her favorite is rhubarb, he says how it's his favorite and has this amazing recipe, but not everyone likes the tartness of Rhubarb and strawberry pies. I mean it was like he knew what she liked, and then he spun the conversation so that she found herself agreeing and shocked that they enjoyed the same things."

His anger and indignation coat the words he speaks. Biting my bottom lip, I try to imagine the situation as Peter described but with the hostility in his tone, a smile and chuckle are threatening to come out.

"I know it sounds like I just didn't like the guy Ansel," he jumps ahead, reading me and probably this whole room right. "But it was just... he was so over the top that I did not understand how mom could just eat this all up. To her it was like she found this person after dad, that she did not think she'd ever find." I nodded.

Peter paused, looking away. "And I swear, I understand that she cannot just be alone. But, he was just trying too hard and he was condescending towards me, and all I could see was this guy that would say anything, do anything, and he'd done his research. Like as though he studied mom and then when he was sure that he could con his way in, he approached her. Yet he did it in a roundabout way," I jabs a finger onto the table.

"He made suggests seems like her idea, dropping hints until finally, mom was – he was just – no," he shook his head from side to side, lips pursed. I keep quiet and shift my gaze over to Naomi.

"Does your mother have a gift?"

Angela flicks her gaze over to me, while Peter does as well, questioning me when Naomi speaks to him. With a slight nod, I let him know she is safe.

"Mom can freeze water, or well liquids," Peter says.

"Your sisters and brothers, do they too have gifts?"

"Yes, but they only use it on the farm, never at school where he would have been able to see."

Cocking my head to the right, I think of what Peter is saying, leaping onto a new idea.

"Does Cheryl ever leave the property?" I ask Peter, resting back. Naomi said that the people like Berty will do anything they are asked. She hadn't gone into details, yet.

Peter frowns, then gives me a look that screams, 'you should know' and 'of course she doesn't.'

Naomi glances between Peter and I, finally deciding to keep her eyes on me fully. Sighing, I shake my head, overwhelmed. "Cheryl was a mess when I found her. The reason I placed her with my grandparents was that I didn't think she'd do well in Bend, or somewhere more populated. I thought small town, on a farm, wide-open spaces, private land would help her-"

"Wait, you think he started teaching at the school, planned to get close to mom, so that he could get close to Cheryl?" Peter asked his voice raising an octave. I look from Peter to Naomi, in question.

She in turn, shifted her gaze to Peter, "Does Cheryl ever leave the property?"

Peter snaps his jaw closed, grinding his teeth, as his eyes harden.

"Cheryl is – she's afraid of her own shadow. She doesn't go further than the barn, and even then, she only goes with grandma. They get fresh eggs and milk in the mornings. Together."

"She plays outside with Lyanna," he says slowly, "but, never after like seven or eight at night. She doesn't leave the house when it's dark. She's up before anyone else in the house, making coffee, she'll bake if there are supplies."

"But she never leaves the property." I finished, knowing most of what he was saying. "And you know I set up the gates for Lewis," Angela says softer, "anyone tries to disarm it from the outside, they'll be warned and can make a run for it. The best way to get anyone on the property is by being invited-"

"So it was all some elaborate game or – or ruse?" Peter spits angrily.

It's one of those types of asked and answered, rhetorical questions that at the time, no one really needs to answer.

Sighing, Naomi nods though.

"Many years ago, I was helping a c – a friend," she glanced around stumbling, unsure of Peter I suppose. "She was on the run. You see when she went to university in Japan, at Sophia University, she met a man. An American man he was a teaching assistant and she was accepted earlier for her abilities in the sciences," she says slowly and I wonder how much of this story was being filed away because Peter was here.

If she did not trust him to an extent, she would have already said something, a larger part of my thinks, listening.

"At the time she was just starting a relationship with someone else, she explained and then he went missing. Then one terrible event after another occurred until, she found herself with only this American man. He had become everything to her, her biggest supporter, always pushing her to achieve the best."

"She was very goal orientated and he saw nothing wrong with that. She wanted a family but wanted to do well in her field, one where women were not thought highly of. He still pushed her further and further, and she explained to me that she felt as though she had won a lottery because everyone thought that her place was to be at home. Not him. When others around thought her as less and less because she was twenty six without children, he said they'd have time, that she was doing important work."

"She was offered a job in Iceland, they had moved for work three times already, and each time, he encouraged her," Naomi continued, her soft spoken manner laced with sadness, despite the actual words she was saying.

Taking in the room, I sneak a few glances at Peter, who has the most perplexed expression on his face, the more details that Naomi reveals. Especially when she gives this woman an age.

"They lived a wonderful life together, and then, when she was twenty-nine, she was going through documents at home and found something that did not fit with what this man had told her. She said that she did not immediately question him; she had just been offered this once in a lifetime opportunity. It was her dream job."

Naomi clears her throat, swallowing thickly.

"I met her after she accepted that job. There should have been many red flags," she says even softer, "she never had a chance."

I frown, when a few questions pop up, the most important was, she said that this woman was her Charge. That all Charges were Fae. This woman was Fae.

"She spent nearly five years working on a top secret biological weapon, and when she finally pieced the parts together. Questioning everything from the death of the man she had just met and was dating, to the death of her entire family that had been made to look like a random incident, the man she met when she was just seventeen years old, he was twenty-one at that time, he is the one that took her life."

I hear someone gasp, though I cannot look away from Naomi to see from whom it came.

"Your Elders, they have something in the works, and they plan to take down anyone in their way."

"My friend..." she pauses, closing her eyes, as though in pain. "That man, she was his job. Encouraging her along on a path that had he not been in her life she said she would not have taken. When I finally crossed her path, ready to help, she had the truth in piles. She had become suspicious, slowly looking into everything and when she learned enough, she ran. I met her and before I had time to even truly help her, this man murdered her," Naomi finishes, hanging her head in the silence that follows.

"That's dedication," Angela finally whispers, her tone awed.

Naomi lifts her head, gazing at my sister. "And those that prove complete dedication to your Elders, they are the ones gifted with a name that is an anagram for 'Betray No Elder.' Men like Berty, it could very well be your mother he was after. Or it might be this Cheryl woman," Naomi addresses Peter directly with a tone that only carried cool hardness. "They love who they are assigned to and they will kill, lie, cheat, harm a child if they have to, to get the job done."

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