Page 84 of Dark Sold Mate

“I can’t,” she whispered. “I don’t know how to make it work. It works, I know it has to, but I cannot control it. It’s impossible to make it show me what I need to see.”

He felt his heart sink, but he maintained a neutral expression. “It’s okay. We’ll find another way.”

“There is no other way. Javi will insist on torture, and I can do nothing about it, and it is all my fault as I cannot regulate my own fucking magic!”

“Hey.” Silas crouched by her side and cradled her face in his hands. “This is not your fault. Your magic is still new. You’re still learning. Nobody wants you to know everything.”

“But I should.” Her eyes glistened with tears. “Why have magic, when I cannot call upon it when I really need it?”

“I don’t know who hired me,” Carter spoke quietly, sniffling. “I really don’t.”

Elle and Silas looked over at him.

“A guy in a bar approached me,” Carter went on, the words falling out in a torrent. “He didn’t give me his name. Just told me he would give me five thousand dollars to place some documents on the ground of the Weston pack. He instructed me to make it appear natural. That’s all I know. I swear.”

“What did he look like?” Silas asked.

“Average height. Brown hair. Nothing distinctive. He wore a baseball cap and sunglasses, so I couldn’t see much. Look,” he sat up. “I’m sorry. I was not aware of what the documents were about. I believed that it was only some silly joke between the packs. I needed the money. My mom is ill, and we cannot afford her medicine, and I just—I am sorry.”

Silas growled in frustration. They’d caught someone, but it was a dead end. Whoever was orchestrating this was smart enough to use intermediaries to keep themselves hidden behind layers of separation.

“What do we do with him?” Elle asked quietly.

“We detain him until we can figure out if he’s lying out of his ass or not. If his story turns out to be true, we shall send him off with a warning.” He stood up and assisted Elle. “He’s not our enemy. He is just a child who has done wrong due to some explainable reasons.”

Elle looked relieved. “Thank you.”

They left Carter in the cell and had guards stationed outside. Then they returned to Silas’s office. But Elle looked worried.

Silas gave her some space and did not intrude because she may need time to digest her inability to use her magic in the way she desired. However, after an hour of Elle sitting silently on the sofa, her eyes staring at nothing, enough was enough.

“Talk to me,” Silas took a seat next to her. “What is happening in that pretty head of yours?”

“Nothing.”

“Elle.”

She breathed out and looked straight at him. “I failed. I said that I could use my magic to get answers, and I could not. I’m useless.”

“You’re not useless. These things take time.”

“I have no time. Women are being sold, and I struggle to understand how my powers operate. I’m unable to fulfill the promises I made to this pack. I am not supposed to be a burden, and yet, I am one more burden you need to cope with.”

Silas grabbed her chin and forced her to look him in the eye. “You are not a problem. You have provided us, in the last few weeks, with more intelligence than we have gained in months of research. Those visions of yours guided us to that auction site. With your knowledge, we have come to know the structure of the operation. You are helping, Elle. The fact that you are unable to do everything does not imply that you are not doing anything.”

Elle’s eyes filled with tears. “But I want to do more. I need to do more.”

“I know. But you cannot pressure yourself like that. It’s not fair.” He pulled her into a hug. “You’re trying all you can. That’s all anyone can ask.”

Elle sighed and rested her chin on his shoulder. Then she whispered, “There’s something else.”

“What?”

“I’ve had this ringing in my head since we got Carter earlier this morning, when the alarm had gone off. It won’t stop.”

Silas drew back to look at her, his wolf becoming alert. “A ringing? Like a headache?”

“Not exactly. It’s more like... a frequency. There is a noise that is always just there, and it makes it hard for me to think.” Elle rubbed her temples. I thought it would pass, but hours have passed, and it is still there.