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Alize appears in the frame, then.
My chest constricts at the sight of her. Instantly, I know something's wrong. Her dress is ripped, and she's looking around like she thinks someone's chasing her. She's hobbling too, which is strange.
Her cheeks are glistening with tears, one of her hands held at an odd angle. But she's rooting in that ridiculous purse of hers. Then she gets out her phone, my heart feels like it's shattering into a million pieces. Is she thinking of calling me?
I check the timestamps.
All of this happened while Wesley was at the bar, while I was talking to Ottilie and Jeffrey. Alize was alone and hurt. I wasn't there to protect her and now she's gone. I swallow down all the guilt and self-hatred clogging my throat.
I need to focus on getting her back.
She lingers in the garden for only a minute before someone appears out of the shadows. His back is turned to the cameras, but even from behind I don't recognize him. He's too thin to be her father. Too short to be mine. And no Empire soldier would be dressed the way he is.
Could he be a guest at the hotel? Possible.
But nobody in their right mind would risk my ire like this.
Alize looks shocked to see the person. From her reaction, it's clear she knows them somehow. But from where? Did she meet them at Saint Frederic University? Who the fuck would follow her all the way to the UK to kidnap her?
I end up with more questions than answers.
The man and Alize trade words.
Fuck, I wish this camera had audio.
Then it escalates. The man lunges at Alize. They struggle for a bit, and I see her digging her hands in his face. Where's her fucking gun? They're tousling, but I don't even see her trying to reach for it. I made sure she had it before she left. Why isn't she using it on this motherfucker?
My heart stops when the man slams her into the planter and then starts choking her.
Alize grows more disoriented by the second. He scoops her into his arms, and she slips off her engagement ring. Then he disappears from the view of the cameras in the garden.
"Where does he go?" I snap at Stuart. "Show me where he goes."
He's tapping on the keyboard in front of him, and my head is on a swivel, trying to find where the two of them pop up. Stuart is scrubbing through the timelines with a knot in his brow. All the possible camera feeds come up blank.
It's almost as if he knew where the cameras were to avoid them.
"I've got something," Stuart says after a few minutes.
He's pointing to a screen in the corner of the wall of monitors. The feed looks like it's from a corner in the parking lot. At first, it looks like there's nothing to see. Until a hand appears from a car that's only halfway in the frame. The person tosses something out of the car, then backs out of the spot and peels out of the parking lot. Stuart replays that little clip a handful of times until I start to see what he's showing me.
The thing the person tosses is Alize's purse.
"Pull all that footage." We've got a partial view of the side of his face from his struggle with Alize, and half of his car's licence plate. That's a start. But I can't shake the feeling that there's more I need to see, so I say to Stuart. "Show me the terrace. Right before Alize went into the garden."
Stuart nods then starts pulling up the footage.
I've got my arms crossed, clenching my teeth.
My stomach grows even colder when my suspicions are proven correct. My father did speak to Alize. Whatever he told her had her backing away from him, surprised. I can only imagine the vile things he said to her. She clutches her stomach at one point, then he puts his hands on her. I lean forward, holding on to the edge of the desk in front of me so tight that the wood groans beneath my fingers.
It gets worse.
He slams her against the railing. The same railing where I found a bit of her blood. Then Alize draws her gun on him. So she did try to protect herself after all. But my father disarms her, slamming her fingers with the firearm so hard I'm sure she's bruised. Then he trains the gun on her until she runs away to the garden.
What the fuck?
Did he know that he was sending her into the clutches of whoever kidnapped her? What the hell did he say to her? Why was he even talking to her? Seeing the CCTV has only made things more complicated.
