Greymoor Academy: I Accidentally Bonded With Four Lycan Royals!

Chapter 226: 226. Interrogations II

Maisie

I managed a cruel smile, even as tremors began to spread in my toes. Revisiting that night always gave me a repeat of the trauma. Very soon, I would begin to sweat and shiver. I had to round this up quickly before they noticed. ”In the back. Poetic, no?”

”And then you pushed him over with your foot on his back?”

”That’s what I just said. Need a hearing aid, Your Sweetness?”

Liar, my Lycan whispered, almost gleeful. Tell them the truth and then let me at them. I want to taste them. It’s been too long.

They’re not yours to taste anymore, I thought back.

Her response was an amused chortle. We’ll see.

Soren studied me for a moment, and without looking away, he pulled up the crime scene.

My stomach churned violently and I hid the jolt as they watched me closely, fishing for my reaction. I didn’t give it to them.

Conveniently, there was no dead rogue, or any signs that there had been another death by that cliff. Neither was there any evidence of my blood anywhere on that cliff.

If I ever wanted to get rid of a body, I would definitely use the Queen’s clean up team.

I kept up the farce of nonchalance as Soren continued, ”A piece of your dress was found clutched in his left hand. The front of your dress, specifically. Chest area. If you were behind him when you stabbed him, explain how he managed to grab the front of your dress.”

My stomach dropped. ”Does it matter–”

Soren cut in, ”And the coroner’s report is clear. Lyon Park landed on his back. If you had your foot on his back and shoved him, he should have fallen forward. Not onto his back.” He set down the stylus pen very gently and entwined his fingers. ”I will ask you one more time, Maisie Adams. What happened that night?”

I opened my mouth and closed it. ”I want a lawyer.”

Mercer laughed again and his fists clenched tightly like he was considering strangling me.

Jericho spoke for the first time, and it was nothing I expected.

”What happened to your neck?”

I stilled, sweat beginning to trickle down my back as memories from that night came back unbidden. I shoved up my hoodie to cover it and looked Jericho in the eye and said, utterly unfeeling, ”I was desperate to get rid of your marks on me. I did a test run with a knife first.”

He looked sick, which was good. It meant he bought the lie. Soren spoke in his stead as Jericho seemed at a loss for words, ”You wanted it gone so badly that you would tear it off your own skin and scar yourself?

I balled my nails into fists but kept my face neutral. ”Yes.”

”Was this before or after you threw Lyon Park off the cliff?”

I thought about it and I decided not to answer. Answering would give away the fact that the timelines were wrong. And if the bond had broken at some point after midnight on Samhain while I was running after apparently plotting an ambush, I wouldn’t have had the time to maul myself just for experimental purposes.

They may have thought me a sick bitch but even that didn’t make sense.

”How did you sever the bond?”

”I want a lawyer.”

”You don’t have one, and even if I were benevolent enough to get you one, you owe me way too much for me to expend any more of my resources on you,” Soren said chillingly.

My cheeks pinkened. I’d only taken from him one time during my run. And the amount was so little, I didn’t even think he would notice. And I stopped feeling bad when not even an hour later, I was tracked down to the bank where I had initiated the withdrawal, and I broke my ankle trying to flee from his guards. Or the Queen’s. It was a little hard to tell.

”You can’t be this sulky over a few hundred–”

Soren’s face twisted with rage and he smacked down a stack of papers in front of me so hard, I nearly jumped in my seat. ”A few hundred?” he hissed. ”Is that some code word for the millions you stole from each of us?”

It was an effort to keep my shock hidden as I stared at the papers. Sweat gathered under my hoodie, chaffing against my scars as I flipped through the pages and started to shake.

Oh goddess. I stopped counting at eight zeroes. To every page of my apparent transactions, there was a photo of me attached, making a withdrawal I never did. The intent of murder in my chest spiked up to an infinite value.

What in the actual fuck is this?

”It wasn’t you, then?” Soren asked.

There was something in his tone. It sounded awfully like hope.

And my heart broke because I had to crush it.

I pushed back the papers and shrugged. ”I obviously needed the money to fund my lifestyle. You did say I owned fifty percent of whatever you owned. I was only taking what belonged to me. What I was owed for putting up with all of your bullshit.”

Jericho’s hands slammed against the table, rattling it as he stood and braced against it. ”Why the fuck do you keep lying? Can’t you see we’re trying to help you?”

I felt my resolve shake again, but I knew that even if they thought I was safe here, the Queen surely had spies in a place like this. I might have stopped caring about my life, but I hadn’t stopped caring about theirs.

So, I trusted in the Queen and Tessa’s ability to ruin everything for me, and I said, ”Didn’t you get my letter?”

Silence fell. Jericho’s eyes flared with hurt and then closed off permanently. Mercer straightened, fists clenched. And I wondered how bad it had been. What had been written in my own words, for them to react this way.

Soren, however, refused to buy it. ”Am I truly to believe you spent all that time pretending? And all you wanted was the money? You weren’t framed and you were so disgusted and appalled by us, by what we had, that you considered killing yourself to get rid of the bond?”