Zach could only let out a sigh as a result and didn't blame Clara for he knew how simple minded and pure she could be while fighting. She relied on her primal instincts to compete with the enemy with brute force that was way beyond the normal.
Before Zach could ask anything else, Violet came out of the cave covered in Luke's Jacket that was so large for her that it was akin to an overcoat that reached her knees.
Before Violet could say anything, Christina lunged towards her and grabbed her hand with worry in her eyes. She couldn't imagine what Violet might have been through during this time. The fact that her clothes were nowhere to be seen and she was covered in Luke's jacket made her feel terrified for her.
"What if she had been defiled by the beast of the son of Hunter family leader? What if they had been too late?", were the thoughts that occupied most of her brain. She wondered how to approach the subject in order to confirm her doubts but in the end, she only held on to her hands with a reassuring smile and tried to encourage her with the warmth of her hands.
After suffering from such an ordeal, Violet found Christina's concern for her extremely touching. She too held her hands tightly and tried to keep herself from tearing up.
Zach wasn't quite tactful like Christina and directly asked Luke about what happened with an inquisitive expression.
"Thankfully, we came in the nick of time and startled that beast. Otherwise, he would have succeeded in defiling her." replied Luke solemnly and with a trace of regret. He thought of the condition he had found Violet in and couldn't help but lament that they had wasted too much time lingering outside or they might have saved her from suffering so much humiliation.
While Christina was trying to comfort Violet, and Zach was prying information from Luke, Clara felt out of place as if she was in the wrong place. Her guilt for letting Nelson escape kept eating away at her from the inside as if punishing her for her incompetence.
She took a look at Christina and found her to be covered in bruises and cuts all over her body and assumed that she had fought against Jack along with Zach who was in a similar condition to her. It made her feel ashamed that even the newly joined Christina had managed to pull her weight while she had proved to be completely useless. She had let a powerless enemy escape from right in front of her eyes. She felt that she had dragged down the whole team down with her.
…
Violet was wearing Clara's black robe as she returned to the Windsor family mansion along with the people who had come to her rescue. She was feeling extremely disgusted after being touched all over by Nelson. Therefore, she didn't wait for anyone and launched towards her room in order to take a bath and to wash the filth that had stained her body.
The rest of the party stayed in her office which was apparently quite safe from prying eyes. There was hardly anyone who came to her office at this time of the night.
Violet took her time in the bath before she returned to her office in a more comfortable but luxury house wear.
The meeting began as soon as she arrived. There were several thoughts that were raging in Zach's mind and he needed to get them across to the others in order to take their opinion regarding his concerns.
The five of them sat around the coffee table on the comfortable couches. Those who were injured during the battle earlier couldn't help but let out comfortable moans in their embrace. All of them deserved some rest after the struggle on the hill but they didn't have the luxury to do that when all the spears were pointed towards Windsor family and a criminal their enemies controlled was still on the loose.
"Do you still remember what I told you before?" Zach asked Clara solemnly. After Violet had been abducted by Jack, Zach had come to realize that there was some insider feeding him information otherwise with Clara didn't look like a threat to anyone. Since someone had taken the effort to steer her away from home before Jack made a move, it was a surety that that there was a spy.
"You mean about that spy?" Clara answered with a question.
"What do you think?" Zach knew that Clara was not one of the brainy people and turned his questioning gaze towards Violet.
Violet was not thrilled about this conjecture as it meant that someone from her own family had betrayed her, people that she had done her best to protect and feed. But Zach's words seemed quite reasonable considering the meticulous planning and execution of the plans carried out by the enemy. Most importantly, the timing of everything was perfect enough to avoid suspicion.
"I am afraid that I have to agree with your thinking. There are some things I have been doubting since the very beginning of this whole affair. The sugar that poisoned the common folk couldn't have come out of our production because the whole thing is kept under maximum security. There is absolutely no way for someone from the outside to enter the facility and poison it at our production facility without us knowing about it. Therefore, the only possibility is that someone from the inside did it right underneath our nose. Knives that are the closest to us are often invisible after all."
With Violet's confirmation all those present had already accepted that there must be a spy amongst the Windsor family.
"Now that we have established that the spy exists. I believe that the spy must be quite close to you two or at least the head of the family. It is impossible for the low rank servants to pull off this kind of plan with their level of power and authority within the family. I believe this mainly because the perpetrator was familiar with the behavior of you two sisters from the get go and had even managed to poison the sugar in the production facilities. The only possibility is that they not only had the opportunity but also the necessary power and rank to pull off such an act. As such, we can begin going through the people that rank right below the core Windsor family and make our way to the bottom of the hierarchy. This way we can determine the person who has been acting the most strangely these days."
Zach's plan to find out the true culprit was a carefully thought-out plan that had the most probability of working out. No one in the group could find a problem with the plan that was not only meticulous but also quite systematic in its execution.
Using Zach's method there wouldn't be any loophole in their search for the spy. Therefore, everyone readily agreed to it.
Violet and Clara both burned their brain cells trying to find faults with the trusted aides who had worked alongside them and their father for the longest of time. Just imagining that there was someone amongst these people who had betrayed them for the Hunter family made their hearts ache. But they didn't dare to make light of this investigation because the survival of the Windsor family and the downfall of the Hunter family depended on whether they could identify the spy in their midst or not.
They began to discuss various trusted aides of their father first. His guards were the main focus as they were not only free enough to conduct espionage at the moment but were also present with their father at whatever production plant he visited. Therefore, it was entirely possible for them to slip in the toxic substance.
After brainstorming for some time, there were none that especially caught their attention. With no other choice but to go down the hierarchical chain of Windsor family, Violet and Clara began to brainstorm over their own personal guards and aides.
While the two girls continued to discuss amongst themselves, the other three participants of the meeting couldn't do anything else but spectate. They were neither very close to the Windsor family to know about their internal affairs nor were they able to follow the conversation taking place between the two girls especially Christina who was rather new in town compared to the others.
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