Endings: Book One

Chapter Six: Shades Of His

We have to come face to face with the reality that pure love even if it is about engulfing the darkest and vile corners of our lives is not enough. Perhaps, impure love is the higher form as it includes even the shades that blend in naturally with reality. The ones we can't see.

-Adrian Legacy, a Compilation of Dark Thoughts.

The thing about being a journalist that most people don't know is that they treat information like a hunger. A craving unlike no other, something so essential to their survival that they couldn't just let it pass them by. At least, that's what Camilla always thought about when it came to what drove her further.

She always took pride in her own capabilities and exceptional wit. She could naturally sniff out a story miles away and a lead even if it was only a whisper trail. So as she took time to move around, she carefully examined the people around her.

The rich and famous.

They all had something to give away, a secret that they would cover up in dollars and in blood because they weren't as shiny and well polished as the world saw them. Instinctively, everyone had a vile reaction to wealth and an even unfamiliar side of them reveals itself when all they had is threatened to annihilation.
When what they now have becomes easily available to destruction and privity, they retaliate. And that's where the darkness settles in.

She didn't place herself as a religious person as much as her mother's upbringing would have wanted. But she did believe in the bad and the good inside people and from her experience, most of whom wore custom made suits and expensive jewelry and host fundraisers for homeless children and war refugees were never clearly distinguished from the catergories.

She found her seat later on, a table where the six seats were only entrusted to a singular soul engrossed in his phone. The man looked up at her as she pulled back her chair and he smiled at her as he went on rambling about how a meeting having to be rescheduled for the fifth time was not a cosmic agitational factor. Camila smiled back and took her seat. An attendant was quickly on her neck as she began settling in and hadn't even had time to look for the exit to the rest room.

"Good evening miss, what will you be having as you wait for the event to commence?"

She gave him a blank look, one of the many looks of hers that for someone who knew her would say she had not liked the interruption. "well, what do you have?"

"We have water, tea, wine and some other refreshments. Whatever would suit you" he spoke meticulously with a focused smile and a bright mood. The only thing that kept her from thinking about how his last sentence was very awkward and inappropriate even for her was the sight of him.

This must probably be his first big gig. She sighed and turned her attention away from him. "just get me some water".

The attendant left after a customary response about appetizers being served later on and left her in her much needed silence. She therefore took her time to scan the room once more. As she did, she let her mind remind itself her sole purpose for the evening, to review all that she knew about the Cadillans and to know what she didn't know.

The prestigious family of English origin had been traced down back to the arrival of Julian Cadillan in the states during the early 1900s with nothing more than a suitcase filled with regenerated steel samples and a genius-like mind at its helm. In less than ten years, he had built a steel manufacturing company that was among one of the few in the industry at the time. With rapid construction ventures taking their place in the technological advancement and development of the world, Cadillan Steel had a front row seat to it all. Making a fortune from providing steel and advanced welding technology to contractors for massive railway construction across the states and overseas, Julian Cadillan became one of the wealthiest men in the country.