Project ERASE

Chapter 3 : Surprise

Ares' POV

I ended the call with Laramie that was on speaker.

"She's asking about you again, Lucien." I commented as I stared into near uncanny golden eyes and realized that he was deep in thought.

"She was lying."

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion. "About everything?"

Lucien closed his arresting golden eyes and leaned back into his chair. "No."

I waited for him to explain what he meant, but he didn't and I wasn't surprised. In fact, it was my mistake to even expect that he was going to talk. He preferred to calculate every detail and plan everything alone in his own head. Lucien believes that explaining his thought process to anyone was a waste of breath and time since we wouldn't be able to understand anyways.

"How much longer are we going to keep her in the dark?" I stopped leaning against the wall near his desk and stood up straight.

He didn't answer.

An amusing idea formed in my mind. "I'm calling her back to explain everything."

His eyes shot open and he sent me a fierce look filled with irritation once he realized that I wasn't actually going to follow through with my threat.

I couldn't hold back my smirk as I put my phone back into the front pocket of my black slacks.

"She was never supposed to get involved." Lucien's expression was as impassive as always but there was a slight bitter undertone to his voice.

Understanding settled in me. If Laramie didn't get approached by this blackmailer, she would have forever lived away from all this darkness we were involved in. He and I, we both wanted to respect her wish to live as normal as possible. However, just like she was dragged into the nightmare of Project Erase, she may get pulled out of the simple life she built once again.

Over the years, I kept Lucien up-to-date regarding Laramie and how she was doing, but I knew those two knew each other in the facility long before I knew she existed. It was also Lucien that convinced me when we were younger that we should keep her safe since she was much smaller than most of us. When Laramie and I both started to see less of Lucien in the facility, she and I stuck together like glue when we could.

"You set up a seamless plan seven years ago, but you decided to put it into action earlier than expected. It took us all by surprise when the FBI busted the place." I started.

He stood up and turned his back to me to look outside the window.

I eyed him curiously as I continued. "If you waited until everything was ready like your original plan, we might've had less loose ends to clean up now and Laramie wouldn't be caught in the middle of this mess."

He remained silent, but I had a feeling that he was going to answer so I waited.

"She was going to be sold."

The blood in my veins froze as I understood what he meant.

"To who?" I asked, but got no answer. "I wouldn't of have let them."

Lucien turned around to face me with an exasperated look in his eyes. "You had no power to stop them."

As much as I believed that I could have protected Laramie until we were rescued according to plan, what he said was true. I would not have been able to stop them from selling Laramie to another syndicate because they didn't need her anymore.

"Just to what extent have you..." Protected her? I wanted to ask, but my question trailed off as I realized that he wasn't even listening to me anymore.