Chapter 42

"Argh" groaned Lucy in pain as she touched her forehead which was throbbing and she felt extremely groggy. She supported herself to sit upright and saw the whole living room filled with smoke and thought 'Am I not dead?. I remember Sean Shooting me with a smile on his face '. Lucy felt a liquid running down her forehead to her cheek and touched it. It was red in colour as she looks at her fingers.

'Is it blood?' Lucy asked herself as she tried to smell it as apart from being groggy and throbbing headache she did not fee any pain as if a hole had appeared in her forehead. ' What the fuck? is this liquid paint? as she smelled the scent of paint from the liquid.

' Didn't Sean betray me? Wait!! What is inside my robe ' thought Lucy as she felt a hardness inside the robe. Lucy felt inside the robe and found a spatial pouch which did not belong to her. Lucy coughed once again as she inhaled more smoke and thought ' I had better get the hell out of here before others come here after seeing the commotion ' as she slowly got up and used the backdoor to escape by using her Qi to protect herself. Since Lucy was in the Eastern part of the city, there were lots of alleys which were filled with homeless beggars and criminals. Lucy used these alleys to get away from the main routes where the city guards were patrolling.

Meanwhile Sean and the Mercs were in the Central part of the city and we're going towards Carmella's mansion. While the Mercs were walking in front Sean was walking at the back as he looked towards the Eastern part of the city and thought ' This is all I can do to help you. Whatever you do next would have nothing to do with me '. ' Fuck, here I thought that I would be able to sleep with Lucy. Couldn't Carmella have chosen a better time to get rid of her. Well it doesn't matter. Lucy will no longer be loyal to Carmella and this is a good thing. The bad thing is that she would no longer trust anyone, after all her childhood friend was the one who betrayed her '.

Currently Lucy hid in one of the dark alleys where there were bunch of boxes of trash piled up. She placed herself behind these trashes and planned to move after she gets herself healed after all she had a hole in her stomach which had also started to heal mysteriously. Lucy held the spatial pouch which did not belong to her and remembered the last seconds before which Sean had shot her on the head and thought 'This must belong to him ' as she opened the pouch to see it's contents.

The spatial pouch had a coin bag filled with gold coins, a small pouch filled with medicines that could help her heal and a weird box shaped object with a red button in the middle and a screen on top. There was also a letter which was placed next to this box. Lucy opened the letter and saw that it was written by Sean. Lucy read the contents of the letter and was shocked and did not dare to believe the information contained within it. Sean had said that it was Carmella who had asked him to kill Lucy and had also said that he had evidence and she could hear it by pressing the red button in the middle of the audio recorder which was in the shape of the box.

Lucy played the audio recorder and heard Carmella instructing Sean to ambush Lucy and going over the entire plan. Lucy only heard the first few words but could not hear anymore, not due to sound issues, but due to her brain shutting down due to despair and sorrow from being betrayed by her childhood friend whom she treated as her sister. Lucy broke down in tears while asking the same question over and over again "Why" as she collapsed from exhaustion and mental breakdown.

Meanwhile in the mansion where Carmella Rothschild was residing Sean and the four Mercs who battled against Lucy gave report on the success of the mission while Sean gave a video footage of him killing Lucy with a head shot. Carmella watched the footage till the end and smiled in satisfaction and said "Well it has been a long day. Why don't you guys take some rest. Sean you can go ask the butler to lead you to the guest room I have prepared for you. Go get some rest, you deserve it. You will need to get up early in the morning tomorrow as the Academy will be starting".

Sean and the Mercs nodded and went on their way out of Carmella's suite in the mansion. Sean went towards the butler and asked him to lead him to the room prepared by Carmella. The butler lead him towards the room which looked like a luxurious guest room which were present in the VIP suite with costly furnitures. Sean lied on the bed and switched off all the lights in the room once he closed the door.

Meanwhile in Carmella's suite from within one of the rooms where Carmella slept came a red haired woman with a curvy figure wearing a tight black robe which accentuated her curves. It was none other than Phoebe Lawrence as she spoke "Is Lucy dead? Was the mission success?"

"Yes it was a success. Lucy is dead. What about you? How is your mission going?" asked Carmella looking at Phoebe. Phoebe didn't say anything but just opened her robe to show that she did not wear any undergarments and was stark naked inside her robe. "Phew" whistled Carmella as she asked "Are you going to Rutherford's place" for which Phoebe nodded her head while saying "He just called me using his communication talisman. He sounded like he was upset and wants to spend some time with me".

"Well, you wouldn't need to continue this much longer since we have most of the intel on Rutherford's Mercenary as well as on his faction business, his properties, his spies, the trade routes of the merchants affiliated with his family. This was only possible thanks to you. We have already rooted out important spies, had sent our own spies into their ranks and even had made deals with their merchants in secret" said Carmella while looking at her friend.

"Well I don't mind, so long you keep your end of the deal" said Phoebe getting ready to go out of the mansion. "Don't worry, I will keep my end of the deal. You can even keep him as your pet after his faction falls. Don't forget that I had entered a contract with you. Oh and one more thing, start slipping this in his food or coffee. This is a slow poison which will slowly deteriorate his health once consumed over a period of time" as Carmella handed a box filled with pills to Phoebe who took it and placed it inside her pocket.

"I don't need him. If I want to I can have a better pet than him. There are many cute and handsome boys everywhere. Anyways I am going now, it's getting late" said Phoebe as she walked out of the room. However it seemed like they weren't the only person who heard this conversation as there was a bug planted underneath the coffee table which was placed between the sofa of the living room and Sean who heard every single conversation had a cold glint in his eyes while thinking 'Lucy and Carmella were not even on the same page. She thought that Phoebe was a betrayer while Phoebe seems to be working for Carmella by sleeping with Rutherford and stealing information underneath him. The question is why didn't Carmella tell that Phoebe was working for her and how did she hide the fact that she had sent spies to work under Rutherford and had long laid the foundation for destruction of Rutherford's Mercenary team as well as hitting their cash cows by stealing the Merchants affiliated with them. This will cause huge losses to Rutherford and his faction as he is only one of the front runners for the next position for head of Alexander family. Generally these big families do not like outsiders involving or causing harm to their family business or members unless Carmella has allied with another front runner of Alexander family. In this game probably most of the spies including the unfortunate Lucy and even Phoebe would be a disposable pawn. I don't know what gives Phoebe so much trust on Carmella after just watching her betray her childhood friend, but in this entire game, the one who is in true mortal danger would be Phoebe herself after all if they suspect her on being a spy she would not have a good end. Does she have something on Carmella which would force her to save Phoebe or is Phoebe confident in her own skill as a spy to escape under the radar. Looks like I need to have 24 hrs surveillance on both this as well as Rutherford's mansion after all I don't want to be surprised like Lucy '. Sean slowly drifted to sleep after not hearing anymore voice after all even if he misses it his system will record the entire audio automatically and store it. '