Jealousy | A Rosewood Chronicles FanFiction

Part 9 - Aric and Leviathan

Kate was reading her book when Jamie stormed back in, obviously agitated at something. "You're back." she said, as Jamie pulled a chair up aggressively near her bed and slouched into it. "What's up?"

"You need to fire Aric." he said bluntly, crossing his arms as if there was no more discussion left to be had.

"Well I can hardly fire him, Jamie. It's not up to me. Besides, why would I?"

"He gave you that chocolate bar." Jamie replied.

"How could he have known it was poisoned?" She responded incredulously.

Jamie scoffed, not say anything at first and staring off into the distance. "He knew." He looked her in the eyes for the first time during his visit. "There's something we need to tell you. About the chocolate and the poisoning incidents."

"What?"

"Well first, Binah knows." he said, his body language showing his obvious exasperation as he put his fist under his chin as if he was thinking about something.

"Knows what exactly?"

"Everything. Lottie, Ellie, Saskia. I don't know how. But she does. And second, she helped us work out what the poison is." he sighed. "It's the Hamelin formula. And Leviathan are the ones using it."

"Leviathan?! Are they after Ellie?" 

"We don't know what they're doing."

Kate bit her lip, worried fro Ellie's sake but mostly at their lack of knowledge of Leviathan's intentions. Who knew what would happen now?

"Jamie, Horace wasn't the only one who's been poisoned."

"What d'you mean?"

"I've heard stuff, while I've been in here. Apparently since Horace there's been one poisoning case every week since Horace."

"Every week? Never more or less..." he said, gazing off into the distance like he'd worked something out, but he didn't say anything. Quickly, he snapped back to reality. "Anyway, please talk to your parents about Aric."

Aric. Kate suddenly realised why Jamie was weary of him. Could he be the one planting the chocolate bars at Rosewood?

"Kate." Jamie said, and she realised he'd asked a question and she hadn't even heard it. 

"Sorry, what?" her reservations about Aric were too much to handle at the moment; she knew Raphael had them too but she thought he was just jealous. Maybe there was more to it.

"I said are you okay?" 

"Yeah, i'm fine, Jamie. Just thinking. If Aric really was working for Leviathan, which I don't think he is," she quickly added, noticing him raise an eyebrow, "my parents never would have hired him. They check everything. They'd know if he was involved with them."

"Anastacia's parents didn't with Saskia."

"That's different. She must have joined them whilst being Ani's Partizan."

"Yeah. Well, all I know is Partizans have three years to settle in with their masters, and if they don't fit they don't have to stay." He got up, dragging his chair back to the side of the room, sending out a piercing scraping noise to add to the already tense atmosphere. "And i'm pretty sure Aric's not a good fit." he stated, before briskly leaving the room.

______________________

A couple of days after, Kate left the infirmary and her and Ellie were hanging out in her and Lottie's room whilst Lottie was training with Jamie.

"Are you sure you're okay now?" Ellie asked again, and Kate sighed.

"Ellie, I'm fine. Just like the last 100 times you asked me." she replied, rolling her eyes. "Has Jamie spoken to you recently?"

Ellie scoffed. "Not since he practically rugby tackled Aric the other day."

"He did WHAT?" 

"Oh yeah, guess he wouldn't tell you that, especially after Aric did it back to him." she said, laughing to herself as she replayed the memory.

"When was this?"

"Whilst you were in the infirmary. They were arguing about the chocolate." she said simply, as if she hadn't given it a second thought whether Aric was innocent...or guilty. 

Kate hadn't spoken to him since that day. It was strange, but she felt almost scared to talk to him since her conversation with Jamie about Leviathan. Suddenly her phone began to ring, and Ellie grabbed it since it was nearest to her, checking the caller ID before clicking answer. "Speak of the devil." she said with a smile.

"No, Ellie don't..." Kate started, but Ellie had already put the phone to her ear.

"Kate's phone." she said, still smirking as Kate rolled her eyes. "Oh Aric, what a surprise. "Err, no Kate's not with me. I just have her phone because..." she hesitated. "...because she's out."

Ellie paused as she listened to his response. "Why doesn't she have her phone? Um, well because she's out with...Raphael-"

Kate rolled her eyes. 

"-and Raphael really hates interruptions whilst hanging out so she asked me to keep hold of her phone." she said, seemingly satisfied with her answer, until her face dropped. "You can see Raphael? Talking to Lottie and Jamie? Well i'm sure Kate's somewhere around there...nearby." She trailed off. "Anyway Aric I've gotta go." she said, practically throwing the phone across the room.

"Ellie?! What the hell was that?" Kate said, mad at Ellie for making it seem like she was avoiding Aric...even if she was.

"What? You didn't want to speak to him did you?" she defended herself.

"No, but that was the worst excuse anyone could ever come up with! Now give me my phone back." she said, snatching it.

"Sorry for saving you. Especially if he is from Leviathan." she replied.

"He's not. Why am I the only one who trusts him?" 

"Cos you fancy him?" Ellie replied, packing up some of her stuff into a satchel that she swung over her head.

"I don't." Kate stated, but she could tell Ellie heard her voice waver, and decided to change the subject."Where are you off to?" 

"I'm going down to find Lottie, coming?" she asked, and begrudgingly Kate followed her out the room down the steps to the reception of Ivy House. 

"What do I tell Aric now?" She asked, cautious that they might bump into each other after leaving the safe haven of Ellie's room. 

"Relax Kate." she said as they stepped out the building, but they both stopped in their tracks when they heard a noise echoing from the Ivy Wood: a faint sound of a girl sobbing, but it was so distant that Kate couldn't be sure who it was, or even if it was crying she could hear. But the sound must have reached Ellie's ears, as she turned around. "Can you hear that?"