METAMORPHOSIS • DEREK HALE [COMPLETED]

Chapter Twenty-Five

"I'm sorry, Gerard Argent is no longer a resident at this facility."

With the words hanging in the air, Alex froze in shock. Her mind raced with all of the possibilities of the elusive man's whereabouts, but the main source of her astoundment originated from the lack of foreknown knowledge about the man. 

She essentially knew nothing of the infamous Argent, only the fact that he put a bounty out for her head and had every intent of following suit.   

A part of her knew she should have expected him to not be here. Assuming the man wouldn't want to be found, he must have known this would be the first place the Chase family would look for him once they learned he was their own personal benefactor. But the other part of her expected to gain answers from the trip. If only it could be that easy. 

A brief pause distilled in the air as Alex's thoughts caught up to her speech, but she could only produce an exclaimed response, "I'm sorry, what?"

Mistaking her surprised tone, the women immediately shifted, "No dear, I'm sorry to have confused you. Mr. Argent hasn't passed, but he moved out a couple months ago. Are you all family?"

"Yes," Matthew spoke up quickly, "He's my uncle and her great-grandfather. We haven't been in touch for a while, but we were in town and wanted to see him." 

Blessed to have him initiate a promising backstory, Alex and Derek glanced over at him, impressed. With the older man returning hinting stares, the duo casually agreed to follow his lead. 

Instead of adding verbal fuel to the lie, Alex only feigned an endearing nod. Knowing she was a bad liar of all sorts, she didn't want to blow their cover.

"He didn't leave much behind when he left, but let me check if he has a forwarding address." Her fingers danced across the keyboard once more but as Alex turned to Derek, she watched a confused frown ripple across his face.

"Does it say if he moved in with anyone after? It's just, I knew he had terminal cancer before."

With the database finally loading and pulling of Gerard's file from behind the desk, the woman scanned the page before voicing, "It says he has a history of cancer, but when he arrived, it was undetectable. Only, when he moved in and during his stay, he had a abnormal and constant flow of black blood from his nose and ears. Aside from the black color, I'd say the strangest part was the fact that it didn't affect him physically. But, I'm sorry, it doesn't specify of him leaving with anyone and no forwarding address."

With the secretary dressed in lilac scrubs glancing her eyes up to the trio of three confused adults, Matthew's concentration drifted off into his own state of bewilderment as Alex caught Derek's green eyes, embarking on their own speechless conversation of questions.

Noticing profound stillness overtaking the three supernatural members, the woman asked, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

"No," Alex voiced, "Thank you so much for helping us."

"Do you know of any other family member who might know where he lives?"

"Yeah, we've kept in touch with my uncle," she lied, knowing that they couldn't gain much more from here. Plus, she didn't want to feed in further to the false story, fearing that it would send them further back from where they started. Which still sat at nowhere. 

Upon the exchange of goodbyes, Derek, Alex, and Matthew left the retirement home, planning on meeting at the local diner for more brainstorming. As they walked away, she sent a text to Chris, with hopes that he might have a little more insight, but in that moment, Alex returned to the car, feeling utterly desolate.