The night bright and lively at Duke Augustus's Manor, many people dressed in beautiful gowns and suits land up outside to enter the grand party. There was no special occasion for this gather just a rich man wanting to spend money.
However, not everyone in attendants came to drink booze and socialize. Two people stood away watching everything unfold both wearing their own dashing and beautiful outfits, the one leaning in against the brick wall was a caramel-skinned young woman who wore a face of disdain. Her short curly hair was put into a high ponytail with two curls framing her face, she wore a beautiful blue silk dress.
Her reddish-brown eyes looking annoyed at the taller dark-skinned man in front of her, his hair short and unruly as he desperately tried to fix it. His black tuxedo vest getting messed up as he messed with his hair, the girl finally had enough of waiting and marched up to her partner to help him.
"Ron, move your hands...let me help" she huffed batting his hands away from his head
She wouldn't do much in the short time they had so she moved some curls around till they looked neat, she stepped back to admire her work then quickly grabbed his hand. Heading to the entrance of the building which no longer had a long line.
"Gabby wait," he said pulling back forcing both of them to stop
"What? We have to hurry inside you wasted a lot of time fiddling with your hair" she grunted clearly annoyed
"I know I know, but I wanna go over everything real quick" he responded pulling out a black and white photo of a well dressed white woman who looked to be in her early 30s
"We go in a look for her when we find her we go somewhere private and talk about what the client told us which is...." Ron was about to finish his sentence
"Yeah yeah I know, tell her she is in danger and direct her to the meetup spot already know " she noted hearing the plan almost a dozen times now
"Good, now let's be quick we don't wanna get shut out"
With that he offered the girl his arm which she took, both getting into character as a rich couple attending the duke's party. They called up the grand stairs up to the two guards in front of the doors blocking entry, Ron greeted them with a smile.
"Good evening gentlemen, I hope you haven't run into any trouble" Ron greeted going into his breast pocket pulling out the invitation the client gave them the day before and handles it to the guard with his hand held out.
"Fortunately no sir not so far at least" the guard on the right responded as the guard on the left inspected the invitation to make sure it was authentic
"That's just grand now, isn't it Rosette" Ron looked down at the young maiden on his arm smiling gently at her
"Of course darling, splendid to see everything in order" she grinned the once annoyed look replaced with a small smile
"Here you are Sir everything looks in order," the guard on the left said giving back the card "Have a Good Evening" the two then stood back pulling the double doors open with them revealing a marble hallway with various paintings on the walls, at the end of the short hallway was another set of wooden doors this time open showing inside people dancing and mingle.
Ron and Gabby walked in hearing the door shut softly behind them as they entered, Gabby looked around the room in awe.
"I can never get over this, how can he afford all this stuff " she mumbled eyeing the naked bronze statue by the hallway to the left away from the ballroom
"Well, we're here now as soon as we get into the crowd we will split off to look" he whispered entering the ballroom, the light was dim as the people around them danced to the orchestra or talked on the sidelines.
"I can't even get a dance first" she pouted teasing her partner a little
Ron rolled his eyes and places a peck on her forehead, grinning he asked "does that makeup for it?"
Immediately, she felt her face get hot and she started getting flustered "fine, I'll look upstairs I think I saw someone match her description" she quickly let go of his arm and tried to look as natural as she could going up to the upstairs part of the ballroom, truth be told she lied to get away from him since she knew he always teased her when she got like this she wasn't expecting to see the lady they were looking for sprawled out on the hardwood dead.
"Fuck" she cursed quickly walking over to check her pulse
Something dawned on her, it was strange that no one else was up here with her. She looked around to see no one but herself and the deceased, she hurried and stood up. Whatever was going on was bad she just hoped it wasn't what she thought it was, she hurried over to the railing that faces over the dance floor hoping to spot Ron's face in the crowd of dancing people, luckily she did he was talking to another man not facing her.
She quickly made a mental note of where he was in the crowd and quickly made her way downstairs and towards him, she pushed through the crowd till she got to him. Pulling on his shirt he turned to her with a confused expression that quickly turned to one of concern and seriousness as he saw Gabby's serious and worried gave.
" We have a problem" she stated pulling him back from where she came
"What happened?" He asked as he followed behind her
"She's dead"
"What! How did that happen!" He almost exclaimed but made sure to keep his voice down as they both flew up the stairs
Ron froze as he made eye contact with the corps "damn, was she like this when you got here?" He asked walking closer to the body to check the corps
" yes and don't bother I already checked her pulse" she responded making the male stop in his tracks
"Damn" he cursed again putting his hand through his hair in frustration meaning it up
"So what's the plan, we didn't include that she might die before we were able to warn her," Gabby asked looking anywhere but the corps
"First, we can't be seen near it or-"
"You under arrest!"
Ron and Gabby quickly looks toward where the voice came from and was met with a middle-aged man whose handle was on the hilt of the sword at his waist ready to draw it at any time, the older man was blocking the staircase down. Gabby moved closer to Ron away from the staircase, she mentally cursed it turned out this was a setup. She should have told Ron what she was thinking and just left now they're in a predicament.
"Calm down, Soldier" Ron lifted his arm up in surrender the other one was holding Gabby close to him "we can explain everything it's not what it looks like"
"We can beg to differ," another new voice said from their right towards the balcony the two didn't notice was there.
A white hair male stood sword drawn looking at the two with cocky black eyes "the evidence we have on you two love birds is enough to put you in chains for a long time" he explained smirking, clearly, he thought this case was over. They were surrounded by both exits blocked by the men with swords, Ron looked between the two soldiers. His mind quickly thinking of a plan, he looked down at Gabby who looked panicked and helpless he quickly made up his mind.
You didn't need to be a genius to realize this was a setup and everyone knew the only option here was to fight or go peacefully but Ron would be damned if he went down for something he didn't do, he let go of Gabby's waist and held on tightly to her hand.
"Sorry fellas but me and my darling didn't do the crimes you see here and it seems we were set up" Ron started his dark brown eyes moving between the two soldiers who were prepared for combat "but it looks like you won't believe us so.."
Ron didn't finish what he said cause he bolted towards the balcony, in the direction of the white-haired soldier pulling along Gabby as he ran. The white-haired man was quick to respond thinking he was about to be attacked he swung his sword towards Ron slicing him on the arm, despite the wound Ron gritted his teeth and pulled Gabby to his chest, and jumped out of the balcony.
Ron hit the ground knocking all the breath out of him, his head hit the grass below making him extremely dizzy but he didn't have time to recover as he was hurriedly pulled up and moved in a direction. He knew who was pulling him so he didn't bother fighting Gabby leading him away from the mansion.
"Run Ron Run!" She growled at the man she dragged along, she knew he was hurt by that damn white-haired guy and the two-story fall but they couldn't afford to get caught, she wasn't familiar with the area so she had no idea where to go to lose the men following them.
the white-haired soldier appeared to catch up with them and pointed his sword at her, she quickly stopped so she wouldn't impale herself.
"Stop right there! Surrender and no more harm will befall you" he commanded his eyes narrowed on the two
"Hey! Leave them alone" another voice called
Gabby couldn't help getting annoyed what's with all these new people, ever one's attentions were brought towards the black hair male sprinting towards them, Gabby's attention doesn't stay on the boy long cause she took his distraction to run past the man. Ron came back to his senses and took the lead on the escape, he turned a corner sharply.
"Aiden will take care of that white-haired guy" Ron reassured as they ran
"Aiden? Who's Aiden?" Gabby asked confused but tried to focus on the problem ahead
"He's the new addition to our group, he's the guy I was talking to at the party" he answered
"So while I was staring at a dead girl you were just chatting!" She exclaimed pissed
"We'll talk about it later, Aiden said he'll meet us in the slums in a house by the lake we can hide out there till everything dies down" Ron explains ignoring her tone "we were supposed to meet him there after our mission but you know things got out of hand"
She was about to give a smartass reply when she noticed him bleeding "Ron! The damned fool hit you didn't he!" She asked worry in her voice
"Don't worry about it" he dismissed "I'm chalked full of adrenaline right now so I don't feel a thing, I'll treat it when we're safe"
All gabby could say was okay as she continued to follow him to their temporary safe house.