23 PAY THE DEBT

"KILL LUIS FLETCHER."

My eyes widen from complete shock. I push Tobias away and drop the knife that he handed to me. He laughs at my action, but he doesn't say anything. I take a step back and get myself ready to leave the room because of how ridiculous the favor was, but then I remembered Luis's words from our conversation earlier.

"Never hesitate." He told me. Does this mean that he knew? He knew Tobias was going to ask me to kill him? But how? How on earth does he even know about something like this?

"W-why? Why would you want me to kill him?" I ask Tobias, but as I'm waiting for his response, my eyes widen from the sudden realization.

"It's not you," I tell him, and Tobias smirks upon hearing my assumption. He knew that I was able to figure it out without him revealing anything.

"You do favors," I continue, "Someone asked you to do it."

Tobias takes the knife that I dropped and starts scanning it, ignoring everything that I just told him.

"How could you drop something so expensive?" He asks with a pout before handing it back to me.

"This is what I want you to use when you pay your debt to me. Once you finish this favor with no complication, you have completely accomplished your training. You'll officially become a saint. Just like me." He suddenly reveals, surprising me even more.

"What do you mean?" I ask, but I know that Tobias isn't going to answer me anymore.

"Remember, a saint knows whom to trust. I gave you your favor. Now good luck acting it out." He continues. And just in time, the bell rings. Like a trained animal, Tobias's expression immediately changes back to the expression that everyone is used to. He gives me a gentle smile, and then he holds my shoulder like I was being blessed by an angel.

"I'm not very nice mister Carter, so if you ever disappoint me-" He was still smiling at me when he leans close to my ears and whispers, "The blood on that knife will be yours."

Tobias then pulls away from me. He's still smiling like he didn't just threaten to kill me a couple of seconds ago.

"It was nice chatting with you sir Hans. I'll see you at the hall." He says before finally leaving the room.

The moment he's gone, I sigh heavily and sit back down. My head feels like it's going to explode. Everything that I learned from Tobias just confused me more than it helped me. And now he wants me to kill Luis too? Or rather, someone wants to kill Luis, and Tobias wants me to do it for him.

If someone asked Tobias to kill him then why did he pass it down to me? Why did he want me to do it instead of him doing it himself? Is this the part where I have to decide? Should I trust Tobias and kill Luis? Or should I trust Luis and kill the person who asked for this absurd favor?

"Ah shit. I'm going to lose my mind!" I shout, causing the guard outside to open the door, startling me.

"Sir Hans Richard. You are needed in the hall." He tells me. I immediately hide the knife behind my back and answer him, "Y-Yes, of course."

The guard doesn't say anything anymore and leaves right after. I take a deep breath and grab the table napkin on the table before wrapping it around the knife. As the blade is now covered, I tuck it in my waistband and fixe my coat. I obviously can't hold a knife in the open, so hiding it like this will be enough for now. But if people find out about it, I'll just flat out say that Tobias Delton gave it to me. It's his fault for giving me a weapon in such a secure place like this.

"A saint knows whom to trust," I mumble to myself as I look at the mirror near the door.

I stare at myself with a blank expression. I'm still wearing the mask that hides my identity, but beneath it, I'm still Vincent Carter. I'm still a man who, like how Tobias explained himself, perfectly acts his role out.

Was the reason why Cyrus wanted me to learn the saint ways first is because he knows about me pretending to be a bodyguard to hide the fact that I'm actually an undercover agent?

"Does that mean he trusts me?" I ask my own reflection.

Hearing the words come out of my own mouth made me laugh.

Trust?

The longer I stay here, the more I realize that trust...is a word that definitely does not exist in this godforsaken family.

...

I enter the hall with my fake confidence. I have the money, so I shouldn't be nervous. But then again I also have Tobias's knife tucked under the waistband of my pants.

The hall is packed. Everyone looks my way when I enter, automatically making me feel uncomfortable because these could be the exact same people that saw me fucking Cyrus yesterday.

Their gazes could have bothered me more, but the uncomfortable feeling eventually vanishes. All that occupied my head was kill Luis Fletcher. I'm afraid that if I suddenly see Luis, I'd just pull out the knife and slice his neck out of impulse.

I really have to relax.

"Mr. Hans Richards! You're here!" Someone suddenly calls out. I turn to my right and was surprised to see Adam Delton's sister, Camilla, walking towards me with a wide smile. She hosted the slut punishment yesterday so I presume that's the reason why she's still here.

"Please follow me so we could settle your payment from yesterday's bidding." She says, and I nod my head and silently follow behind her.

"You must have enjoyed your night with master Cyrus Delton. That was a chance that even billionaires would die to have." She tells me like Cyrus isn't her nephew.

"Well I guess from what you saw on the live video yesterday, I did, in fact, enjoy my night with him." I sarcastically tell her with my fake British accent that I hope I wasn't butchering.

Camilla laughs when he heard what I said. I think she's going to comment about my very obvious fake accent, but then she says something else instead, "As much as we wanted to, the live broadcast was cut short. We were not able to see it, which displeased a lot of the guests."

I almost stop walking when I heard what the woman just said.

"What do you mean?" I ask, but Camilla doesn't answer me anymore as she stops in front of a large door.

"It doesn't matter anymore. You got what you bid for, and that's the most important part, isn't that right...mister Hans Richards?" She asks as she slides her hand on my arm like she's some kind of snake. It reminded me so much of Chance that I couldn't help but take a step away from her.

Camilla chuckles and opens the door for me, "We hope to do business with you again."

I look at her for a second before entering the room.

Camilla doesn't follow inside. The room is actually an office, and to my surprise, Catalina was standing right in front of me with her arms crossed.

"M-Madam Catalina!" I say from shock.

Catalina looks at me seriously and answers, "You're doing a pretty horrible job for someone who's pretending to be a fake British heir."

I gulp and remove my mask to face her. I guess there's no point hiding anymore.

"I have the payment," I say as I take out the credit card.

Catalina doesn't say anything and snatches the card from my hand. She sits in front of the desk and scans the card. I watch her type something down on the computer. Just looking at her makes me realize how fitting the boss role is to her. But as I stare at her in silence, I'm suddenly reminded of Cyrus's punishment. For the next 48 hours, Cyrus is personally going to kill their mother who Catalina loves dearly.

"I offer you my sincerest condolences," I say without thinking.

I immediately regret it because Catalina stops typing and looks at me with a deadly glare.

"You were one of the choices weren't you?" She asks.

I take a deep breath and nod my head as an answer. I thought Catalina was going to get mad, but instead, she takes the cigarette that's on the ashtray and starts smoking. She looks at me and exhales the smoke. "It doesn't matter now. Talia is as good as dead. When Cyrus is given a punishment, there is nothing in this world that will stop him from completing it." She tells me. Then she puts the cigarette back on the ashtray and starts typing again.

I don't know why but Catalina addressing her mother as Talia suddenly made me feel sad for some reason.

"I'm sorry," I say.

Catalina doesn't remove her eyes on the screen as she replies, "You're not the one who's going to kill her. Why the hell are you apologizing?"

"No, I'm apologizing for what I did to Cyrus," I answer.

Catalina doesn't say anything back. As I waited, something suddenly comes out of the printer. She takes the papers and gestures me with her index finger so I could come closer. She hands me the papers and a pen as I sat on the seat in front of the desk. I'm assuming she wants me to sign these papers for her, so I read through the documents one by one.

"No need to read it. Just sign with your fake name so we could get this over with." Catalina tells me, so I did what she advised and start signing the papers with the name Hans Richards.

As I'm signing the papers, Catalina starts smoking again.

"You were asked to fuck my brother. Not make love to him." She suddenly says, startling me.

I look up at Catalina, but she isn't looking at me at all. Instead, she's looking at the blank space beside me, like her mind's occupied with something else.

"But thank you...for saving him. There is no need to apologize for something so noble like that." She says as she exhales the smoke and taps her cigarette so the ash could fall off.

"I didn't save him. I ended up doing what I was trying to prevent from happening to him." I honestly say back, and Catalina chuckles.

"Oh, believe me, he would have wanted you to do it more than any of the men and women in that room. And we feel the same way too, but that doesn't mean we liked it." Catalina tells me. Then she looks at me with a serious expression and continues, "We want it all to end."

Of course, Catalina wants it to end too. After everything that Chance shared with me, I realized that anyone who went through this would want this to end as well. Only someone who's insane would actually want to stay.

"I know about your family, about the roles, and everything else that someone like me shouldn't be able to know," I tell Catalina. There's no point in keeping it a secret from her, but it seems like Catalina already knew about it.

"I know. Because the moment I saw you here last night, I knew you've learned a lot. I bet Chance told you about it." She says.

"Please don't punish him for it," I tell her, and Catalina looks at me amusingly.

"He was always the one who couldn't zip his mouth. But I love my brother, so there is no need for you to worry." She assures me. I sign the last paper and hand it over to Catalina. She throws her cigarette away and takes the papers before putting it inside a brown envelope.

"Camilla said the live broadcast was interrupted. Does that have to do with the bell yesterday?" I ask.

Without looking back at me, Catalina answers, "You chatted with little Tobi right? He didn't tell you?"

I'm surprised that she knows about my conversation with Tobias earlier too, but I'm also confused by what she means. I'm supposed to ask her about it, but then I remember how Tobias was acting this morning during breakfast. He was acting like he was hurt. And thinking about it now, Tobias was supposed to head to the main house, not Cyrus.

"Was Tobias supposed to receive the gentleman punishment?" I ask next, and Catalina shakes her head and surprisingly answers me, "Yes, but he already received his first punishment, which may be the reason why Cyrus decided to take it from him. Think of it as...a favor?"

I don't know why but I suddenly stood from surprise when I heard what Catalina just said.

Catalina looks back at me with her right eyebrow raised and asked, "Why? Are you surprised? Tobias can't receive the gentleman punishment in the mansion so he received the saint punishment instead. He was whipped thirty times, but he broke too many rules for interrupting the live punishment so he was given two punishments. But thanks to Cyrus, Tobias wasn't able to-"

I immediately cut Catalina off and say, "No, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about what you said after."

"What? About it being a favor?" She asks me, and everything suddenly started connecting together.

"I-It was Cyrus...Cyrus asked Tobias to do it." I say, and Catalina looks back at me confusingly. She was staring at my shocked expression, but moments after, her eyes widen, like she finally got the picture. So Catalina immediately stands from her seat and pulls me towards her. Without warning, she lifts my coat, revealing the knife tucked under my pants.

Catalina takes the knife and removes the table napkin that I used to cover the blade. When it was confirmed that the knife was indeed Tobias's, Catalina looks back at me with shock.

"What's the meaning of this?" She asks, and I knew that I wasn't given the option to lie to her.

"Tobias...he asked me to kill Luis Fletcher," I reveal.

Catalina almost falls back, but she holds onto the table for support. I try to help her, but she stops me as she said, "He asked for a favor? Tobias doesn't ask for favors. He fulfills them."

Catalina's obviously talking to herself, but then she looks back at me and grabs me by the shoulder. She was grabbing me so hard that I thought my shoulder blades would be crushed, "You have to kill him. No matter what happens, you have to kill Luis Fletcher."

"W-What? I thought you'd disagree with this." I honestly tell her, but Catalina started looking nervous. And her being nervous like that started making my heart beat even faster than before.

"Do you know what this means? When the saint asks for a favor, a role that he is supposed to do himself, it only means one thing." She tells me.

I look back at Catalina without saying anything. I just waited for her to continue.

"He made a deal with the devil," Catalina reveals.

I was confused for a moment, but then I remembered Cyrus's true role.

He's the devil.

"If this deal isn't accomplished, Tobias will be-" Catalina suddenly gets cut off when the door opens behind me. Both of us stopped talking as I stare at the intruder standing in the doorframe. I gulp as I watch him look at us with a serious and taunting expression.

"What's going on here?"