Contractbound

There were already a lot of people gathering at the source of the scream. It was a woman who was sobbing uncontrollably at a doorway of a house. Graham activated Supersight, which was a name he invented because he was tired of calling it eye power, to see the inside of the house better. From his angle, he could only see some part of the house, but it was enough to know what was going on.

There was a dead body of a man inside a house, and its condition was already very familiar to Graham. The man"s mouth was wide open and his hands were scratching the area near his eyes. The expression of shock and horror was preserved to his death. The man must have worked out a lot while alive because his body looked muscular.

Graham turned from the man and observed the room and the crying woman. Judging from her reaction, it was highly likely that the woman was in a close relationship with the man-- probably the wife or girlfriend because there was a key inserted into the keyhole from the outer part of the door. She had got up from the doorway and was now crying on the shoulder of another woman, probably her neighbor.

The bystanders looked shocked by the dead man"s condition. Although they must have read the news about the first and the second victim, it was still horrifying to see something like that happen in real life. Egon had gone and talked to the people he knew there. After all, he lived close to the scene. Graham was trying to listen in to the people"s conversation to get any bits and pieces of information.

"Isn"t that her husband?!" said Egon in disbelief.

"It"s happened before, right? I don"t feel safe now. What if we"re next?!" said a woman who looked panicked.

"How did someone scare Levi like that? He was supposed to be a tough guy..." said a scary-looking man.

Graham couldn"t see the thing he was looking for from outside the house but he bet there would be the same death threat from Pravitatem somewhere inside. He would check with divination later to make sure. For now, he needed to find clues about the crime somehow. Just as he was about to walk closer to the house to see better, he saw a familiar face: it was the friend of the second victim who had found the body!

Graham looked at her closely and he was sure it was the same person. The woman also saw him and in that instant, she went away from the crowd and started running. Graham darted towards the direction she went by politely pushing people aside and started chasing her.

"Sorry, excuse me," said Graham while making his way through.

The woman was wearing a pair of sneakers, so her movement was not hindered at all, and she ran very fast as if she didn"t need to even touch the ground. She could nimbly avoid the people walking in the narrow alley without slowing down.

"Stop running!" yelled Graham at her, but of course she wouldn"t stop just because of that. She ran even faster.

Graham had a really hard time keeping up with her, so he slowly lost sight of his target. He stopped running immediately when he was sure that he wouldn"t be able to catch her like that. He had another method of catching her, one that he knew very well how to use, so he wasn"t very worried. He could divine her purpose of going there and her whereabouts later, but for now, he needed to go back to the death scene to find more clues.

By the time Graham came back, there were even more people gathered there to watch. Someone had closed the door out of respect to the deceased, but the bystanders didn"t go away. They were talking and chattering about the event because it was not every day that something that big happened in their lives. Graham was observing everyone present and listening in to their conversations.

A few minutes later, the Police came and sealed off the house with a police line. Graham recognized the officer who seemed to be in charge; it was the officer who had come with his partner to interrogate him about Naomi Bakker. The scar across his nose was very distinctive, and his unfriendly face was difficult to forget. He was also present in the first and second victims" crime scenes along with his partner. However, Graham didn"t see the officer"s male partner today, but a female with a bob haircut instead.

"Val, that officer seems to have to be partnered with someone friendly-looking to balance out his gloominess," Graham muttered jokingly.

The officer saw Graham and was slightly surprised. He then approached Graham and said accusingly, "What are you doing here? Why are you in every crime scene?"

Graham knew he would ask that. The first and the second were a pure coincidence, but this time it was by divination that he went there. Of course, he couldn"t just tell the officer that, however, as it was the same as announcing that he was a Contractbound.

"What if I told you it was really a coincidence," he said innocently and started looking for Egon. When he found Egon, he said, "I was getting a tour from my driver right there and we heard a scream."

The two officers both looked at where Graham pointed at and Egon nodded in approval when they looked at him, confirming Graham"s words.

"We will still have to get your alibi later. Don"t go anywhere," said the tall officer coldly and then went into the house by walking under the police line.

"He just had a rough morning," said the shorter officer with bob hair. Her voice was much warmer than her partner"s. She then followed her partner inside the house.

With the Police there, Graham"s chance of sneaking in had gone down the drain, so he had to think of another way. He observed the remaining Police officers inside the house who seemed to be lower in rank and once he had found a target, he leaned back against the wall and waited. He kept trying to listen in to people"s conversation in the meantime. There were two men and a woman who were talking whisperingly close to him.

"Crazy, huh? Something like this happening here."

"Yes. I would have never imagined my neighbor would get murdered."

"Do you think the news will come here? Maybe it will be my chance to get famous!"

"You"re fishing in troubled waters."

The conversation stopped there because they saw some blue-coated men exiting the room. Graham noticed that his target was among them, so he approached the target with the excuse of asking a question. He whispered in a very low voice to avoid anyone eavesdropping and stepped back at once after he was done. He then went over to Egon.

"Do you know the victim?"

"His name is Levi, I think-- I don"t actually know him. You know there are so many people here so it"s not rare to not know a lot of them," he said in a slightly regretful tone.

"That"s okay. What were you talking about with the others?"

"We were just talking about how scary it is. Now I"m worried about my wife and son," he said with genuine worry in his voice.

Most people there were mainly gossiping without any actual useful information, so Graham didn"t bother to ask them one by one. We would ask the wife directly after she had calmed down, but he would need to do so without the Police noticing, so he waited for some time.

It didn"t take that long for her to stop sobbing, because she had been on it for quite some time now. He walked over to the three gossiping people from before spoke in a very persuasive manner while his eyes glowed red under his contacts.

"Can you guys form a wall to block me from the Police"s view? I need to ask important questions."

The three people looked confused for a second and thought that the request wasn"t hard to do, so they walked over to where the wife was and pretended to chat while covering Graham.

"Ma"am, I need you to answer my questions calmly without breaking into tears. I know you can do that because you"re a strong woman." Graham said persuasively while looking directly at the woman"s now red eyes.

The wife nodded slowly in confusion. The other woman whose shoulder she had cried on was only looking at Graham without saying anything. Graham looked at her in the eye and said,

"It"s best if you join their conversation because it will be very interesting. Trust me."

The woman confusedly walked to the three people covering for Graham while thinking that the man"s advice made sense and joined in on their conversation.

Graham turned back to the wife and asked in a gentle but deep voice, "What can you tell me about your husband?"

Her expression looked pained but she seemed to be trying hard to hold back her tears, her voice was full of sadness, "He was a kind man. Very kind. We lived happily together. He didn"t leave me although he knew I can"t give him children. Why did he have to die? Why couldn"t it be me instead?"

"What"s your husband"s name? Where does he work?" Graham asked softly.

"His name is Levi Brouwer. He is--," she paused, "was a teacher at a private school."

"Hmm... there was nothing in common among the victims," he muttered, and then asked, "Do you know if your husband was involved with any shady characters?"

"No. He doesn"t even drink," she said strongly.

"I"m sorry for your loss. Stay strong," Graham said while walking away from the wife when he noticed that the Police officers were walking out of the room.

Everyone there was allowed to leave after they gave their contacts to the Police, including Graham although they had taken his before. He left the scene and The Concrete by following the Police crews who were also leaving. Egon decided to stay with his wife and son because he was worried about them, so he couldn"t guide Graham out.

In the street, he hailed a public motor carriage to take him home because he should have something waiting for him soon and needed to do a lot of divination. Since his divination directed him there, his power up should be related to solving the murder case; that was what he thought.