Battle Wounds || Jasper Hale {2}

Chapter 23

The file weighed heavily in Ellie's hands, the smell of old paper drifting up to her nose. It was enough to make her heart thump wildly in her chest. This was it. This was the moment she had been waiting years for.

She could feel Felicity's eyes burning into her. Her curious gaze seeping into her skin like lotion on a dry summer day.

"Did you know?" Felicity asked, her gaze sweeping the blonde's face, searching for any sign that she was hiding more than she let on.

Ellie finally lifted her eyes from the file to face her friend. She knew she was a Cartwright. She just felt like she never knew them enough to carry their name. Of course, if she thought about it, the DuPree family didn't deserve for her to carry their name. Not with how they had treated her. Regardless, she gave a curt nod of her head.

"Are you related to Harmon?" the brunette asked, not truly surprised to find out Ellie knew.

Ellie glanced to the file before bringing her vision back to Felicity and shrugging her shoulders. A quiet, "I don't know," slipped passed her lips.

A sigh left the brunette's mouth before she nodded. She had her own suspicions on the matter considering how eerily similar the two people who were closest to her were, but she believed that Ellie truly did not know if she was related to the sandy haired emissary across the room.

She lifted her gaze to the said boy, finding him immersed in a file she was sure he would tell her about later. He deserved to know if he had any remaining family out there. She wanted that for him more than anything, but what was she willing to do for it?

Dragging her eyes back to Ellie, she said, "I suppose the only way to find out is to read it then."

The blonde nodded. This file was going to change her life. She could just feel it, and if she gained something from it, it couldn't be as bad as Jesse. That she was sure of.

Felicity glanced back to Harmon who seemed to be exploring the rest of the room, watching as he looked from the windowless walls to the grates on the floors until his attention landed on the wardrobe in the back of the room. "I'll, uh, let you get to that then."

As the brunette moved toward her tether, Ellie braced herself to find out the secrets the council had, so generously, been keeping from her. Hopefully, one of them could help her defeat the monster that haunted her dreams.

Pulling her bottom lip between her teeth, Ellie flipped open the folder.

Her eyes were met with a mugshot taken the night she had been arrested for the murders of sixteen innocents, a crime she had not actually committed, but a stark reminder of why she despised the idea of vampires mingling with humans.

Under the photo, an informational list followed.

Eleanor Violet Cartwright-DuPree

Status: Alive

Sex: Female

Age: 18

Height: 5'10''

Weight: 125 lbs

Mother: Elizabeth Marian Cartwright nee Brown

Father: Philip Steven Cartwright

Ellie's eyebrows furrowed as she took in the new information. Her father was Philip Cartwright? The Philip Cartwright? The one who had a statue standing in the training room? He couldn't be. Her eyes followed the list as she recognized other family that she never knew she had.