Nevertheless, her worry for Theodore's well-being outweighed these reservations.

After careful consideration, Ariana clenched her teeth, retrieved the medicine bottle once more, and swiftly captured a photograph of it.

Without hesitation, she sent the image to Holden, along with a pressing question: “Mr. Fredrick, are you acquainted with this medicine's nature?”

Ariana kept her gaze fixed on her phone for a while, but there was no response from Holden.

This left her feeling somewhat anxious and confused.

Typically, Holden would respond to her messages almost instantly. But now, there was complete silence.

Could he have gone to bed?

A quick look at the time made her doubt it. It was still early, especially for Holden.

Considering Holden's nocturnal habits and his tendency to respond to texts even in the middle of the night, she doubted he would be asleep so soon.

Ariana wasn't certain why Holden wasn't responding, but she reasoned that even if her question had upset him, he would have responded.

Perhaps he was simply swamped with work and hadn't noticed her message yet.

With this assumption, she set her phone aside and stopped pestering him.

After finding what she was Looking for, Ariana sat in the chaos she had created in the room. Realizing the mess, she rose and began to tidy up, aiming to restore the room to its original state.

She didn't want Theodore to return home and think he had been robbed.

The thought of Theodore reminded her of his unusual absence. She hadn't seen him in a long time.

It would make sense if he was avoiding her, but even Horace was clueless about his Location.

At the time, she couldn't discern if Horace was lying, but she couldn't think of any hideouts that even he wouldn't know about.

Ariana pondered as she cleaned up the room. While tidying the bed, she noticed that the corner of the calendar on Theodore's bedside table had been flipped.

This change had slipped her notice previously, so she picked up the calendar out of curiosity, flipping it back to find the 10th of the following month circled.

Ariana frowned at the circled date, puzzled.