Chapter 515 Impeccable Acting
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Kristie bit her lip in distress as she closed her eyes. “When he first approached me, I had no idea what was in store for my future. I even foolishly believed myself to be lucky to be able to attract such a handsome and rich boy.”
She whimpered. “I-I was so stupid! I couldn’t believe it when he finally started making me change to fit the image of someone else, and as time went on, I finally came to realize just how unhinged and sick he was deep down.”
The investigator frowned as she gently prodded for more details, and Kristie just shook nervously as she continued ‘reiterating’ more details about her relationship with Amos.
After noting it all down, she nodded. “Miss Kristie, while I assure you that we’ll look into this and get you all the help that you need, could you please elaborate on what you know about your ex-boyfriend’s involvement in Mr. Alexander’s case.”
Kristie shivered in visible terror, seemingly recalling something terrifying as she nodded. “Y-Yes, yes… h-he… I don’t know who he was, a-an old man I have never seen before, but he came to Amos in the middle of the night—”
The audience watching the clip listened with rapt attention as the seemingly terrified blonde girl reiterated how she overheard their conversation.
Apparently, while she was forced to kneel on the ground as punishment for her performance during the Golden Crown being too inadequate and being too ‘fake’, an unusually athletic-looking old man dressed in white visited her boyfriend in the middle of the night.
His face was covered and his gait sneaky as he opened and closed the door without even knocking, making the situation seem even more strange. But even though she was already used to her so-called boyfriend’s unexplainable perversions and twisted whims, the young girl still stuck her ear against the door out of morbid curiosity.
Kristie smiled self-deprecatingly. “M-Maybe they just thought of me as a doormat, so neither of them gave my existence beyond the door much thought.”
The audience couldn’t help but sympathize with her. “Poor girl. She went through such an abusive relationship at such a young age. How unfortunate.”
If they knew that she was lying through her teeth, maybe the audience would directly recommend her as the next movie queen.
Even Rhea, who was an actual actress with almost two years of experience and intense training, didn’t do nearly as well as this barely-of-age girl while framing her deceased boyfriend as Emilia’s other ‘partner in crime’.
Kristie shivered as she continued. “A-At first I didn’t hear anything, b-but then I heard him laugh. I… I-I… I-It wasn’t the kind of joyful laugh of someone happy, but a sick, twisted one full of glee at the misfortune of someone else. I-I knew it quite well, I-I heard it from him often, a-and it was never good news.” She shuddered. “H-He said… i-if you can teach that bastard an eternal lesson, I-I will make sure that you spend the rest of your life in anonymity and luxury.”
The blonde girl gulped. “I-I didn’t realize who he was talking about at that time, a-and I even thought he was just going to get someone beat up, maybe. B-But then, l-later…” She sobbed. “I-I saw, I-I saw—!”
The female investigator reached out to hold her palm, and rubbed it in a soothing, encouraging motion. “Relax, just tell me what you saw. You’re safe now, nobody can harm you.”
Kristie almost broke character because of the intense amount of pity overflowing from the investigator’s eyes.
Fortunately, the thought of a fresh new life in the Empire of Blue Dawn, free from all shackles and full of hope for the future, quickly made the blonde girl reaffirm her determination.
Her eyes shook as Kristie pretended to flinch back before ‘forcefully calming herself down’ before she hiccuped. “Hic—! I-I… I saw t-the photo of a bloody, mutilated face!”
The investigator clenched her pen in excitement, but her face remained calm as she gave the younger girl an encouraging nod.
Kristie sobbed, and a fresh line of tears started dribbling down her face as she ‘did her best’ to wipe them off with her sleeve. “I-I saw it on his phone when he received a message while beating me up. I-I saw that the man in the photo was wearing the same clothes as A-Alexander at the party. I-I… I didn’t want to believe it at first!”
Ignoring the tissue offered by the investigator, the young girl sniffled. “H-He’s someone who is used to getting his way. T-This wasn’t the first time someone just disappeared when he found them an unpleasant sight, after all. But… I think he forgot that, unlike regular people, it may not be so easy to sweep everything under the rug this time, and panicked.”
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Although Kristie’s testimony couldn’t be taken as definite proof against Amos, in the eyes of everyone in the world, he was already guilty.
Of course, compared to the general public that only knew the surface details, Alexander’s was even more convinced.
While normally skeptical by nature, the description of the old man in the girl’s testimony as well as the timing of the whole thing made him certain that his son’s murderer was, without a doubt, Amos Black.
After all, could a peasant like that girl have ever been exposed to an existence like the Old Snake had it not been for Amos?
The mere fact that she even knew about him meant that Amos must have interacted with the old snake somehow, and that was already enough to sentence him to death as far as Alexander’s father was concerned.
Clenching his fist, the man smiled grimly. “Contact the government of Oriana and let them know that the Gray Wolfe is interested in assisting them against the Black Tiger. And as for Amos… I want his reputation to stink, his pride to shatter, and his body to rot as he watches it all helplessly!”
The leader of the nightingale clan hesitated for a while before nodding. ‘Fuck it, regardless of what the twins do to the Gray Wolfe, it’s all good for us. Attracting more of Sanders’ ire our way at this time would be idiotic.’
In fact, a part of him still couldn’t believe that Sanders was willing to overlook one of the Nightingale clan’s members being involved in his son’s murder.
But thinking about it again, perhaps he just failed to notice it in his overly emotional state, or maybe all his anger was being directed at Amos Black instead.
Regardless of the reasoning behind the strange oversight, he obviously wasn’t stupid enough to question Sanders about it, and just nodded calmly before leaving. ‘Let’s just hope that we can get over all this crap safely, and the twins end up taking over the Gray Wolfe before his wrath turns to us.’
The moment the other man left, Alexander’s father sneered. ‘Fucking bastard… you think I’m so easy to fool?’
Of course he didn’t forget about the Nightingale Clan. If not for them, how could that scaredy-cat Old Snake have the guts to plot against the Gray Wolfe on his own?
For making him lose his dearest son and forcing his beloved wife into a coma, he would surely make them pay for it all with blood. But not now.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Naturally, such a disastrous bombshell of a news couldn’t be concealed from Amos for long, and his subordinates also realized that trying to hide it at the moment would only make things worse for them later.
When he first heard about his so-called girlfriend’s betrayal, however, the silver-haired boy almost choked on his own spittle in indignation. “S-She did what?! WHAT?! Say it again!”
Even as the new secretary forced to be the bearer of the ‘bad news’ shivered, he couldn’t help but curse his predecessor in his heart. ‘Fucking bastard ran away as soon as he got wind of the situation and left me to deal with this crap!’
Of course, although he said that, it wasn’t really so easy for most to just up and quit their well-paying job at the first sign of danger.
Not to mention the fear for their future prospects once they left, most would have the fluke mentality that somehow they wouldn’t be unlucky enough to be really hurt in the end, and would always have the chance to escape later.
Unfortunately, sometimes reality taught such optimists a harsh lesson.
“M-Miss Kristie accused you of—gwack?!”
A heavy ornamental ashtray slammed into the unsuspecting man’s head, his last thoughts full of disbelief as his vision went dark and his twitching body fell to the ground.
Amos cursed as he stomped forward to kick the fallen man. “Fucking trash! Since that fucking whore dared to say all that shit, do you still have to say her name so respectfully? Moron!”
Frowning in disgust as he realized that the man had fainted and wouldn’t be able to respond to his rebuke, the silver-haired boy gave him another kick in disgust. “Trash!”
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━