Wrong Flirt, Right Trouble: His Uncle Pulls Me Close

”Help me, help me!” A blood-curdling scream came from the room.

The room reeked of blood mixed with feces and urine, followed by a woman’s desperate wails. ”I really don’t know! I don’t know anything! I want to see Ivy Sherwood! Let me see Ivy Sherwood!”

”I didn’t kill him! It wasn’t me! I want to call my daughter! I’m going to sue you for murder!”

Ruby Sterling was sprawled on the floor, but she still had the strength to scream.

Her body was covered in injuries, and she had long since lost control of her bowels and bladder out of terror.

Both of her legs had been broken, and there were knife wounds on her body.

Ruby Sterling had never been in such a pathetic state, but she staunchly insisted that she had nothing to do with Charlie Rhodes’s death. She thought that as long as she kept denying it, she would be safe.

That evening, Elijah Hawthorne finally arrived at the location.

”Still hasn’t confessed?” Elijah Hawthorne lit a cigarette, the curling smoke obscuring his features.

As soon as Elijah Hawthorne appeared at the door, someone immediately brought over a chair for him.

Ruby Sterling, still on the floor, asked, ”Who... who are you?”

’This isn’t Quentin Blackwood. Is he one of Quentin’s subordinates?’

’He doesn’t seem like one. The stench of blood on this man is even stronger than Quentin’s.’

”You’re not worthy of knowing who I am. Did you kill Charlie Rhodes or not?” Elijah Hawthorne had little patience.

”It wasn’t me, it wasn’t me... It was Ivy Sherwood! Ivy Sherwood killed him!” Ruby Sterling still refused to admit it.

Elijah Hawthorne waved his hand, and someone immediately came forward with several items.

Elijah Hawthorne explained, ”I’m giving you one last chance. Confess, and you can walk out of here. If you don’t, then we’ll use these items on you, one by one. Go on, tell her what they are.”

”This is hard liquor, perfect for disinfecting your wounds.”

”This is salt. After disinfecting, it’ll help stop the bleeding.”

”This is itching powder. We’ll sprinkle it on the wounds too. Then it won’t just hurt, it’ll itch, and you’ll be desperate to scratch.”

”And these are needles. We’ll slide them under your fingernails. They say the fingers are connected to the heart—you’ll know what that feels like soon enough. But with needles in your hands, you probably won’t be able to scratch your wounds anyway.”

The men described the items matter-of-factly, as if this wasn’t the first time they had done something like this.

Nearby, Elijah Hawthorne’s expression showed no hint of softness or pity. For him, this kind of thing was nothing out of the ordinary.

In his view, no one was that tight-lipped. If you couldn’t break someone, it just meant your methods weren’t persuasive enough.

And he was being relatively merciful, considering she was a woman.

”No... don’t...” Ruby Sterling trembled all over just hearing this. ’Pouring liquor and rubbing salt into my wounds... how much would that hurt?’

Elijah Hawthorne waved his hand, signaling for the men to begin.

Then, he added, ”I recall you have a daughter named Claire Sherwood, don’t you?”

”Since you enjoy this sort of thing so much, how about I grab Claire Sherwood, bring her here, and find ten old men to have some fun with her right in front of you? What do you think of that?”

”No... No!” Ruby Sterling had been stubborn before, but Elijah Hawthorne’s words had just crossed her absolute line.

Claire Sherwood was the most important person to her. She would not allow her daughter to be ruined.

”My daughter is abroad! You’ll never find her!”

Elijah Hawthorne directly pulled up a segment of airport surveillance footage. ”It seems you don’t know your own daughter very well. She returned to the country a month ago, and today, she arrived back in Lustre. This is the video from Lustre Airport. I assume you still recognize your daughter.”

One of his subordinates held a tablet in front of Ruby Sterling so she could see more clearly.

The woman in the video—who else could it be but Claire Sherwood?

”No... No... Don’t! I’ll talk! I’ll talk!”

Elijah Hawthorne had Ruby Sterling moved to another room, where police officers were present as witnesses. As for the injuries on her body, that was even easier to explain—they would just say that Ruby Sterling was under immense psychological stress and had injured herself.

Even if Ruby Sterling tried to argue, she had no proof.

In front of the police, Ruby Sterling finally admitted that she was the one who killed him.

She had delivered the final stab, but she had wrapped her hand in something to avoid leaving any fingerprints.

”Why did you do it? What was your motive? Did someone put you up to it?” the officer asked.

After all, Ruby Sterling had called Claire Sherwood right after the incident.

”No one put me up to it. It was me. I wanted to kill Charlie Rhodes and frame Ivy Sherwood. I’m begging you, please don’t go after my daughter.”

Right now, the only thing Ruby Sterling cared about was her daughter.

’Claire is so smart. She said she had a way to get me out.’

’As long as I don’t die, as long as I’m still alive, there’s a chance.’

At the very least, Ivy Sherwood was now completely cleared of the murder charge.

When Ivy Sherwood saw the interrogation footage, she was shocked that Ruby Sterling had actually killed Charlie Rhodes and, on top of that, had tried to frame her for it.

”Can I see Ruby Sterling?” Ivy Sherwood asked Quentin Blackwood.

”You can, but... what are you planning to do? Why don’t you let me do it for you?”

Quentin Blackwood didn’t want Ivy Sherwood to see Ruby Sterling. He was worried something might happen, or that Ruby would say a string of infuriating things that would upset Ivy.

Ivy Sherwood said, ”Please thank Elijah Hawthorne for me. This was all thanks to his help. As for Ruby Sterling, I’ll go see her myself.”

Although Ivy didn’t know what methods Elijah Hawthorne had used, the fact that the stubbornly silent Ruby Sterling had confessed was a testament to his capabilities.

Ruby Sterling had already been taken to the police station. When Ivy Sherwood saw her, Ruby was already in custody, dressed in a prison uniform, wearing handcuffs, and sitting in a wheelchair.

In just one short day, Ruby Sterling had become so gaunt she was almost unrecognizable, and her hair had practically turned white overnight.

Ivy knew that Ruby Sterling loved to pamper herself and cared immensely about her appearance. Seeing her like this now, Ivy couldn’t help but find it pathetic.

”What are you doing here?” Ruby Sterling’s eyes were bloodshot.

If she could get out, she would have lunged forward and taken a bite out of Ivy Sherwood.

Now, she was a prisoner, but Ivy Sherwood? She still had that same lofty, superior air about her.

That face of hers was the very picture of a pampered young lady, a little princess who looked at everything with such indifference, as if nothing in the world mattered to her.

Ivy Sherwood said, ”I came to laugh at you, of course.”

”Ruby Sterling, do you remember what you were like when you first married into the Sherwood Family?”

Of course Ruby Sterling remembered. She had married in with great fanfare. The wedding was even more lavish than those of first-time brides.

When Yvonne Summers and Timothy Sherwood got married, they just registered their marriage and didn’t even host a reception.

Back then, Timothy Sherwood was just a poor boy. Ruby Sterling was fond of his sweet talk, but at the same time, she looked down on him for being poor.

So after she became pregnant with Claire Sherwood, Timothy Sherwood proposed, but Ruby Sterling refused.

Later on, she heard the news that Timothy Sherwood had gotten married. And after his marriage, it was as if he had met a benefactor. His career suddenly took off, and he even started his own perfume company, which would later become the Sherwood Company.