Dolores glanced down at Terry’s outstretched hand, which held a memory card. Her brows furrowed in confusion. “What is this?” she asked.
Terry’s expression turned serious. “My brother didn’t commit suicide. He was murdered.”
It was the same sentence, but Dolores wasn’t initially interested.
“I’m sorry, but I have other matters to attend to. I’m leaving,” Dolores replied curtly. She paid for her ticket and headed towards the exit.
In a rush, Terry ran towards her and grabbed her arm. “Six years ago, my brother received a sum of money from a woman. She asked him to intentionally hit and kill another woman with a car.”
Bang!
Dolores felt as if a lightning bolt had struck her head.
Someone had tried to kill her six years ago?
“You’re the woman my brother was ordered to kill. But luckily, you survived, right?” Terry speculated.
After discovering the recording, Terry understood why Dolores found him repulsive and disgusting whenever she saw him.
Dolores accepted the memory card from his hand, examining it carefully. She realized it was a phone memory card, the kind used in older phones from the past. Nowadays, smartphones had large internal storage and no longer required such cards. Dolores placed the memory card back in Terry’s hand. “Do you have evidence on this?”
“If you have time, we can find a place to talk,” Terry proposed, confident that Dolores would agree.
As assumed, Dolores agreed. She also wanted to know who had wanted to kill her.
That car accident had nearly cost her the lives of her babies.
“I know a nearby coffee shop. Let’s go there,” Dolores suggested, taking the lead.
Terry followed her.
The coffee shop was situated in the neighborhood’s surroundings. Dolores had noticed it the night before.
Soon, they arrived at the coffee shop, and Dolores found a secluded corner where they could sit.
“Would you like something to drink?” Although Dolores was eager to uncover the truth, she realized Terry looked parched and could use a drink.
“I’ll have some water,” Terry replied, genuinely thirsty.
Dolores handed the menu to a waiter. “Bring us two glasses of water for now. We’ll let you know if we want anything else.”
“Sure thing.”
The waiter returned with two glasses of water. After the waiter left, Terry took a sip from his glass, quenching his thirst. Dolores leaned forward and said, “Tell me everything. What happened?”
“Listen to this first.” Terry pulled out a phone capable of accommodating the memory card. He inserted the card into the phone and played a recording he had found on it.
The recording consisted of a single conversation.
“If I do as you say and kill that woman with a car, won’t I end up in prison?”
“Don’t worry. I won’t let you face lawsuits or get imprisoned. We’ll tamper with the brakes in your car beforehand and stage a brake failure. You won’t have to shoulder much responsibility for an accident caused by brake failure. Besides, you’re sick, and I’ll support you. You should know that completing this task will earn you a substantial sum of money. You wouldn’t make that much even if you worked your whole life. It’s a good deal for you.”
“Don’t worry. Even if you’re imprisoned, I’ll get you out.” The woman sounded eager to persuade him.
At that time, Maria not only wanted Dolores to experience the pain of a car accident but also wanted her life to end.
Maria aimed to make Dolores vanish from the world before Dolores and Matthew got a divorce. That way, nobody would threaten Maria’s position anymore, and Matthew would belong solely to her.
But Maria didn’t know that someone would come to Dolores’ rescue.
She also didn’t know that a man had taken Dolores away from B City. Dolores had been gone for six years. She had even given birth to her babies.
“Based on this recording, I speculate that this woman knew my brother needed money and that he was a truck driver. So she sought him out and orchestrated the accident,” Terry concluded, placing the phone back in his pocket.
Dolores rested her head on her hand, contemplating the female voice in the recording. It was clear and familiar. Almost instantly, she recognized the voice.
It belonged to Helen, who now went by the name Maria.
It was Maria who had inflicted mental illness upon Jessica in the past, which had later been controlled and cured by Sampson. Now, Jessica lived a normal life. That was why Dolores had chosen not to pursue it.
The reason she hadn’t pursued it was because Maria was Sampson’s sister.
But now…
Dolores had always believed the car accident was due to brake failure. But it wasn’t.
“You know who the woman in the recording is, don’t you?” Terry asked tentatively.
Dolores raised her head, absentmindedly spinning the cup in her hand. She didn’t answer him directly but instead asked, “I’m curious, how did you obtain this recording?”
Terry’s face froze, and then he lowered his head.
“You’re not saying anything?” Dolores released her grip on the cup and stood up. “Thank you for telling me this.”
Terry lifted his head abruptly and stared at her in astonishment. “Aren’t you going to investigate? Someone tried to kill you.”
Dolores glanced at Terry, who appeared incredibly eager, and replied nonchalantly, “Whether I investigate or not is my business.”
“But don’t you think we have a better chance of success if we work together?” Terry proposed, hoping that by collaborating, they could bring justice to the woman who killed his brother and allow Dolores to seek revenge on the person who tried to kill her. It would be a win-win situation.
Why was Dolores so calm and indifferent after learning the truth?
“However, you’re still withholding something from me, aren’t you?” The truth surprised her, but it didn’t drive her mad. Terry had yet to confess something to her.
Terry lowered his head, nervously rubbing his hands together.
“After you tell me everything, I’ll consider whether to cooperate with you.” Dolores gazed out the window and spoke plainly, “That woman isn’t someone you can bring to justice with just a few pieces of evidence.”
In the past, it might not have been so difficult.
But now, Maria was part of the Herbert family, a family with wealth and power.
Bringing her to justice wouldn’t be easy.
“Wait…” As Dolores reached the door, Terry stood up and looked at her retreating figure. “Sit back down.”
Dolores turned to face him. “Have you made up your mind?”
Terry tightly pursed his lips and nodded.
Dolores returned to her seat.
“If you want me to cooperate with you, you need to tell me everything you know.”
Taking a deep breath, Terry locked eyes with Dolores. “I had been investigating my brother’s death, but I couldn’t find any useful leads until I received a call.”
“What call?”
“My brother had stored something in a safe deposit box at Ping An Insurance while he was alive. When the lease on the box expired, they contacted me since I was the secondary contact on the registration form. They couldn’t reach the primary contact, my brother, so they reached out to me.”
Dolores remained silent, listening attentively.
“My brother seemed to have intentionally stored it there,” Terry continued, lowering his head.
“Why did he do that?” Dolores asked, studying Terry’s face.
Terry hesitated, reluctant to expose the dark secrets of his deceased brother. After all, they shared a mother.
He lowered his head and fell silent.
Dolores waited for several minutes, but Terry still didn’t speak.
“If you don’t tell me the truth and I’m not fully informed, how can I cooperate with you? If you don’t trust me, why did you stop me from leaving?” Dolores questioned.
“I do trust you,” Terry immediately denied.
“It’s possible that my brother intentionally recorded the conversation with that woman. After completing his task and receiving the money… maybe he found her later and tried to blackmail and threaten her with the recording. That’s why he was killed.”
In essence, Terry’s brother died because of greed.
Dolores now understood the whole situation. His brother was the driver hired by Maria to cause the car accident that would kill her. After the accident, Dolores left the country. However, driven by greed, Terry’s brother returned to blackmail Maria with the recording after receiving payment, resulting in his own demise.
“What are you going to do? You won’t let the woman who tried to murder you go free, right?” Terry asked eagerly.
“The truth is clear now, but it won’t be easy to reopen this old case,” Dolores said, standing up. “I have other matters to attend to today.”
“I can drive you there,” Terry offered, standing up as well. “I have a car.”
Dolores looked at him and nodded.
Once inside the car, Terry wrote his number on a piece of paper and handed it to her. “This is my phone number. Feel free to call me whenever you want. By the way, my name is Terry.”
Dolores took the paper. “I’ll remember it. You can call me Dolores.”
“Okay.” Terry focused on driving, and soon the car came to a stop in front of the under-construction shop.
Theresa anxiously waited at the door. As she saw Dolores, she rushed over. “What took you so long?”