He Betrayed Me, I’ll Expose His Crimes

Chapter 3

Blinding incandescent light seared straight into my face.

The justice I'd spent everything hoping for? It never came.

A thick stack of evaluation reports came flying at me, slamming hard into my cheek.

"Emma, this so-called complaint of yours is nothing but outright malicious defamation."

"That's impossible! I submitted the raw anomaly logs proving the engine was tampered with! I even marked every single hole in the offshore illegal betting ring's overseas funding trail perfectly clear, if you just pull up the records..."

"Pull up what? Pull up the delusions in your head?" The investigator cut me off mid-sentence, disgust written all over his face.

I stared at the scattered reports. Flawless, spotless telemetry data. Impeccable, untraceable financial records.

Every single loophole I'd turned in earlier? They'd been erased completely, not a trace left behind.

Standing off to the side, Damian heaved a dramatic, pitying sigh. "My apologies, investigator. After her accident left her disabled, her mind became completely twisted. She faked all the evidence to get revenge. Hell, she even tried to cut the brake lines right before the qualifying race."

He tapped open a clip of security footage.

There, a figure wearing clothes identical to mine was sneaking around tampering with the race car's undercarriage.

"That's forged! Give me a pen, I can break down the inconsistencies right here!"

I snatched the pen off the table, already moving toward the whiteboard to prove my innocence.

But Damian clamped his hand down over mine before I could take another step.

He stared at me, his gaze dripping with fake heartbreak. "Emma, you're sick. Far sicker than I thought."

The investigator's face twisted with revulsion. "Take this violent maniac out of here."

"Revoke her competition entry credentials and ban her from the tournament."

They dragged me back to the chassis dyno room, deep in the heart of the team's garage.

The second the door swung open, a thick stench of burnt flesh and blood hit me like a brick to the chest.

"Emma... don't... don't worry about me..."

I snapped my head up, and my heart split clean in two.

It was Liam! Professional racing straps bound him tight to the spinning dynamometer, holding him pinned in place.

His right hand was forced hard against the exhaust pipe, which glowed hot at hundreds of degrees Fahrenheit.

"Sizzle, sizzle" The sickening pop and crackle of burning flesh filled the small room.

Liam convulsed all over in agony, his eyes rolling back in his head. Even through all the pain, he gritted his teeth so hard he never once begged for mercy.

"Let him go!" I dragged my crippled legs across the floor and scrambled over, clamping down tight around Damian's leg.

"Let him go! He's just a kid!"

Slowly, deliberately, Damian pulled off his white gloves.

"This brat just wouldn't do what he was told. He tried to sneak into the main server room to steal the real black box for you. He loves cars so much? I'm just letting him get his fill of touching them."

He pressed the increase temperature button on his remote with his thumb.

The exhaust pipe's temperature skyrocketed in an instant.

A gut-wrenching scream tore out of Liam's throat, and the charred flesh melted away to reveal the stark white of his finger bones.

This was the hand that had drawn every single line of blueprints right alongside me!

"Stop! Please stop it!"

Damian bent down and brushed his hand along my cheek.

"Three o'clock this afternoon, we're doing a public clarification broadcast streamed live to the entire internet. You're going to get on stage. Get on your knees and apologize to Julia. Beg her to forgive you. What's it going to be, Emma? Save his life, or hold on to your pride?"

I ground my teeth until my jaw cracked. "I... I agree..."

Satisfied, Damian pressed the stop button.

"Remember this. If you so much as shed a single tear during that broadcast, next time I'll burn his head instead of his hand."