He Bet My Life On A Table And Called It Justice For Her Chapter 09

He Bet My Life On A Table And Called It Justice For Her Chapter 09

Just then, the other private phone in Thane’s pocket rang sharply.

The name flashing on the screen was unmistakable.

Greer.

Thane stared at those five letters for a full five seconds.

Then he slowly answered and deliberately put the call on speaker.

Greer’s panicked, tearful voice instantly filled the room.

“Uncle Thane! Where are you? Please come back!”

“Auden… Auden brought a bunch of people into my room out of nowhere. She smashed everything. She said she was going to choke me.”

“I’m so scared. Uncle Thane, please come save me.”

Thane and Breck froze at the same time.

Greer kept sobbing through the phone.

“Uncle Thane… why is no one home?”

“I woke up and got so scared. I looked everywhere, but I couldn’t find anyone. Does Auden hate me that much?”

“It’s my fault. I must have done something wrong.”

Thane’s fingers tightened around the phone until his knuckles turned white.

His hand was trembling.

A long time passed. Long enough that Greer seemed to grow uneasy on the other end.

“Uncle Thane?”

Only then did he speak.

His voice was frighteningly calm.

“You said Auden smashed your room?”

Greer didn’t notice anything wrong. She rushed to confirm it, sounding wounded and certain.

“Yes. It was her. Uncle Thane, please come back—”

Thane’s voice dropped suddenly, cold as ice.

“Then tell me something.”

“How did a girl with both Achilles tendons severed, a girl who couldn’t even crawl, break into your room and smash anything?”

The other end went dead silent.

A few seconds later, Greer seemed to snap back to herself.

She hurried to explain, but a trace of panic had slipped into her voice.

“She… she was faking it. Her feet healed a long time ago. She was lying to all of you.”

Thane closed his eyes and took one hard breath.

Then he ended the call.

The room fell into a silence so heavy it seemed to press on everyone’s chest.

Breck’s face turned pale.

“Miss Marlowe… she’s already lying right there. Even if her feet were fine, she couldn’t possibly…”

He stopped.

As if something had finally clicked into place, the color drained from his face little by little.

“Miss Maddox lied so easily.”

“She lied like that right to your face.”

“Has she been playing you… playing all of us… for fools this whole time?”

Thane’s expression had gone beyond ugly.

Only now did he fully understand how blind he had been.

Greer’s talent for lying without blinking, for twisting black into white, had never appeared overnight.

She could say something as absurd as Auden faking her ruined feet without hesitation.

Then what about all those times before?

“Auden pushed me.”

“Auden insulted me.”

“Auden tried to hurt me.”

How many of those accusations had been made just like this, in places he couldn’t see?

She made them sound helpless. She made them sound harmless.

And every time, he believed her.

Then he turned around and used those lies to scold Auden, punish her, and abandon the girl he had once sworn to protect.

If Auden were not lying cold beneath a white sheet right now…

If she had somehow survived and was still lying in a hospital bed…

Would this lie have fooled him again?

Would it have become one more blade in his hand, cutting into Auden one more time?