Chapter 2

Hearing the mention of a million dollars, the security guards immediately sprang to action.

I stared at Tiffany’s baseless accusation, utterly appalled.

“Trying to skip out after destroying jewelry? Grab her!” Tiffany sneered at me, her face contorted with arrogant disdain.

Faced with the sudden, wild accusation, my mind went blank.

Skip out? Destroyed jewelry?

She was the one who couldn’t hold on to it!

“Who the hell do you think you are?” I growled, my brows furrowed, my eyes icy. “You’re the one who lost your grip!”

But the security guards ignored my protests. At Tiffany’s subtle nod, they moved in.

They roughly pinned me to the floor with their batons, and my fingers twisted at an unnatural angle as I fell.

The searing pain in my fingers shot through me.

The excruciating agony instantly drained all color from my face.

“Let go of me!” I struggled desperately on the ground. “This is slander!”

More and more onlookers gathered. All I wanted was to end this absurd disaster as quickly as possible.

“Let me go now! I’m calling the police! Otherwise, prepare for a court summons!”

“You dare call the police? A summons?” Tiffany glared at me, a mocking smirk on her face. “So self-assured despite trying to skip out on a million-dollar bill!”

The surrounding crowd started whispering.

“Her clothes don’t look like she’d skip out on a bill, do they?”

“What do you know? That designer jacket she’s wearing? There’s only one in the world, and it was bought by a foreign collector.”

“Then she’s wearing a knock-off?!”

“How tacky!”

“And she dared to skip out on a bill? Such a huge amount, she should be locked up for ten years!”

Their mocking gazes rained down on me.

The taunting words in my ears were like poisoned darts, piercing me deeply.

“I didn’t break it! Just check the cameras!” My eyes grew colder with anger, every ache in my hands and body tearing at my nerves.

“Cameras?” Tiffany sneered. “How conveniently, the cameras broke yesterday!”

My eyes widened, beginning to bloodshot.

Tiffany continued her righteous accusations.

“I know! You’re the one who sabotaged the cameras, aren’t you?!” Her gaze, like a venomous snake, wrapped around me inch by inch. “Your goal wasn’t to destroy the jewelry, it was to steal it!”

My heart hammered in my chest. How could it be such a coincidence?

My face turned ashen, and a cold sweat broke out on my forehead.

“I have proof!” I suddenly remembered that I was recording a video for my best friend when I entered the store, and my phone was still recording!

“Let go of me! Who the hell do you think you are?” My gaze, cold and certain, pierced the two security guards.

They exchanged a look, hesitated for a moment, then lowered their batons.

Ignoring the throbbing pain in my twisted fingers, I pulled out my phone.

“See for yourselves! This video proves I didn’t break the jewelry!” I played the video, holding it up for everyone to see, my voice laced with ice. “For everything that’s happened today, I’m suing all of you for assault and battery!”

Everyone crowded closer, their suspicious glances turning into looks of disbelief, as if I were insane.

Tiffany was the first to let out a derisive laugh. “This video is all shaky and blurry, completely unclear! You just filmed some random shaky footage beforehand, then blurred it on purpose, hoping to escape your guilt today, didn’t you?!”

The crowd chimed in.

“Exactly! Only the beginning is clear, nothing after that. Do you think we’re idiots?”

“Why waste time? Just send her to the police station!”

Watching the grim-faced security guards slowly advancing, I quickly clicked on the video.

The video was perfectly clear. Why were they all pretending not to see it?

The two guards exchanged a look, then picked up their batons again, pointing them directly at me.

Seeing the sharp ends of their batons, my face went white, and my whole body trembled uncontrollably.

“Wait!” I pulled out my supplementary card, wanting only to escape quickly. I had no desire to deal with these barbarians any longer. After all, a hundred million was negligible to me, but being gawked at like a circus monkey made me intensely uncomfortable! “Just swipe a hundred million. Get it done.”

Tiffany saw me pull out the supplementary card.

Her smug expression twisted into something uglier.

Tiffany scoffed, looking me up and down, then leaned in close, whispering conspiratorially.

“You’re Mr. Sterling’s mistress, aren’t you? I’m warning you, get lost! How dare someone like you even associate with Mr. Sterling?”

“I don’t even get a chance to be near him, so who do you think you are?!”

My heart skipped a beat, a bad premonition instantly flooding my mind.

I didn’t understand what she meant! Mistress?

“Is this *your* card?” she sneered, her voice dripping with contempt.

My face showed impatience, my eyes shooting daggers at her. “Of course, it’s mine!”

Tiffany stepped forward and, to my utter shock, slapped me across the face.

She yanked my hair, her eyes filled with disgust. “This is Mr. Sterling’s supplementary card. Who are you to him?”

My ears rang, my breathing grew heavy.

“Ryan Sterling?” My gaze fixed on her. “I’m his wife! What’s the problem?”

Tiffany ignored my cold stare and burst out laughing.

“Wife?” Her eyes were filled with utter disdain. She then pulled out her phone. “*She’s* Mr. Sterling’s wife! You’re just a pickpocket who stole the card, aren’t you?”

My brow twitched, and I instinctively looked at the phone.

When I saw the young woman nestled against Ryan Sterling, my breath caught in my throat. I felt as if I’d been struck by lightning.

The woman intimately embracing my own husband wasn’t me!