Love’s Cunning Ruse

Chapter 177

At Lavender Club.

Adeline was fuming, glaring at the two trembling men before her and cursing them out. “You guys are

completely useless! I asked you to kidnap a woman and you couldn’t even manage that!”

Elliot gave Adeline a glance, furrowing his brows. “Just what the hell happened?”

This was certainly unexpected.

The two men had a pretty solid plan. One of them pretended to be a janitor, knocked Julie out, and

stuffed her into a cleaning cart before wheeling her out of Simpo Co. The other guy was supposed to

meet him at the door.

Next, they were supposed to deliver Julie to Adeline, but on their way, a sedan appeared out of

nowhere and blocked their path. Two armed men got out of the car.

Their job was just to bring Julie to Adeline. They never signed up to kill anyone, let alone face armed

guys. So, to save their own skins, they ditched Julie. Elliot had suspected from the get-go that Adeline

was behind this. That’s why he came to her first, instead of explaining everything to Kieran Hernandez.

Now they were in a real pickle. They had no idea who the two men that appeared out of nowhere were.

But one thing’s for sure, it was quickly spiraling out of control.

Adeline knew how serious this was.

Frowning, she dialed Kieran’s number.

Twenty minutes later, Adeline and Elliot arrived at Simpo Co. They weren’t alone. Dylan was with them.

After listening to Elliot’s side of the story, Dylan turned to Adeline, clearly unhappy. “I just finished

dealing with a suicide case. Are you trying to keep me busy?”

Although this wasn’t Adeline’s intention, she knew she was the one who started all this. So, she kept

quiet, letting Dylan chastise her for once.

Elliot informed Payne Hernandez about the location where the kidnappers grabbed Julie. Payne was

reviewing the traffic department’s surveillance footage. Just like the two men had said, Julie was taken

by two masked men, one tall and one short.

Having seen the footage, Kieran was already on the phone with the police. “Yes, that’s correct. Two

men, one tall, one short. The tall one’s about 174 cm, the short one’s around 168 cm. I’ll send you the

footage right now…”

Payne sent the suspects’ snapshots to the police station.

Dylan, still not entirely convinced, asked Kieran, “Could it be…”

Dylan suspected Lucian Hernandez, but didn’t voice his suspicion. Kieran knew what he meant.

The room fell silent, save for the clicking of Payne’s keyboard.

Finally, Payne broke the silence. He pointed at his computer screen and said to Kieran, “The suspects

were driving a car without a license plate. I managed to track it down using the surveillance footage.

The car ended up in the northern suburbs. But there’s a stretch of road there without surveillance. I

skipped that part, checked all the possible routes, and confirmed that the car ended up in an

abandoned parking lot in the northern part of the city…”

Elliot immediately said, “I’ll send someone to check it out!”

“No need.”

“No need.”

Two voices spoke simultaneously. One was Kieran’s, the other came from the doorway.

Everyone turned to look at the door following Kieran’s gaze.

Hayden Simson, dressed all in black, stood by the doorway. He looked at Kieran and said, “I’ve already

checked the car. No one’s inside.”

Kieran continued, “The suspects must have switched cars on the stretch without surveillance.”

Everyone anticipated this. Payne continued to work swiftly on his computer. “According to my records

and analysis, 48 cars passed through the stretch without surveillance.”

“So… she could be in any of these 48 cars?” Elliot asked, furrowing his brows deeply.

Adeline stood up and looked at Payne. “Give me all the plate numbers!”

Payne wrote a program to automatically capture and print the plate numbers. He then turned to Adeline

and said, “The quickest way now is to take these plate numbers to the police. Let them check all the

car owners…”

Adeline, clutching the printed plate numbers, quickly dragged Elliot out of the room.

Just as Payne was about to shut down his computer, Dylan stood up and told Payne, “First, track the

final parking location of the 48 cars. Then find the missing car without surveillance. After that, list all the

suspicious cars for me. I want to check the videos myself.”

Payne followed Dylan’s instructions, but he was confused. “There are 13 suspicious cars in total. They

all ended up in places without surveillance. So what?”

“Pull up the surveillance video of each car for me.” Dylan had already taken a seat next to Payne.

As Payne was scratching his head in confusion, he heard Dylan, his face expressionless, watching the

video of a suspicious car and saying, “Julie’s not in this car. Next one.”

“How do you know Julie’s not in this car? It passed through the stretch without surveillance and also

ended up in a place without surveillande. We can’t be sure if Julie was in this car!”

Dylan couldn’t explain how he knew.

Julien hung up her call with the police and turned her attention to Dylan. This was the forensic scientist,

Dylan, that Hayden had mentioned. He had incredible observation skills. He was better at psychology

and deduction than autopsies. He was quick, able to spot every detail in an instant, and his wealth of

knowledge made him a master at reasoning.

As long as the owner’s face is caught on the surveillance footage, Dylan would have Payne zoom in,

and then make accurate judgments based on the micro-expressions on the driver’s face.

Julien has some skill in this area too, just not as precise and quick as Dylan.”

Hayden looked at Kieran. He was just sitting on the sofa, unusually calm.

Kieran didn’t say a word, didn’t show any expression, but Hayden knew, the more calm this man

seemed, the deeper his thinking was.

He kept staring at the phone on the table, for a long time.

Hayden didn’t pay attention to Kieran, but turned to Julien and said, “You don’t need to participate in

today’s mission.”

Julien felt like she had heard wrong. She gave Hayden a cold look, “What?”

Hayden obviously wouldn’t repeat what he had said.

Payne on the side hurriedly repeated for Hayden, “I think this gentleman is making a lot of sense. This

mission to rescue Julie is very dangerous. Even though you look so cool when you fight that I want to

lie in your arms right away, I think you really shouldn’t participate in this mission.”

“No one has ever dared to lie in my arms.” Julien said this, her eyes fixed on Hayden.

Hayden’s cold gaze fell on Julien. He said, “This is an order.”

About rescuing Julie, Julien would never compromise, so she calmly contradicted Hayden.

She said, “The only one who can give me orders is me!”

This was the first time Julien had disobeyed Hayden’s orders since she had been following him, and it

was for his friend’s woman.

Hayden had a reason not to let Julien participate in this mission. He wasn’t worried about Julien’s

safety like Payne was. But rather, he was more worried about the safety of the kidnappers.

Just as Hayden and Julien were at a stalemate, Dylan suddenly spoke up and broke the silence

between the two, “Except for the five cars where the driver’s face can’t be seen in the surveillance

footage, the other forty-three cars are all clear.”

Payne immediately understood what he meant, “I’ll call Adeline and Elliot.”

-He was about to take out his phone, but suddenly realized, “If you can determine which cars are

suspicious, then why would you let Adeline and Elliot run

around for nothing? According to this search speed, Adeline and Elliot should have already searched

two cars by now, right?”

Dylan calmly replied, “Shouldn’t those who do wrong be punished?”

Payne was speechless.

He’d better just call Elliot honestly…

Payne sent the license plate numbers of the only five suspect cars to Elliot.

Dylan stood up and looked at Hayden and said, “I’m going to check on Elliot’s situation. You

occasionally need to interrupt Kerry’s thoughts.”

Dylan was about to leave, when he suddenly heard the always silent Kieran ask him, “Stop!”

This shout scared Dylan enough to stop him in his tracks.

“Do you have any idea who the suspect might be?” Hayden asked Kieran.

Kieran didn’t explain why he asked Dylan to stop, but turned his head to ask Karl, “What’s the name of

the woman who had lunch with Julie yesterday and spoke to Julie first in the canteen today?”

“Mr. Hernandez, are you referring to Davina Field, the head of the legal department?” Karl looked

confused, not understanding why Mr. Hernandez suddenly brought her up

。,,,,,, ◌�。-

“Where is she now? Kieran asked.

Karl frowned, and then replied, “After Mrs. Hernandez disappeared at noon, Ms. Davina has been

looking for her. I guess she’s still looking…” Kieran suddenly walked over to Payne, took Payne’s

laptop, opened a surveillance video, then looked at Dylan and said, “Come and see!”

Even though Dylan didn’t understand Kieran’s intention, he still walked towards Kieran.

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Kieran pointed to the surveillance video of Julie and Davina having lunch yesterday, then asked Dylan,

“Take a close look at this woman. Can you notice

anything?”