Chapter 145: The Murderer Killed Me to Punish Me?

Chapter 145: Chapter 145: The Murderer Killed Me to Punish Me?

"Our young master suffers from a severe mental illness and cannot be agitated. But these people... showing up uninvited is just..." Assistant Foster sighed and pointed to the surveillance camera in the yard. "We have cameras everywhere. You can review the footage. Our people tried to stop the stray dogs from biting them the moment it started, but you know as well as I do, once a dog goes berserk and latches on, it won’t let go easily."

The officer glanced at Asher, then back at Jude Lynch and Mrs. Lynch. "You need to get her to the hospital, now. We’ll conduct a full investigation, but if it turns out you were trespassing, that changes everything."

Asher hid behind me, his eyes dark and menacing as he stared at Jude Lynch and Mrs. Lynch.

"Don’t forget, we’ve already cut all ties... Next time you barge in here and provoke me, I just might... kill someone." Asher said the most vicious words in the most timid voice.

"Cece, were you scared?" Asher asked quietly after the police, Jude Lynch, and the others were gone.

I was more worried about the dog. I shook my head. "That lead dog... is he one of yours? He won’t be in any trouble, will he?"

"He’s very smart. He’s probably already run home by now," Asher said cheerfully.

I asked quietly, "What’s the dog’s name?"

Asher lowered his head and fell silent.

"Does he not have a name?" I asked.

"Stella..." he mumbled quietly.

"Huh? Stella? You gave the dog a ’star’ name, just like yours?" I almost laughed.

Asher just huffed and refused to say another word.

"Sir, Madam," Owen Foster began as he approached, "Noelle Lynch is at the hospital. Her life isn’t in danger, but her face is likely ruined. The situation is still blowing up online."

"Asher," I asked quietly, "what happened to Miss Lynch’s family... was that you?"

Asher didn’t deny it. Instead, he changed the subject. "Cece, I don’t want to go to the office..."

He was whining, trying to get his way. "You have to come with me, Cece."

I pushed his handsome, pouting face away. That trick wasn’t going to work on me. "Go by yourself. I have things to take care of."

"No..." It seemed Asher couldn’t bear to let me out of his sight, probably afraid that something would happen to me.

"Alright, I’ll go with you to the office first," I relented, deciding to placate him for now.

As we were leaving the Lancaster estate, Asher and I both went to see the Old Master, who was paralyzed and unable to speak.

’Honestly, living like this is more painful than death itself.’

’Too bad for him. He isn’t really living, but he can’t die either. He can only serve as a human shield.’

’I refuse to believe the Old Master had a change of heart and started feeding stray dogs. It’s obvious Asher was the one raising them...’

In the bed, the Old Master stared at Asher, his eyes looking like they were about to pop out of his skull. He stammered and sputtered, unable to form a single word, the picture of frantic desperation.

Asher just stared back at the Old Master, the corners of his mouth curling into a smile.

For a split second, he was truly terrifying.

"Grandfather, take care of yourself. You need to live... for a long, long time." Asher walked to the Old Master’s bedside, his voice low and deep.

Veins bulged on the Old Master’s forehead from the strain, but it was no use. He couldn’t say a thing.

I turned and walked out of the room to find Assistant Foster waiting outside. "Assistant Foster, how many years were you with the Old Master?"

He answered truthfully. "Ten years."

"And in all that time, you felt nothing?" After the Old Master’s collapse, he conducted a massive purge, instantly cleaning out the entire Lancaster household, right down to the maids.

’Back then, I suspected Owen Foster was some kind of hidden mastermind, but he always acted with such genuine respect toward Sebastian Lancaster.’

’Then I started to suspect he was using Asher—using the Lancaster heir and his mental state to seize control, like a regent ruling through a puppet emperor.’

"You’re still young, Madam. You don’t understand the depths of human evil." Owen Foster seemed to be deflecting, but his words were clearly loaded with meaning.

"My father died in a construction accident when I was a teenager. My sister was only five at the time. My mother took the blood money we got for his death and ran away, leaving my sister and me to fend for ourselves. I was just a kid, working and studying, picking through trash, begging for shelter... With the help of some kind people, I managed to pull myself and my sister out of the slums."

Owen Foster walked beside me as we made our way into the courtyard.

He looked down at the weeds, casually plucked one from the ground, and smiled faintly. "My sister was beautiful. Everyone said Dylan Lancaster was lucky to marry her."

’Marrying into the Lancaster family was, at the time, a huge step up for Owen Foster and his sister.’

I stared at Owen Foster in shock. Dylan Lancaster did have a wife once; I just never imagined it was Owen’s sister.

"If I hadn’t become the Old Master’s assistant, Dylan Lancaster never would have had the chance to meet my sister," Owen Foster said with a cold laugh. "He probably thought he could win my favor, since the Old Master valued me, so he married her. Unfortunately... he’s a real piece of scum."

Owen Foster’s gaze drifted to my stomach. "When my sister was six months pregnant, the hormones caused her to gain weight and made her look haggard. He grew tired of her, said she’d lost her youthful beauty, and started spending all his time fooling around. He became utterly infatuated with some popular starlet and wanted to divorce my sister, even against the Old Master’s wishes. She was six months pregnant. Of course she wouldn’t agree to a divorce."

And during a pregnancy, if the wife refuses to consent, there was nothing Dylan Lancaster could do.

"Can you guess what idea that little starlet gave Dylan?" Owen Foster asked with a faint, chilling smile.

But his expression sent a chill down my spine.

"She told him that a horse-training whip... it doesn’t leave major marks, but it’s excruciatingly painful. She told Dylan to beat my sister with it until she agreed to a divorce. She even said that domestic violence is just a ’family dispute,’ and if my sister insisted on staying and got beaten to death, well, she’d have deserved it."

I drew a sharp breath. ’Some people really can be monstrously, appallingly evil.’

"So that day, Dylan came home drunk and beat my sister. One body, two lives..."

Owen Foster’s voice was calm, as if he’d already put it all behind him.

But I knew he couldn’t have. He hated the Lancaster family. He hated Dylan Lancaster. And he hated the Old Master.

’I’m more certain than ever that the Lancaster family’s current state is inextricably linked to Assistant Foster. This man... is far from simple.’

"Dylan Lancaster lied and said my sister had fallen down the stairs. The Old Master paid to cover up the truth. If a maid in the Lancaster household—someone I was on good terms with—hadn’t risked her life to give me a video she’d recorded, I would have just believed my sister was ill-fated..."

Owen Foster opened the car door. "My apologies, Madam. I shouldn’t have burdened you with all this."

"And what happened then?" I asked, my tone deliberate.

Owen Foster’s hand froze for a second before he smiled. "Later, I brought the young master back from the psychiatric hospital. We were kindred spirits in our suffering. His eyes... they look a lot like my sister’s. I’ve tried to atone for what happened to my sister by dedicating myself to him..."

Owen Foster said he met Asher after all that, but I felt there was a double meaning in his words.

"And later, Dylan Lancaster got what was coming to him. He ’played’ too hard and ruined his body, leaving him sterile. He also injured his spine and has been in a wheelchair for years..." I murmured. "And now he’s a vegetable, living a fate worse than death. Serves him right."

"For the truly evil, death isn’t a punishment," Assistant Foster said meaningfully. "Keeping them alive, breathing but in a state worse than death... *that* is punishment."

I don’t know why, but a sharp pain suddenly pierced my chest.

’Death isn’t a punishment, a fate worse than death is...’

’Before I died, I was turned into a specimen and put in a glass display case. The killer used all those nutrient solutions to keep me alive... was he punishing me?’

My head suddenly began to throb violently. I braced myself against the car door, the pain only subsiding when Asher came to my side and wrapped his arms around me.

’What... what is it that I’ve forgotten?’