Fiona and Charmaine were both confident that Bethan was faking her injury. Fiona was even willing to bet that there would be a hickey on Bethan’s arm if she removed her bandage!
Fiona could not help but feel enraged whenever she recalled how exhausted Brettley was when he arrived home moments ago.
It should have been her! She should have been the reason Brettley was dog-tired, but it turned out that…
“Alright.”
Seeing how confident Fiona and Charmaine were, Bethan sneered and placed her arm in front of Arianna. Arianna could smell the stench of blood wafting off Bethan’s bandaged arm as soon as it got close to her.
Arianna furrowed her brows and shot Bethan a nervous glance. Then, she asked in a low voice, “Director Bethan, do you really…want to remove the bandage?”
Since she could still smell the stench of blood despite the many layers of bandage, Arianna guessed that Bethan’s wound must be very deep.
Bethan sneered, then glanced at Fiona and Charmaine. “If I don’t remove my bandage, how can I show them that I’m really hurt and not faking my injury?”
Arianna pursed her lips in disapproval. She had no choice but to follow Bethan’s request and remove the bandage from her arm.
The scent of blood wafted through the entire office almost immediately.
Charmaine froze momentarily, then turned to look at Fiona, her face etched with alarm.
A hint of surprise flashed through Fiona’s eyes. How… How was this possible?
The reason Brettley had carried Bethan out of the office was that the libido-enhancing drugs had taken effect, and he wanted to use Bethan as a means of releasing his sexual desire! How could there possibly be a wound on Bethan’s arm, much less such a fresh one?
While the two of them were immersed in their thoughts, Arianna continued to unwrap Bethan’s bandage and finally removed it altogether.
Beneath the bandage was a bloody wound sprinkled with yellow antiseptic powder. The wound was sutured, but even then, it was still a big one.
Arianna glanced at it and guessed that Bethan’s wound was about ten centimeters long, with more than ten stitches!
Charmaine and Fiona were both stunned.
The rest of the employees, who–like Charmaine and Fiona–did not believe that Brettley had taken Bethan to the hospital, were just as astounded.
In fact, Bethan had deliberately cut herself with a fruit knife at home.
At the time, the doctor had told her that as long as her arm was wrapped, no one would try to look at her wound and attempted to talk her out of harming herself.
However, Bethan knew that…neither Fiona nor Charmaine would let her hear the end of this unless she showed them an actual wound.
She had expected this to happen, so she had deliberately cut herself to prepare for this scenario.
“Is this clear enough?”
Bethan scoffed, turned around, and proffered her arm to Fiona and Charmaine. “
What did you two promise me just now?” she added, smirking coldly. “Charmaine, I’ll be waiting for your apology letter.”
With that, she ordered Arianna to help her wrap her wound up again.
Bethan turned around and glanced at Fiona’s pale face impassively. “I’m not someone who’s skilled at faking illnesses. In my opinion, faking illnesses is something only a useless person would do.”
She blinked at Fiona innocently. “Don’t you agree, Ms. Blake?”
Fiona’s face was as pale as a sheet of paper. She bit down on her lip and said in a casual tone, “Of course. Just now, I kept trying to stop Charmaine from spreading rumors about you faking an injury…”
With that, she smiled at Bethan and added, “Don’t worry. I ‘ll make sure that Charmaine hands in the apology letter exactly as you asked.”
Bethan chuckled. “That’d be great.”
Then, she turned around and adjusted the sling on her neck.
However, as she was doing this, the collar of Bethan’s shirt gaped open, revealing her collarbone, where Brettley’s hickey remained.
Charmaine immediately jumped when she saw this. She immediately stormed toward Bethan, who was walking toward her office, and blocked her path. “Ms. Bethan, when you came in to work this morning, your neck and collarbone were bare. It’s not even twenty-four hours yet, but why is there something new on your collarbone?”
Bethan froze in her tracks.
She turned around and glanced at Charmaine with her eyebrows raised. “What are you trying to say?”
Charmaine snorted in indignation and pointed at Bethan’s hickey. “This thing wasn’t on your neck this morning. You were working the who le day, and the only time you left your office was when you hurt yourself, and Mr. Morrison had to carry you out of there “Who left that hickey on your neck, then?”
Bethan pursed her lips upon hearing Charmaine’s question but did not know what to say in response.
She could not tell them that Brettley gave her the hickey, yet at the same time, she could not think of any other excuse.
Bethan was afraid that if she told everyone that it was Brettley, Fiona would fake her illness and pretend to faint.
If that happened and Brettley rushed over, Bethan was worried that Brettley would deny everything, causing her to become the offender once more.
However, if she did not come clean with the truth… How else could she explain the hickey? She could not say that she did it herself, could she?
“What’s wrong? Cat got your tongue? “
Charmaine could tell Bethan was hesitant to tell the truth because of Fiona and felt even more confident in her guesses. “Didn’t you go to the hospital? Did the doctor give you a kiss for your boo-boo?”
Bethan narrowed her eyes and swept her cold glance across Charmaine’s face. “Why do you care so much about something on my neck?”
“That’s right.”
Arianna rolled her eyes at Charmaine and could not help adding, “First, you insisted that Director Bethan faked her injury, and now, you’re questioning something that’s on her neck. I don’t think it’s any of your business at all! “
Charmaine snickered. “I just wanted to get to the bottom of things, that’s all.”
She crossed her arms at her chest and continued, “After all, Mr. Morrison did carry Director Bethan away just now. He is my best friend, Fiona’s boyfriend, so of course I want to get to the bottom of this so that I know Bethan isn’t having an affair with Mr. Morrison. Besides…”
Charmaine curled her lips into a smirk. “Director Bethan was in her office the entire morning but didn’t suffer any injuries at all, but as soon as Mr. Morrison arrived, she ended up hurting herself so badly.
“On top of that, it was her arm that had gotten hurt, not her legs, but she still needed Mr. Morrison to carry her… Who knows if her injuries were real, or if she was just faking it to get Mr. Morrison’s attention?”
“You– “
Arianna glared at Charmaine in fury. On the other hand, Samson was so infuriated by this that he lunged forward as though he wanted to beat Charmaine before Zayne stopped him.
Just as the atmosphere in the office grew tense by the second, a clear, male voice rang out from the door, “Why, what an excellent imagination you have there.”
Everyone immediately glanced in the direction of the voice.
Bethan, too, furrowed her brows upon hearing this voice and lifted her head.
Christian was leaning against the doorframe casually, staring at the employees with a roguish look on his face, while Brettley stood behind him, his expression dark.
Everyone in the office fell into silence upon seeing their arrival.
“Brettley, is this the Morrison Group’s work culture? It’s quite interesting, I must say, ” teased Christian with a small smirk. Then, he turned to smile at Bethan. “I was worried about your injury, so I came upstairs to check on you, but I didn’t expect to stumble upon such an exciting show!
“I guess it’s true when they say that designers’ brains are built differently from normal people’s,” added Christian as he slowly walked toward Bethan. “
Any normal person would surely be concerned when they saw their colleague or superior getting hurt, but you, Ms. Ross, are built differently. Bethan has suffered such a serious injury, yet you’re fixated on her hickey instead.”
Then, he pulled Bethan into his arms.
As soon as he did this, Christian could feel Brettley’s cold gaze on him. He could not care less, though.
Just a few minutes ago, he had witnessed Bethan removing her bandage right in front of everyone.
Initially, he, too, thought that there would not be any wound beneath the bandage since he had just found out about everything that happened from Shannon a short while ago.
To his surprise, however…there was a cut on Bethan’s arm beneath the bandage.
Christian quickly put two and two together and realized that Bethan had deliberately hurt herself to ensure she would not be caught out.
On top of that, the wound was a fairly large and deep one.
He could not believe that Bethan willingly hurt herself to prevent anyone from misunderstanding her. As soon as he realized this, Christian could not help but feel sorry for her.
He smiled, glancing at Charmaine and Fiona. “Didn’t you want to know where the hickey came from?
Well, it’s from me.”
As soon as he said this, the entire office burst into a flurry of activity as the employees murmured and gossiped about this discovery.
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