After Our Entire Family Was Reborn Adopted Brother Went Insane Chapter 08
Leo slumped against the floor, still trying to argue.
“It’s not like that.
That artist is genuinely gifted.
He’s going to be famous one day.”
“Lily just wants to give him a chance.
Once he wins an award abroad, they’ll come back together.
They’ll be happy.”
That was when my adoptive parents, who had been listening in the doorway, pushed into the room.
My adoptive father was shaking with fury.
He grabbed the ashtray off the coffee table and hurled it.
“You worthless fool!”
“You two conspired to swindle fifty million from this family – for some nobody who crawled out of nowhere?”
“And all that talk about a kidnapping!
Do you have any idea what filing a false report means?”
Leo didn’t flinch away.
The ashtray struck his forehead.
Blood ran down his face.
My adoptive mother screamed and lurched forward – torn between horror and fury.
“Stop hitting him!
What matters now is finding Lily!”
“If this wasn’t a real kidnapping, then get that child home before anyone outside this family finds out.
Think about our reputation!”
I linked my arm through Ethan’s.
“Lead the way.”
“Let’s go see this brilliant artist you’ve all been sponsoring.”
Leo pressed his hand to his bleeding forehead, eyes shifting.
“I – I can’t.”
“Lily said not to come before the money came through.
The artist has a temper.
If he gets upset, he might not take her abroad for the exhibition.”
I let out a short, cold laugh.
A temper?
More like bottomless greed.
Ethan had run out of patience.
He dialed his assistant.
“Track Leo’s phone location history.
Find whatever number he’s been in frequent contact with.”
Less than five minutes later, an address landed on Ethan’s screen.
On the other side of the city.
The most neglected, run-down corner of Manhattan.
Leo’s face went white.
“Don’t go.
Please.
Don’t go.”
“It’ll humiliate Lily.”
Ethan looked at him with cold eyes.
“Would you like to walk yourself, or would you prefer to be carried?”
When the car pulled up to the address, the air was thick with the smell of rot – garbage and stagnant water pooling across cracked asphalt.
My adoptive mother held her nose, struggling to believe her daughter could be somewhere like this.
“Leo, are you sure this is right?
Lily grew up with every comfort.
She couldn’t survive a place like this.”
Leo shrank into the corner of the car and said nothing.
The car stopped in front of a crumbling residential block.
The moment we stepped out, voices came spilling down from one of the upper floors – sharp, ugly, in the middle of a fight.
“Where’s the money!
Your useless brother said he’d wire it today!”
A man’s voice.
Loud enough to rattle the walls.
Then Lily – her voice breaking, desperate.
“Zach, calm down.
My family’s definitely getting it together.”
“As soon as the fifty million clears, we’ll go to Paris.
You’ll have your exhibition -“
The next second, Lily’s words were cut off by the crack of a slap.
“Exhibition?
I owe loan sharks, and they want their money back tomorrow!”
“I think your brother’s been stringing me along!”
“If there’s no money, don’t blame me for what happens next!”
Everyone standing below went still.
I looked at Leo.
He was pale as ash, mouth trembling.
“No, it can’t be.
Zach promised me he’d treat Lily right.”
I gave a short, cold laugh.
In my last life, the ransom had been wired through immediately.
Lily never got to see who this man really was.
She had gone on believing she’d found her true love.
But this time around…
It seemed she had been reborn as well.
She had believed the man she loved was real, and had run away for him at any cost.
Only this time, without the money arriving on schedule, his true colors had come out.
Before Leo could react, Ethan’s security detail had already sprinted up the stairs.
I followed.
The flimsy iron door was kicked off its hinges.
What we found inside stopped everyone cold.
