They couldn’t believe what they had just heard. Did Gwen seriously just say that she had killed someone while driving?
“Where did it happen?!” Lady Elizabeth asked hurriedly.“Not too far from here. About seven minutes from the gate”, Gwen replied, pointing in the direction of the street that the body would be on.“And did you check to see if the person was actually dead or not? Sometimes you can hit something and it’ll still be alive.”Gwen’s eyes widened.“Oh my god. I made a mistake and didn’t check, grandma. What if he is alive and is in so much pain and agony because of what I did? I can’t believe I messed up so badly” Gwen cried even more, realizing the massive error she had made.Lady Elizabeth quickly consoled her.“It’s not your fault, my darling. Something like this has never happened to you before, so it’s expected that you will make a mistake. Everything will be fine, so clean your tears” Lady Elizabeth helped wipe Gwen’s tears from her eyes.“Okay, Grandma, I’ll be strong” the traumatized girl sniffled.“Good. Now, for the most important question. Was anyone in the car with you when it happened?”Gwen shook her head.“No. Thankfully, I had already dropped my friends off at their homes and was on my way back when I got into the accident. Grandma, what do I do? What if someone saw me and the police are on their way to arrest me? I don’t want to go to jail”, Gwen panicked.Lady Elizabeth caressed her fearful granddaughter’s face and smiled warmly.“Don’t worry, my beautiful girl. Nothing is going to happen to you. Not while I’m alive. I’ll protect you until the ends of the earth”, Lady Elizabeth promised.Lady Elizabeth looked at her other children and grandchildren, and she took charge, like always.“Malcom and Genevieve, come here and take care of my granddaughter” she instructed, and her son and daughter-in-law did as told.Once she saw that Gwen was being comforted by her parents, Lady Elizabeth looked at the others and instructed “As for the rest of you, follow me outside, and let’s see the car that caused all of this”“Okay, grandmother,” everyone said in unison and stood up.Jeremiah, who didn’t want to be a part of what was going on, decided to do his own thing. He, on multiple occasions, had been told that he wasn’t a part of the family, so for the first time in a very long time, he was going to listen.“Come on mum, let’s go back to our room and leave the others to handle this” Jeremiah said as he tried helping his mother stand up.Once he had managed to do that and was about to take her to their room, Lady Elizabeth stopped him.“Monkey, where do you think you’re going?”Jeremiah froze, then he looked at the woman with a confused stare.“I’m going to my room. I don’t want to bother anyone anymore, so I’m excusing myself from the—““And who gave you permission or the right to think you could leave without my say-so?” Lady Elizabeth questioned, and Jeremiah didn’t know what to say back.“You and your useless mother are coming with me and don’t think you can refuse. Now, walk behind the rest of us. I don’t want your stench rubbing off on me and my family”, Lady Elizabeth instructed, then took the lead.Jeremiah looked at his mother and wondered what he should do.First, he was told not to be a part of the family’s matters, and now he was being told the opposite. It was very confusing.“Don’t say anything and just do as Lady Elizabeth says. You don’t want to incur more of her wrath now, do you?” Michelle advised, and then looked at the injury behind her son’s head.“When this is all over, I’ll help you clean that up and patch it with a bandaid, then I’ll cook your favorite meal as an apology for slapping you.”“Alright, mother,” Jeremiah said, then listened to his mother.The two followed, giving a good enough distance between themselves and everyone until finally they were all standing outside the mansion where the murder weapon, the car, was parked.The car had a huge dent in the front bumper, cracks on the windscreen, and patches of blood on both areas which showed how seriously Gwen had slammed into the victim.“Mother, what do we do? That is such a massive dent that it’ll be hard to get rid of it”, Malcom asked Lady Elizabeth, who was thinking of the next step.Lady Elizabeth groaned.“First of all, we’ll have to—” she said, but wasn’t able to finish when, suddenly, police sirens started blaring from the estate’s gate.The estate was quite massive, so once the gate is opened, it'd take them less than three minutes to get there.Gwen’s eyes widened, and her heart sank into her stomach.“Oh, no. They’re here. I’m going to go to jail for murder and rot until there’s nothing left of me. Mum, please don’t let them take me” Gwen begged, and with her entire body, ridden in horror, she held her mother tightly.Lady Elizabeth looked at the traumatized girl who she had a lot of plans for, and she couldn’t let her life go to waste.“Nothing like that is going to happen,” Lady Elizabeth said.Everyone looked at her, thinking that she had a plan.“What do we do, mother-in-law?! The police are so close” Genevieve asked.Lady Elizabeth saw that everyone was panicking and that wasn’t good. The situation had completely changed now that the police were involved.“Everyone calm down! You’re going to make the police suspicious of us when they get here. Now, take a deep breath and breathe”, Lady Elizabeth instructed, and they all did as told.Standing with his mother, Jeremiah wondered what was going to happen.Though they all insulted and belittled him at any opportunity they had, Jeremiah didn’t really hate the members of the Prescott family. He didn’t want to see his niece get thrown into jail, but there was nothing he could do except watch.“Now that everyone has calmed down we’ll do what we’re supposed to and that starts with taking care of the evidence,” Lady Elizabeth said, then walked up to Gwen.She opened her hand and asked, “Where are the car keys?”Gwen, whose hands were trembling, struggled to take the keys out of her pocket, so her mother helped her do it.“Here it is, mother-in-law”. Genevieve stretched the keys to Lady Elizabeth.She took the keys and then faced the other members of the family.“The truth should never leave the lips of those standing here. Don’t even dare say it as a joke or else I’ll make the parrot regret it for the rest of their life. Am I understood?!”“Yes, Grandmother!” they all replied, and she looked at William.“You’re a part of the family now, William, and as my future grandson-in-law, it is your duty, just like my son and grandsons, to protect the lineage. I hope I can trust you?”William’s eyes widened.This was the opportunity he had been waiting for. The perfect chance to ingratiate himself with the matriarch of the family.It also meant that he now knew a massive secret of Gwen’s, who was someone he had always wanted for himself.In fact, his original plan was to go for Gwen instead of Mirabel, but because his family’s name wasn’t as big or influential as Lady Elizabeth wanted, she decided to push the relationship with her first granddaughter, Mirabel, instead.She had way bigger plans for Gwen.“My mouth is sealed, grandmother. I’ll never say any of this to anyone, not even my family members”, Willian promised.“Good” Lady Elizabeth said, then they started hearing the sirens getting louder, which meant that the gate had been opened for them to enter the estate.The panic started to come out again, but Lady Elizabeth quelled it.“We’re going to get rid of the evidence and once we do that, all we have to do is convince the police that they’ve made a mistake coming here and everything will go back to normal” Lady Elizabeth gave the plan.“Alright, grandmother. We only have less than two minutes to get rid of the car, so who is going to—?“ Victor asked, but was interrupted when Lady Elizabeth cut him off.She turned to a particular direction of the gathering and said “Jeremiah is going to do it.”“What?!” Jeremiah exclaimed, utterly shocked by the statement. Everyone looked at Jeremiah and they didn’t say anything. They were okay with using him for the task.“Come here, boy!” Lady Elizabeth instructed, and Jeremiah’s eyes blinked rapidly. He was being forced to involve himself in the situation, and he didn’t know what to do about it. He hesitated to move and then noticed that his mother was also holding him. She didn’t want her son to join the cover-up for murder. Lady Elizabeth looked at Michelle who was trying to prevent Jeremiah from moving and she frowned.“Hey witch, what did I tell you about interfering in my affairs?!” Michelle gulped.“You told me not to, Lady Elizabeth” she replied.“Then what do you think you’re doing—?!” The sirens got louder.“I don’t have time for you at the moment, but don’t make the mistake of thinking that your actions will go unpunished. Now, you have one second to let go of that bastard, and he has less than three seconds to come here o
Hearing the voice, Jeremiah’s eyes widened.He had been so enthralled in the chaos of what he was doing that the loud noise of the car’s engine had drowned the sound of the police cars driving towards and surrounding him.They had turned off their sirens and headlights to make sure he didn’t see them coming, and now he had nowhere to go. “The police? What are the police doing here?! I thought grandmother was handling the situation—” Jeremiah panicked but was interrupted.“This is your final warning! Turn off the engine and come out with your hands up. Refuse and we’ll be forced to use deadly force”, Officer Prince warned.Immediately, Jeremiah turned off the engine.“Good. Now, come out with your hands up and do it slowly. Any strange movement and we might be forced to put you down—““Alright, I’ve heard you! I’m coming out!” Jeremiah yelled, then took his hands out of the car first.“As you can see, my hands are empty and outside the car. I am coming out too, so please don’t shoot”
Jeremiah picked himself up and then returned to sitting on the welded steel bench inside the holding cell. One by one, Jeremiah watched the other detainees get their bail paid and leave their holding cells and each time, the fear in his heart grew because he knew what was installed for him at the end of the night.He wasn’t going to be bailed out and would be sent to prison to rot and, because of the severity of the crime he was being framed for committing, he would have an instant target on his back. More time passed and something switched. Instead of fear, what grew in Jeremiah’s heart became hatred for the entire Prescott family members. The only one spared was his mother.They had committed the crime and also framed him for it and all he could think of was getting revenge on every single one of them. If the opportunity ever presented itself, then he was going to take it with full force and not look back. Finally, the police station closed and Jeremiah, being the only detainee
The man got closer really fast and started to aggressively wear Jeremiah his shirt. Even though Jeremiah tried to fight him, the man’s chaotic strength was just too much. Within seconds, he was able to wear Jeremiah his shirt.Jeremiah was very confused. Why did his new cellmate just switch their shirts? He wondered but wasn’t given the time to think more about it because the man hurriedly grabbed his hands and started chanting something.“Hey, let go!” Jeremiah yelled as he tried pulling his hands free, but was shocked to realize that his hands wouldn’t budge. He tried pulling his hand free some more, but still nothing. Something that was beyond the cellmate’s grip strength was keeping both his and the man’s hands together, but Jeremiah had no idea what that was.Panicking, Jeremiah looked at the cell door where he could still hear the strange type of knocking. He grimaced after realizing that it wasn’t just regular knocking but rather sounded like a form of code.However, he didn’
“Wake up” echoed an eerie voice at the back of Jeremiah’s mind.“Huh? Who said that?!” Jeremiah asked internally, feeling like he was surrounded by multiple entities.“Food. We can sense delicious food and it is so close. Our hunger rises, now WAKE UP AND FEED US!”Jeremiah gasped, panting as he regained consciousness and opened his eyes.‘What was that? What was that voice and presence I just—?’ He thought but paused when he realized something.“Wait. Why is everywhere so dark?” He asked himself, then grimaced because he felt something covering his head.“What’s this on my head? Wait, is this why everywhere appears so dark?” Jeremiah tried to take the sack off his head, but to his surprise, his arms were cuffed behind his back, so he couldn’t move them. “Looks like I’m still handcuffed, but why?” He asked himself, wondering why he was still handcuffed when he had already been taken to his cell and had been released from his cuffs.He also realized that he was sitting on the floor.“
Jeremiah's widened eyes fidgeted. A spine-chilling cold washed over him as the sight of the aged gentleman begging for his help caused his entire body to vibrate with shock and disbelief.His bones became weak for a moment, and, as a result, he fell backwards. Although, he was already sitting on the floor and, as such, didn't and couldn't fall far.However, Jeremiah placed his left forearm behind himself and his right palm beside his body, using both to barely prevent his entire back from touching the floor. Jeremiah looked up and saw the bodyguard staring down at him with a no-nonsense expression. A sight that eliminated any idea of this being a joke or prank being played on him.Panting, Jeremiah stared at the back of the aged gentleman's head, and knowing what it meant, he understood the gravity of what was being asked of him. "Umm, I don't know what to tell you, sir, but I can't help you," Jeremiah said, hoping again that the man would listen."Doctor Michael, all a mortal man,
“The Mr. Gordon Folly?! You mean the man who stands as the richest person in all of Beethoven, Gordon Folly?!” Jeremiah asked. William smirked and chuckled lightly.“That is correct, Doctor. It brings me joy seeing that you know who my master is, because it means you understand why your help is so important”, William said.Jeremiah grunted, then wondered just how talented this Doctor Michael person was for William to be going this far just to seek his help.His next thoughts became ones that questioned why someone so important was in a prison cell when he met him. Also, why was he looking rough and unkept like a man who had given up on hope and life in general?As a matter of fact, the color of the badge on the uniform shirt he wore was one that allowed the possibility of bail, so if Doctor Michael was really that important, then why hadn’t his bail been paid when Jeremiah met him?Jeremiah had so many questions about his mysterious cellmate, but just as he began to get lost in them,
Jeremiah, although not this extremely intelligent Doctor Michael person, was still smart enough to know that the same promise that William had given him had also been made to every single person brainstorming in front of him right now.He knew that based on how active and passionate they were about what they were doing.Even he would act the same way they were when receiving a favor from the richest man in Beethoven, who also was amongst the top ten richest people in the world, was on the line.“Isn’t this kind of overkill?” Jeremiah asked, and William grimaced.“Overkill? How so, doctor?”Jeremiah cleared his throat and said “I mean, more than one thousand people are fighting for the same thing and only one out of all of them is going to be the winner. That’s quite a lot if you ask me.”William looked at the crowd and said “If this is what Doctor Michael considers overkill, then I wonder what he would think about the actual scope of the think tank project.”Jeremiah jolted in shock.