Chapter 138
A low, familiar voice suddenly rang out at the doorway, dripping with undisguised mockery and icy fury.
Every pair of eyes immediately turned toward the entrance.
Jacob stood there.
He wore a black suit, his shirt collar unbuttoned, revealing fabric slightly dampened with sweat. His face bore something resembling a smile, but that smile held no warmth—only naked killing intent and a kind of almost manic pleasure.
Sawyer's expression changed instantly. "You..."
"Me what?" Jacob stepped into the room, his gaze sweeping across the three people before finally settling on Elizabeth, studying her deeply for a moment, then turning to Sawyer. "Sawyer, did you think your plan was foolproof?"
Sawyer's pupils contracted violently. His hand crept toward his waist, where a gun was hidden.
Jacob caught the movement but merely smiled with contempt.
"Don't waste your energy," he said, his tone carrying the leisurely quality of a cat toying with a mouse. "Your men outside are all down. Everything you arranged on this yacht, including your people—they're all in my hands now."
Sawyer's hand froze.
He stared at Jacob, disbelief flashing in his eyes. "Impossible! The poison..."
"Poison?" Jacob raised an eyebrow, pulling a small glass vial from his pocket and shaking it in his hand. "You mean this?"
Sawyer's face completely changed.
Inside that bottle was the colorless, odorless lethal poison he'd meticulously prepared. He'd had it slipped into Jacob's drink, timed it perfectly—Jacob should already be dead by now.
Yet Jacob stood there, alive and well, toying with that vial of poison like a plaything.
"Sawyer," Jacob casually tossed the bottle to the floor, glass shattering, poison spattering, "you shouldn't have tried to recruit the Smith Family's people against me."
He took a step closer, his gaze cold as a blade. "Did you really think Richard, Dave, and the others would actually cooperate with you? Sure, they hate me, but they understand something more clearly—betraying one of their own means destroying the entire Smith Family. If the Smith Family goes down, what good outcome could they possibly have?"
Sawyer's face alternated between pale and flushed. He whipped his head toward Uri—no, toward Elizabeth—a flash of sudden realization crossing his eyes.
"You..." his voice came out hoarse, "you were working together all along?"
Elizabeth said nothing, only watched him quietly. Behind her mask, her eyes held an indescribably complex expression.
Jacob suddenly laughed, that laugh carrying some indefinable emotion.
"Sawyer, you calculated everything, but you got one thing wrong," he said, his tone tinged with mockery. "The Smith Family has maintained its foothold in this city for so many years, not just through ruthlessness. It's because we've always known who's an outsider and who's family."
He paused, then spoke each word deliberately, "No matter how much money or power you have, to them, you'll always be an outsider."
Sawyer's expression had reached its ugliest point. But his eyes still showed no panic.
He looked at Jacob and suddenly smiled too.
That smile carried a kind of morbid excitement and cruel satisfaction.
"Jacob," he said softly, "you're right—I did miscalculate about the Smith Family. But there's one thing you seem to have forgotten."
Jacob's brow furrowed slightly.
Sawyer's gaze slowly turned toward Elizabeth. His lips curled into a malicious arc.
"Your family member here just personally admitted—she only got close to you to investigate her grandfather's death. Her kindness toward you, her tenderness, all that supposed sincerity—it was all fake."
The air in the private room instantly froze.
Jacob's body stiffened almost imperceptibly.
He didn't turn around. He didn't even glance at Elizabeth. But his clenched fists, the veins bulging on the backs of his hands, betrayed the violent turmoil within him.
Sawyer watched his reaction, his smile growing more triumphant.
"Jacob, you really are a romantic fool," he said softly with a laugh. "Too bad the person you fell in love with has been lying to you from the start. You did so much for her, offended everyone for her sake, didn't even care about your own life—and what did you get?"
He paused, each word like a poisoned needle piercing Jacob's heart, "She doesn't care about you at all."
Elizabeth's body trembled slightly.
She wanted to say something, but her throat felt blocked by something, unable to produce a single word.
Sawyer was speaking the truth.
She had approached Jacob initially only for revenge, for self-preservation, to investigate Hughes's death. Those tender moments, those nights held in his arms, those times he'd practically begged her to "be true to me"—all along, she'd kept secrets in her heart.
She had never truly trusted him.
She had never truly been honest with him.
What right did she have to defend herself?
Jacob remained silent for a long time.
The private room was terrifyingly quiet, with only the sound of waves outside the window, beating against everyone's hearts, one after another.
Then Jacob moved.
He didn't turn around, didn't question, didn't rage. He simply took a deep breath, then looked coldly at Sawyer, his voice hoarse but firm, "You'd better worry about saving your own skin first."
Sawyer's smile froze.
In that instant, Sawyer suddenly raised his hand, pulling the gun he'd prepared from his waist, the barrel pointing directly at—
Elizabeth!
The gunshot was deafening!
Elizabeth's reaction was lightning-fast! The moment Sawyer pulled the trigger, she dove to the side!
Jacob's pupils contracted instantly! Almost instinctively, he lunged toward Sawyer, but was blocked by several obstacles Sawyer had positioned in advance!
Sawyer seized the opportunity, violently bursting through a hidden door on the other side of the room, his figure disappearing into the darkness!
"Stop!" Jacob roared, about to give chase—
"Jacob! Don't move!" Elizabeth's voice suddenly rang out, sharp and urgent, carrying unprecedented fear!
Jacob whipped around.
Elizabeth was half-kneeling on the floor, the mask on her face askew, revealing half of her pale face. She wasn't looking at him, but staring fixedly at the spot where she'd just thrown herself down.
Under that table, a device with a countdown timer was clearly strapped in place.
Bright red numbers were ticking down.
5:00
4:59
4:58
A bomb.
Elizabeth's mind went blank, but her body reacted before her consciousness could. She suddenly sprang up, rushed toward Jacob, and used all her strength to push him toward the door!
"Jump overboard! Jump now!"
Jacob stumbled back a few steps from her push, turned to look at her, shock and anger flashing in his eyes. "You..."
"There's no time! Go!" Elizabeth's voice was nearly a scream. "There are bombs all over this yacht! Sawyer's going to blow up the entire ship!"
Jacob stared at her intently, then suddenly reached out and grabbed her wrist in one swift motion. "We go together!"
Elizabeth froze.
She looked at him, looked into those deep black eyes, which held no accusation, no anger—only a kind of almost insane determination.
4:12
4:11
She gritted her teeth, gripped his hand in return, and together they rushed toward the deck.