Chapter 1 Inspection
Amidst a splitting headache, Amelia Richardson suddenly felt something probing between her legs.
Her ice-cold eyes snapped open, only to see two middle-aged women—one pulling at her pants while the other struggled to pry her legs apart, trying to reach her hand underneath.
"You're asking for it!"
Amelia kicked away the fat woman who was groping her. Caught off guard, the woman fell backward.
"That hurts!"
The other woman stopped trying to pull off Amelia's pants and quickly moved to help the fat woman up.
Amelia tried to grab the two women but found her hands tightly bound with rope.
Damn it! Where was this? Wasn't she supposed to be sleeping at her foster mother's house?
She quickly scanned her surroundings. This was a run-down woodshed with the door shut tight, only a bit of light streaming in through a small window above.
The fat woman was helped up and spat at Amelia.
"Damn it! How dare you push me! You're bitch!"
She raised her hand to slap Amelia's face, but the other woman grabbed her arm.
"She's worth thirty thousand dollars—don't damage her! We're counting on that face to double our profit!"
The fat woman pulled back her hand, suppressing her anger. "That dose could knock out a bull, but she woke up so fast! Well, since you're awake, you can cooperate with the inspection yourself."
Amelia narrowed her eyes. "What inspection?"
"For thirty thousand dollars, we need to check if you're still a virgin."
So they were inspecting her?
How dare they!
Did these people know who she was?
She was the black market boss of Thornfield. The entire underground market of Thornfield was her territory.
Amelia let out a cold laugh, her sharp eyes flashing as she worked to free herself from the rope while deliberately stalling for time. "What thirty thousand dollars? Who the hell are you people!"
She had flown back to Ravenshollow from Thornfield because she heard her foster mother Piper Thornton was dying.
But Piper's condition wasn't serious—just a common cold.
She was planning to return to Thornfield the next day, but when she woke up, she found herself tied up here.
The fat woman grabbed one of her feet and sneered, "Piper sold you to us. If you behave, we can marry you off to someone decent. Otherwise, you'll end up with some fifty or sixty-year-old bachelor!"
"What did you say? Piper sold me to you?"
Amelia just stared, utterly speechless.
When she was three, Piper picked her up from the roadside. She was supposed to be a foster daughter but was really raised as a servant.
From the moment she could understand things, all the dirty and hard work fell to her.
So she worked hard to learn skills. At twelve, she finally had the means to leave and never came back.
But she never forgot the debt of being raised.
On the first of every month, she sent money back.
The money she sent was already enough for them to buy three or four apartments in any city center.
This time, she only came back because she heard Piper was seriously ill and wanted to see her one last time.
But she never expected Piper to be even more ruthless than before, selling her to these people for thirty thousand dollars.
No wonder Piper was so caring when she came back this time.
She thought Piper had changed, but this was what she was waiting for.
She should have listened to her subordinates—the Reynolds family had no good people, and she shouldn't have come back.
Her mind raced as her hands kept working behind her back.
Just a little more and she could untie the rope.
Amelia took a deep breath and pretended not to believe them. "You're lying! I'm supposed to marry Isaac Reynolds!"
"Marry Isaac?" The woman laughed. "You haven't been back in so many years, so you don't know! Isaac is about to marry the daughter of a big company. Their family is driving a Mercedes now—why would they need to marry you?"
The other woman gripped her ankle harder.
"Spread your legs! We need to check if you're still a virgin. If you're not, we need to get half the money back."
"Don't try to struggle. If we accidentally break it, you're the one who'll suffer."
Amelia suddenly smiled.
"Let's see who suffers!"
The next second, the rope finally came loose. She grabbed the fat woman's throat and lifted her up.
The woman struggled hard but couldn't break free from Amelia's grip.
From lack of oxygen, her face quickly turned red, her lips becoming purple.
Seeing this, the other woman rushed forward to help but was kicked away by Amelia, her back slamming hard against the wall.
When she fell, she coughed up blood.
But the woman ignored the pain and immediately shouted outside, "Help! Someone help!"
Soon two burly men rushed in.
Each held a stick and swung at Amelia.
Seeing this, Amelia threw the woman in her hand aside and caught both falling sticks with her hands.
The two men froze.
Such fast reflexes!
By the time they reacted, they were already kicked away by Amelia and knocked unconscious.
Just then, the fat woman Amelia had thrown earlier silently lunged at her again.
But Amelia had already sensed it. When the woman got close, she spun around quickly and knocked her out with a flying stick.
Ten minutes later, Amelia walked out of the woodshed engulfed in flames, the harsh sunlight causing a slight stinging pain in her eyes.
She raised her hand to shield her eyes, hearing cries for help from inside.
She didn't look back once. After adjusting to the light, she walked expressionlessly toward the Reynolds family.
Human traffickers deserved to die!
And the next to die would be the Reynolds family!
As she walked forward, shouts came from the distance.
"Fire!"
"Put out the fire! Quick!"
The fire drew villagers carrying water buckets running toward it.
Amelia wore one of the middle-aged women's coats. With her head down, she didn't attract any attention, passing by the villagers rushing to fight the fire in the opposite direction.
Before long, Amelia arrived at the Reynolds family residence.
She raised her foot and kicked open the wooden door of the Reynolds Villa.
The door fell with a crash, raising a cloud of dust.
But after entering, she found the Reynolds Villa already empty—not a soul in sight.
"They ran pretty fast!"
But even if they ran to the ends of the earth, she would find them!
She had already repaid the debt of being raised. Now it was time for revenge.
Piper, Isaac—she wouldn't spare any of them!
Amelia walked grimly to her room.
Her room was converted from a woodshed—small and stuffy, with a damp, moldy smell in the air.
As expected, the small bag she brought back and the phone under her pillow were gone.
There wasn't anything valuable in the bag, just an ID.
But this would make getting back more troublesome.
No matter—once she got to town, she could borrow a phone to call her subordinates to pick her up.
Just as she was about to leave, hurried footsteps suddenly came from outside.
Amelia frowned, but then flashed a barely noticeable smile.
It looked like someone coming to die had returned.
She looked around, grabbed a sickle from behind the door, and walked out like the grim reaper.
But when she walked out of the room, the person peeking inside wasn't from the Reynolds family—it was a young man in his twenties she'd never seen before.
His face was covered in dried mud, disheveled, but he wore a suit.
The suit was tattered though, and behind him was a rusty tricycle.
Amelia hid the sickle behind her back.
"Who are you looking for?"
Perhaps her footsteps were too light when she came out. The young man only noticed her now, his gaze turning toward her.
The next second, after seeing her face that resembled his mother Natalie Wood by sixty or seventy percent, the man's eyes suddenly widened, and tears streamed down his face.
"Amelia! It's really you! Amelia!"
He ran toward Amelia like a madman.
But he suddenly stopped about 2 feet away from Amelia.
Amelia was pointing the sickle at him.
If he took one more step forward, the sickle could cut his throat.