Chapter 136 The Price
“Welcome, Mr. Royden! I’m really relieved now that you are finally here!” Exactly like the rumors, Peter Hoffer was materialistic and obsequious. He was all smiles when he saw Edgar, to the point of almost kneeling before him to polish his shoes.
As usual, Edgar had a cold expression on his face. He merely shot a glance at Peter. However, Miles, who was standing behind him, announced, “Mr. Royden’s time is limited. You’d better finish everything within 20 minutes.”
“I see. Sure, sure. There’s no problem at all!” He then turned around and fixed his gaze on Jean before waving to her, asking her to come over.
Jean was the representative of Black Horse Team. In this industry, it was rare to see a female motor racer. On top of that, everyone knew about her relationship with Edgar.
When she was walking toward them, there were already whispers among the crowd, but Peter feigned ignorance and said with a smile, “Mr. Royden, she is representing Black Horse Team. I asked both of you to be here to explain one thing – the results of our investigation is out, but I hope that the matter will end here.”
Jean arched her eyebrows, but she did not say anything.
Edgar shot a glance at her and frowned. “The reason being?”
“Er… Mr. Royden, you’ll know when you see this.” Peter laughed dryly with an ingratiating hint in his tone.
Jean was a step ahead of Edgar and took the document before he could, “I was there when the accident happened. It’s better if I look at it instead.”
As she took the document over, her fingers slid past his hands.
His hand froze for a moment, but he was not annoyed at all. He merely looked at her silently.
In front of everyone, Jean opened the document and started reading it. As time passed, her frown deepened.
“Are you done?” Peter cleared his throat and reached out for the document, but Jean avoided him.
She immediately stood up. “Based on these results, do you still think it’s an accident? Even if you are trying to cover it up, there has to be a limit for that!”
With that, she threw the document in front of Edgar.
“I’d like to hear your thoughts on this.”
In an instant, the atmosphere became rather heated.
It was out of Peter’s expectations that a meek-looking woman like Jean could be so out of control when she got mad. On top of that, she just flared up in front of Edgar. No wonder they had a divorce. If I had known about this earlier, I would have met Edgar alone beforehand. I wanted to make him owe me a favor to get more sponsorship for the next competition, but my plans are all ruined now.
Hence, he was displeased with Jean.
“Ha!” She let out a cold snort and took out a recording pen. “My recordings here are directly uploaded to my laptop’s cloud storage. If you chase me away now, I’ll upload our conversation from just now on to the Internet. Let’s see who’s more ridiculous this time.”
“You!”
Peter gritted his teeth, not expecting Jean to do this at all.
At this moment, Edgar had also finished perusing the report, and his face was very dark indeed.
Before this, he had asked Miles to investigate this incident, and the latter found out that Gigi had bribed two employees to tweak the brakes. Since there were only a few witnesses and verbal confirmation, he was able to suppress them.
However, the situation was different now.
After a week of investigation, the Racing Association had gotten some concrete evidence, and the timeline of the incident was clear to them.
Based on the evidence they held, let alone putting her in jail, they could sue Gigi for voluntary manslaughter.
The more they refused to give up on this, the harder it would be for him to hide the incident.
It was highly likely that the entire Royden Group would be implicated.
Edgar’s frown deepened.
He would never do something that would result in a loss to him.
“Mr. Hoffer, can you leave with the others? I’d like to speak to Jean privately about this.” He stressed on the word ‘privately’.
“Sure. Please take your time.”
With just a look from Peter, everyone from the Racing Association left.
Jean looked at him coldly. “I have already discussed with the members of Black Horse Team. We won’t accept any form of bribery or compensation. We just want the truth.”
“Why not?” Edgar smiled nonchalantly. “We have reached an impasse that will bring no benefits to you, Ben, or your team that doesn’t even have a strong foundation.”
On top of that, Ben’s racing career might be ruined as well. After all, no organization would like a racer with a stained history.
Even though Jean had mentally prepared herself, she still felt overpowered when she faced him alone.
In this world, only the worthy can survive. In front of him, I’m struggling to even stay afloat.
He threw the report back to her and looked at her deeply, confident that she would give in. “Just state what you want.”
She had spent a lot of time devising her battle plan. However, at that moment, it had completely failed. After all, Edgar was simply too adept at taking advantage of his opponent’s weakness.
I could disagree with him, but what about the other people in the team? What about Ben? The team needs to survive. It’s futile to fight Edgar head-on. Did we already lose? I’m so mad at this! Both Edgar and I clearly know the truth!
She bit her lips and couldn’t speak for a while.
Edgar had been observing her reactions until now. Seeing how much she hesitated, he thought she was feeling sorry for Ben.
Hence, his voice became even more morose.
“Even if you announce this to the public, I have my ways to suppress it. Now, you still have the chance to negotiate with me. If you take more time considering, you might not even have this benefit.”
Every single word from him felt like a dagger stabbing her heart.
She lowered her head in defeat.
After a while, she asked glumly, “Do you think you can control everyone and make them do whatever you want, Edgar?”
She lifted her head obstinately. “I believe that Ben won’t give in to you.”
Edgar clenched his fists tightly. “Jean, I’m giving you another chance.”
Is Ben that important to her? Why does she always have to oppose me? I’ve been taking too much care of her to the point that she thinks she stands a chance against me.
Just as he was about to flare up, she suddenly smiled and threw the report into the bin.
“Thanks for giving me a chance, Mr. Royden, but we don’t need it. Just now, I have already asked the manager of Ben’s team to contact the lawyer. From now onward, we will no longer listen to the Racing Association’s one-sided announcement. We will let our lawyers deal with this. Since the Racing Association won’t play fair, let’s see what the judge will say about this.”
“Don’t go overboard, Jean.” Edgar’s gaze turned colder as he did not want to waste any more time on this matter.
Jean’s smile widened when she met his gaze. “You forced me to do this, Edgar. That day in the hospital, you clearly knew that it’s related to Gigi, yet you chose to protect her.” Her voice became colder the more she spoke. “She killed someone, do you understand?”
