Chapter 702 Bring Him to Her Place

Andy curled up in a pile of rubble in the corner. Blood covered him, staining his pale skin, which now looked almost translucent.

He had just escaped from an abandoned factory, planning to return to his hideout. But when he arrived, he realized someone in his crew must have betrayed him; police officers were stationed nearby.

To avoid raising suspicion, Andy left quietly, though he was already nursing a gunshot wound from Daniel and a blow to the back of his head. His head throbbed like it might split open, leaving him dizzy and disoriented.

The night was deep, and with nowhere to go, Andy had no choice but to stay there and wait for dawn, curling up to make himself as inconspicuous as possible. But the growing fever clouding his mind made that increasingly difficult.

At some point, he wasn’t sure when, a pool of blood had formed beneath him. When their eyes met, Emilia immediately felt the tension in Andy’s glare – a cold, sharp warning. She thought, “Is it because he noticed my earlier actions?”

A streetlight behind her cast a long shadow that stretched toward him, overlapping with his in the dim alleyway. In the brief seconds it took for her to regain her composure, Emilia put on an innocent face and approached him.

“What happened to you?” She tried to sound like a clueless passerby. “Are you hurt? I’ll call an ambulance.”

As she pulled out her phone, Andy snatched it from her grasp before she could hit call. His piercing eyes were full of caution. Without hesitation, he threw her phone several yards away, where it smashed against the ground. Even from a distance, Emilia could see the shattered screen.

“Hey!” she snapped, glaring at him. “You don’t have to thank me, but did you really need to destroy my phone?” She stormed over to pick it up, confirming her suspicion – the screen was completely ruined.

Emilia wasn’t surprised by his reaction. Men like him – fugitives with nothing to lose – trusted no one, especially when they were injured and vulnerable.

Her gaze flickered with disdain as she remembered how this same man had extorted millions of dollars from the Clarke family during her kidnapping. Watching him suffer now felt like karmic retribution.

But despite everything, Andy probably didn’t realize she had already recognized him. Emilia had been tracking him, not only to reclaim the Clarke family’s stolen money but to dismantle his entire operation.

The police had warned her that his network ran deep. If they failed to take him down in one strike, the Clarke family might face dangerous retaliation. Glancing at the police cars swarming the area earlier, Emilia guessed they must have raided his temporary hideout.

Emilia had been ready to leave, angry at the situation, but paused mid-step. She thought, “With his hideout compromised, he and his gang would likely relocate by tomorrow. If I lost him now, how would I find him again?”

Turning back, she approached him once more. Andy looked up, his guarded expression laced with surprise at her return. His eyes remained cold, but she was used to that by now. “You owe me for the phone,” Emilia said, waving the broken device in front of him.

Andy raised an eyebrow, as though her demand was absurd.

Emilia pressed. “Don’t even think about dodging this. You’re always buying cigarettes from the convenience store. I’ll give you a discount – forty-eight hundred dollars, not a penny less.”

Andy’s gaze shifted to her rain-soaked hemline, his expression unreadable. Finally, he spoke, his voice low and chilling, yet inexplicably captivating. “You’ve got some nerve asking me for money. Do you even know who I am?”

Emilia froze for a moment but quickly recovered. “Does it matter? From the looks of it, you can afford cigarettes, so you’d better not stiff me. Or how about you give me your phone, and I’ll smash it too? Then we’re even.”

For reasons she couldn’t fathom, her words made Andy laugh softly. Emilia thought, “Good. I need to play the part of a naïve, carefree girl perfectly.”

In the dark, their eyes locked, and an inexplicable tension lingered in the air. Emilia boldly reached out to steady him, but when her hand brushed against his feverishly hot skin, she recoiled instinctively, like touching a live wire.

“You’re burning up. You’ve got a fever,” she said, glancing at his bloodstained clothes. The dim lighting and his gray jacket made it hard to tell where he was hurt, but the metallic tang of blood was unmistakable.

Pointing toward the alley entrance, she added, “My car is just up ahead. Want me to take you to the hospital?”

Andy narrowed his eyes. After some hesitation, he got into her car. When he told her not to go to the hospital, Emilia made a decision to bring him to her place.

Not her family home, of course. Instead, she took him to a small, secondhand apartment she’d purchased nearby for convenience while working at the convenience store.

The place wasn’t big – just forty or fifty square meters – but it was enough for one person. Bringing him there was risky, but this was her only chance. Emilia thought, “If I don’t seize it, where would I find him after tonight?”

Once inside, with the lights on, Emilia finally saw the extent of his injuries: a gunshot wound to his shoulder, though the bullet seemed to have grazed through his clothes. It hadn’t gone deep but had bled profusely.

Feigning ignorance, Emilia rummaged through her first-aid kit, piling antibiotics, fever reducers, and painkillers on the table in front of him, along with a glass of water.

Andy hesitated briefly but read the labels before swallowing the pills, likely to ensure she hadn’t poisoned him. When Emilia tried to remove his jacket to treat his wounds, his eyes darkened dangerously, his presence suddenly suffocating.

The look reminded her of the day he had kidnapped her – the same cold, piercing glare. She backed away, setting the bandages down. “Fine, if you don’t want me to help, do it yourself.”

Turning to leave, she heard his voice, icy and sharp. “Why work as a cashier there?” His question stopped her in her tracks. “Lingering around me, what’s your real purpose?”

Through the reflection in a nearby vase, Emilia saw Andy had drawn a gun, aiming it steadily at the back of her head.

Her heart pounded wildly. Andy hadn’t trusted her from the start. Coming home with her had been nothing more than a test, a way to see what she was up to.

Emilia thought, “This man is too cautious. Even the slightest slip-up and he won’t hesitate to end me.”