A Replacement Bride

Chapter 382

Chapter 381 The Same Could Be Said About You

The voice was all too familiar. An involuntary shudder swept over Jayden; it even took a moment for him to turn around. The moment he saw Katherine, he exclaimed with his eyes full of disbelief, "Kathy, didn't you—"

Katherine's lips slowly curled into a chilly smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Didn't I what?" she asked in a quiet voice. "I was supposed to have gone to Zoscistan already, right? Is that what you wanted to ask me?"

Jayden's expression froze. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came to him for a moment. He shifted his gaze away from her, only to turn even paler when his eyes fell upon Joaquin's face next to hers.

Taking in all his reactions, Katherine let out a sneer and slowly walked up to Dylan, who was good enough at taking hints to promptly stand up and offer his seat to her without hesitation.

Sitting on the freshly vacated seat in an instant, Katherine looked up slightly with her eyes fixed squarely on Jayden. She was looking up at the man from a lower position, yet her bright and clear eyes gave the feeling that she was looking down at him. "Jayden, have you ever heard the quote, 'Too much scheming will lead to the schemer's undoing?' It suits you perfectly, I'd say."

Jayden's smile faded away as he pressed his lips together without making a sound. Now that things had gotten to this point, how could he not understand that he had fallen into Katherine's trap?

After being silent for a quarter of a minute, he turned around with his eyes half-lowered. Staring at her with an unfathomable look in his eyes, he countered somewhat frostily, "Scheming, eh? Didn't you scheme against me as well, Katherine? Otherwise, we wouldn't have met in such a way today, no?"

Katherine laughed out loud at his words as if she had heard some funny joke. "So, you're blaming this on me now? How on earth is this my fault? Jayden, I've never schemed against you from the beginning. I don't think I've ever been unfair to you as a friend, but look at what you've done! You sent mercenaries after me and ambushed me in Fontan by pretending to hijack my flight, trying to kill me the second time when your first attempt ended in failure. Not only that, but you also posed as a Good Samaritan and saved me just to make me let my guard down. And now you're blaming me for the things that you have done?" Her smile faded away as she spoke; a hint of frostiness appeared on her face. "Would I have had to set this trap if you hadn't plotted against me again and again? Everything has its cause and effect, and you're only reaping what you've sown. You can't blame anyone else!"

Just then, Joaquin came to her side and leaned against the sofa she was sitting in with a nonchalant expression. "That's right, Mr. Hall. One's got to be reasonable, you know. You're in the wrong, to begin with, so don't blame others for turning their backs on you after you've betrayed them."

Jayden's hands quietly clenched into fists at his sides when he saw the man speak in support of Katherine. His cheeks trembled for a moment before he set his jaw. Then, he said in a tense and somehow hoarse voice, "When did you find out about me?"

Joaquin raised his eyebrows without saying a word. Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

Katherine slowly answered, "I didn't suspect you at first, Jayden. Surely you know that I'd hate to suspect those around me. One can say that I trust my friends a hundred percent despite being cool on the outside, so I'd never suspected you even when such an impossible coincidence occurred. However, you've gone too far." As she spoke of this, she suddenly raised her eyes and fixed Jayden with a piercing gaze that would chill one to the bone. "You easily gave yourself away because you were too anxious to get your hands on the stuff left in my hands by my late grandmother. The way you planted that tracker of yours was really clumsy. You were certain that I wouldn't suspect you at all, so you dared to use these underhand methods so blatantly. Still, it was hard for me not to suspect you when you've done so many bad things."

Right after she finished her speech, Joaquin unhurriedly picked up where she had left off. "Kathy didn't suspect you since you two were old friends. Well, she trusted you, but I wouldn't. To put it bluntly, Jayden, those little tricks of yours are what I would have used when I first started, and they're neither honorable nor brilliant."

The veins bulging on Jayden's forehead throbbed at Joaquin's words, as though he were struggling hard to control himself. "Ha!" A sneer escaped his lips as his expression grew frosty. "We're both plotting against each other, so how does that make either of us more virtuous than the other? We're birds of the same feather, anyway. Neither of us has the right to denounce the other!"

Katherine cocked her fine eyebrows and looked at him with a hint of contempt. "Jayden, do you think everyone is just like you? You only get schemed against because you've plotted against others in the first place! You only care about your own interests and would stop at nothing to get what you want. How is it my fault when all I did was defend myself justifiably? What kind of logic is that?"

Jayden knitted his brows. Trying to defend himself, he retorted, "All I wanted was to borrow your grandmother's secret tome from you! Would I have had to set one trap after another if you had let me take a look at it right away? Kathy, just ask yourself whether you really treat me as a friend! If you'd really treated me as a friend, why would you keep your late grandmother's belongings in your hands without showing them to anyone?"

She never expected him to say such a ridiculous thing. "What's wrong with that? Is there any law stating that I have to show my late grandmother's belongings to others? Or is there any unwritten rule that puts me under an obligation to share my belongings with my friends? My late grandmother's belongings are left to me, not you! Since all her belongings are mine, no one has the right to tell me what I should do with them, so why do I have to let you take a look at them? Are you trying to guilt-trip me? I really never expected such a shameless reply from you, Jayden!" There was a disappointment and, more than anything, anger in her eyes. "I've been friends with you for so many years, but I've never expected you to be such a person! Jayden, are you good at hiding your true self, or have we never seen through you for who you really are?"

Jayden's face turned red one moment and pale the next with embarrassment. After clenching his teeth with a taut expression, he retorted with a stony face, "The same could be said about you! You've never told us about your real identity either. Who would've thought that you'd be the real mastermind behind LW Laboratory? You're also hiding your real identity very well, aren't you?"

Seeing how the man stubbornly refused to mend his ways even now, Katherine looked all frosty with a forbidding air about her. After letting out a sneer, she slowly stood up and stared fixedly at him with a look of disdain in her piercing eyes. "It's true that I'm hiding it, but it's because I don't feel like revealing who I really am! Also, I don't want to get my friends and family into trouble! You think my identity is a glamorous one, huh? In reality, this identity has only brought me endless trouble!"