Everyone turned at the sound, only to see the door to 1602 open. Maisie Lynch was standing in the doorway.
When everyone’s gazes turned to her, Maisie felt a flash of nervousness, but she quickly forced herself to calm down.
She took a few steps forward, tilting her head up slightly, and spoke to Officer Tate. "Officer, I can be a witness. I saw everything last night. I saw lody Sumrs run hurriedly out of the elevator... Her mask accidentally fell off then, so I recognized her."
The mont Maisie Lynch finished speaking, lody Sumrs turned to look at her.
eting Maisie’s slightly nervous gaze, lody stared into her eyes and said, enunciating each word, "Maisie, do you realize you’re committing perjury right now? Have you considered the consequences of giving false testimony?"
It was as if lody’s gaze had seared her. Maisie’s eyes darted away in a panic, not daring to et lody’s.
Seeing this, Mrs. Sutton quickly stepped forward, positioning herself protectively in front of Maisie.
Mr. Sutton, however, pointed at lody Sumrs and said to Officer Tate with a disgruntled expression, "Officer, I suspect she’s threatening the witness!"
Imdiately after, Mrs. Sutton also turned and patted Maisie’s hand. She said to Maisie with a look of relief, "Thank you, you kind girl. We’re complete strangers, thank you for being willing to co forward and testify for us!"
Then Mrs. Sutton turned back to Officer Tate and said, "Officer, we don’t know this young lady. We just moved in. Our words might not count as proof, but hers should, right?"
Officer Tate ignored Mr. and Mrs. Sutton. He looked at Maisie, who was behind Mrs. Sutton, and asked her, "You said you saw everything? Do you have any proof?"
Maisie didn’t quite dare to et Officer Tate’s gaze. She lowered her head slightly and said, "Because lody Sumrs looked so panicked at the ti, I was a little worried about her. I even called out to her and asked why she was going out so late... I rember the elevator doors hadn’t closed yet, so the elevator’s surveillance cara should have recorded it."
Hearing this, Mrs. Sutton quickly took out her phone and said, "Yes, yes, she’s right! There is a voice at the end of the video. Officer, look, the surveillance cara recorded it."
As she spoke, Mrs. Sutton replayed the segnt of surveillance footage from the elevator, turning the volu all the way up.
At the end of this surveillance clip, right before the elevator doors closed, a woman’s voice could indeed be heard from outside the elevator: "lody Sumrs, why are you going out so late?..."
Seeing this, Officer Tate took the phone from Mrs. Sutton’s hand. He dragged the progress bar to the end and listened to it several tis.
Then, Officer Tate frowned slightly. The voice at the end of the video did indeed match Maisie Lynch’s...
Seeing the situation develop to this point, Mr. and Mrs. Sutton both wore triumphant expressions.
Mr. Sutton pointed at lody Sumrs and said to Officer Tate, "Officer, we have both a witness and physical evidence now. You can convict her now, right? We demand that her family compensate us for our losses and then move out of the complex!"
Mrs. Sutton nodded along in agreent. "That’s right, Officer. There’s a thief living in the complex. If she doesn’t move out, the rest of us won’t feel safe living here!"
Before Officer Tate could speak, Maisie Lynch, who had been standing to the side, suddenly spoke up. "lody Sumrs, I heard just now that you have to compensate the victim for a six-figure loss... Can you afford that kind of money right now?"
Maisie raised a hand to brush her bangs aside, suggesting with a light chuckle, "If you can’t co up with the money, you could sell your apartnt, 1606. I’m willing to buy it from you. That way, you can compensate the victim for their financial losses and still have money left over to find a new place to live."
The thought of lody Sumrs’s spacious apartnt soon belonging to her made Maisie’s eyes light up with excitent!
Looking at the triumphant smiles on the faces of the Suttons and Maisie Lynch, lody Sumrs suddenly let out a small smile of her own.
Just a mont ago, she had figured it out—the down jacket!
Back when she bought that down jacket, the independent designer’s online store had gone out of business and held a clearance sale.
Maisie Lynch had asked lody Sumrs for the link to the down jacket before. When the store had its clearance sale, she had secretly bought an identical one.
Maisie had always thought lody didn’t know about this, since she had never worn the jacket at school, but lody actually did know.
Because the down jacket had a unique tal tag shaped like a golden lotus leaf.
lody had seen this tag in one of Maisie’s books. Maisie must have really liked the tag, because she was using it as a bookmark.
lody knew that tag wasn’t hers, because she had snapped her own tag in half and thrown it away long ago.
That left only one explanation—Maisie had also bought the sa jacket.
lody thought to herself, ’Maisie shouldn’t have jumped in to be a witness. If she hadn’t, I never would have rembered this. After all, it happened so long ago.’
Once she understood about the jacket, everything else fell into place—
An identical down jacket...
Surveillance footage that conveniently didn’t show a full face...
On top of that, Maisie also had long hair. She was just a bit shorter than lody. But that was an easy problem to solve—all she had to do was add a few height-increasing insoles to her shoes.
And since it was winter, bundled up in a bulky down jacket with a mask and a hat on, her build would be completely obscured on a surveillance cara. Maisie could easily pass for lody.
All the clues were clear now. This whole thing was just a farce staged by the Suttons and Maisie Lynch, working together in an attempt to fra her!
lody’s thoughts returned to the present, just in ti to hear Mr. Sutton still clamoring, "Officer, just make the thief’s family move out today! Do as the witness said and have her sell apartnt 1606 to her. That way we can get our compensation. It’s better for everyone."
Maisie was also nodding eagerly beside him, adding, "That’s right, Officer. lody Sumrs is going to be kicked out of the complex anyway. The apartnt will just be sitting empty, so I’m willing to buy it outright in cash!"
Maisie felt a little nervous now, her palms growing slightly sweaty.
She had taken a risk and agreed to put on this act with the Sutton Family, all for the sake of getting lody Sumrs’s apartnt!
The Suttons had promised her that if she followed the script and got lody’s family to leave The tropolis Residences, they would give Maisie a sum of money so she could legally buy the apartnt.
The hallway fell silent for a mont. The Suttons and Maisie Lynch all stared intently at Officer Tate, waiting for him to deliver the final verdict.
But Officer Tate just frowned, shook his head, and said, "Even with a witness identification, there’s no way to prove what you’re saying is true... For now, we can only continue to investigate her as a suspect. It’s impossible to convict her just like this."
After all, there was still a lack of crucial evidence. The video, the supposed physical evidence, didn’t show lody Sumrs’s face. How could he possibly make lody move out today, just as the Suttons demanded?
Hearing Officer Tate say this, Mr. and Mrs. Sutton and Maisie Lynch were all stunned.
They hadn’t expected that, even after all this, they still couldn’t secure a conviction against lody Sumrs!
Investigate her as a suspect... The Suttons and Maisie Lynch felt a pang of guilt at those words. They knew full well that this matter wouldn’t hold up under investigation. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been in such a rush to demand that Officer Tate convict lody Sumrs imdiately!
Just then, lody Sumrs, who had been silent all this ti, finally spoke. She pointed at Maisie Lynch and turned to Officer Tate, saying, "Officer Tate, this witness and I also have a grudge. I have reasonable suspicion that they’re all in this together!"
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