Reborn in the Enemy's Embrace

"Andy Black?" Zion looked at the photo, surprised. Had Sarah really gotten together with Andy before?

"Do you still have any clues you haven’t told the police, Mr. Leigh?" he asked.

Floyd gave it some thought before taking out a stack of letters and some remittance slips from his battered suitcase.

"These are the letters Sarah sent to me back then. She would send me money every month, and she would transfer money once she got a card." He took out the letters wrapped in a plastic bag. It was clear that he had put in effort to keep her belongings.

I reached for the letters and envelopes. They were indeed rather old, with some of the envelopes yellowing. But it wasn’t hard to tell from Sarah’s letters that she had a close relationship with Floyd.

She likely knew that he was illiterate, so her letters included simple greetings, expressions of longing, and also little drawings depicting her current life. At first, she only drew herself, but another figure appeared over time-Andy.

Sarah mentioned in her letters that she met a good person and decided to spend her life with him. However, the Blacks had opposed it after knowing of her poor family background.

She seemed to have cried while writing another letter as it was wrinkly. In the letter, she asked: "Is it really important to marry within your social class, Floyd?"

I looked at Dexter. "Sarah was just 18 back then, and Andy should be of similar age as well. They were both barely legal, yet they were already considering marriage?"

"People were more conservative back then. They would think of marriage once they got together," Zion explained.

I nodded. It was likely for two young people in their prime to have gotten together intimately, in that sense. Sarah wouldn’t have considered marriage so early otherwise.

She probably thought that she already belonged to Andy, so it was only a matter of time before she married him.

"We found our only clue Andy," I whispered.

That meant we’d have to make a trip back to the Black residence. We needed to look through Andy’s belongings to see if we could discover anything related to Sarah.

"Do you have any other clues still, Mr. Leigh?" Zion asked again.

Floyd shook his head.

"How did all of you decide to come to Huma together to report on their disappearances all of a sudden?" I looked at him.

That had indeed happened too suddenly.

"Someone sent me a letter a while back." Floyd hurriedly rummaged through his belongings for the letter. "They said that Sarah had been missing for years, and it wasn’t because she had gone overseas. They claimed that she went missing in Huma and asked me to come over."

Zion nodded. "Most of the other victims also received letters. Some had received internet calls."

I nodded before turning to him. "I’ve nothing else to ask for now. Let’s head back."

Our next destination would be the Black residence.

Somehow, I felt that things weren’t as simple as they seemed. Sarah’s disappearance was definitely not an accident.

"Genome Society has long since infiltrated Huma. They first disguised themselves as a charitable medical institution within the country and gradually started to conduct shady experiments. The Blacks were indeed the main contributor to Genome Society under Andy’s management in the early years."

Back then, Genome Society highly valued Andy because he invested a significant sum of money. Their growth was largely due to his support.

However, Andy discovered the truth behind Genome Society later on. He then started resisting them. "Andy is the key to solving Sarah’s disappearance." Zion nodded.

"But he might not have left behind any valuable information, seeing that he died too early." He sighed.

I remained silent throughout the entire journey to the Black residence.

Somehow, I felt that something was amiss, yet I couldn’t figure it out.

If Andy truly loved Sarah, wouldn’t he be anxious to look for his own lover when she went missing?

"Andy went to study overseas when he was 19. Once he graduated and returned, he slowly took over Black Group. That was when Ignatius gradually ceded power," Dexter said solemnly.

That meant Andy had gone overseas shortly after Sarah went missing. That shouldn’t be a coincidence as well.

"Could it be that Mr. Black Senior had some connection to Genome Society? He was worried that a poor woman like Sarah might hinder Andy, so he had her captured and sent to Genome Society?" Zion speculated.

It seemed like it could only be a speculation at this point.

"Ignatius probably has little to do with Genome Society. He’s an extremely conservative person who wouldn’t actively participate in charity. The funding support to Genome Society started from Andy.

"Besides, if Ignatius were an important member of Genome Society, he wouldn’t have allowed Martin to bribe Genome Society in secret to edit genomes in babies, leaving a risk like Jimmy."

As Mr. Black Senior was inherently suspicious, he wouldn’t have allowed any family members from the branches to surpass him when he was still alive.

I nodded. Indeed, if Mr. Black Senior was someone from Genome Society, he wouldn’t have died so easily.

We got out of the car upon reaching the Black residence. The old house was looking desolated. Despite the staff and butler’s constant cleaning, the unoccupied house still seemed forlorn.

Dexter brought us to the top-floor attic storage room. Many of Andy’s belongings were left there.

We found Sarah’s black-and-white photo in one of his earlier diaries. She was smiling brightly in that photo. It was likely Andy had brought her to get the photo taken.

That photo had unexpectedly become the only evidence of her existence in this world.

"Is Sarah mentioned in the diary?" I asked Dexter.

He shook his head. "You can see it for yourself."

The handwriting was blurry due to moisture, making many words unreadable.

I flipped through the pages there was nothing related to Sarah at all. However, it was strange that her photo was in the diary.

"Since we could find Sarah’s photo in Andy’s belongings, then it should be solid proof that they were together," I whispered, checking the date of the diary. "Wait a minute, this diary was after Sarah’s disappearance. What about the ones before?"

Did Andy keep a diary before her disappearance?

We searched through the room for a good while, yet we couldn’t find other diaries. We only found a string of strange numbers on the back of the battered diary.

"7628977. And what are these dates for?"

"What do these numbers mean?" I wasn’t sure if they were just Andy’s random scribbles.

Dexter studied the string of numbers. "This is... the donation account of Genome Society."

The string of numbers was the donation account of Genome Society. That meant that Andy had been regularly transferring money to them.