It was unexpected. So unexpected that I accidentally dropped the phone.
I picked up the phone again. Slowly brought it close to my face and took another look. There was nothing wrong with the phone except for the lock screen. The lock screen display had a picture of Jerome. Normally, that isn't supposed to an issue, but this picture wasn't normal. In the picture, Jerome was wearing...some questionable clothes.
'This has to be one of the most disturbing things I've ever seen and fuck I have seen some actual shit. It's okay, Fin. Shallow breaths. That's the way.'
I finally managed to break my stunned stage. Luckily, the phone could be unlocked with fingerprint, so it wasn't too difficult to unlock the phone. Immediately, the home screen display greeted me and unfortunately...it was worse than the lock screen. I was already considering if having eyes was truly worth it. I needed to delete that video and picture first. I mustered up the courage to tap on the gallery icon. Surprisingly, there were no more disturbing pictures there. I sighed in relief and quickly found the evidence and deleted it permanently. I checked his browsing history, apps, messages, contact information and any notes he had on his phone. I also found my own phone which was next to the TV.
'Ah so that's how this business works.'
Basically, there is a backer who supplies these guys with actual workout creatine and these guys mixes them with normal creatine and sells it as regular low-quality creatine. Of course, not many people are dumb enough to fall for this scam, so their business is still under the radar.
'Their advertisings and connections are so shit. No wonder their business is doing so shit.'
'For now, I haven't found anything too incriminating yet. If I send all the evidence to police, then Jerome and his crew will only get a slap on their wrist. I need something better. Something so dire that I can use it as my leverage. I nee-'
As I was calculating my next move, the phone suddenly rang. Someone named Sarah was calling. I waited for a bit before answering the phone. A female voice resounded from the other side of the phone.
"HELLO! Is everything alright there?"
'Ah damn, I need to respond. Come on, remember Jerome's voice. I gotta imitate his voice.'
"Mmmm" I responded after mustering my deepest voice possible.
"Uhhh..I'll take that as a yes. LISTEN uncle, you can get away from there RIGHT NOW. I called Kaiden Jolkev again and demanded ransom for their kid, but he simply hung up and called the police. The police are looking for you. You have to leave now. I know you are doing this for me, and I really appreciate your efforts but please don't risk your life for my sake. My TROP tuitions are already covered. I don't need more."
'That bitch. He didn't even think twice before calling the police. Fuck. Why is Kez's father so similar to my own?'
"Why are you not responding? Please say something."
'Ah damn what do I say? It's a problem if police catch Jerome because he saw me with the shopkeeper. If police decide to investigate that matter, then I am in big trouble. Why does bad things always happen to the good people. Sigh'
"I-Is there a p-problem. Hel-Hello?"
"Mmmm. No problem. I will leave."
I tried my best to imitate Jerome's voice. I knew it wasn't perfect, but it wasn't too bad either.
"...HEY WHO ARE YOU? WHERE IS UNC-JEROME?"
'Ah shit how did she find out?'
"W-what are you talking about, Sarah? I-It's me, Uncle Jerome."
"...You think I am a fucking dumbass? Nobody is falling for that. You sound like a 7-year-old trying to sound old."
'S-seven?!! Damn. I knew my mind wasn't into that acting but seven? DAMN.'
"H-hello. Where is Uncle Jerome? What did you do to him?"
I didn't feel like the need to respond anymore so I just hung up the call. I went back to his phone's gallery and my lips curled up. It was time to wake up Jerome. Why? Because I already found my leverage against him. However, I didn't have to wake him up. From looking at his chest moving and down, I could tell he was awake.
"You Neice huh? Looks like she is also involved in my kidnapping. I'll be more than happy to send her picture to the police, along with all the other evidence I found. So, wake up already."
Instantly Jerome opened his eyes wide open. His muscles bulged and the chains rattles and creaked, almost as if they were going to break any seconds. I started laughing.
"Ah Jerome, Jerome, Jerome. You fool. I only need to tap once to send these. You think even if you could break those chains, you could stop me in time?"
"I WILL KILL YOU NO MATTER WHAT."
The chains started creaking even more. I started growing nervous by the seconds, but I didn't let it show on my face. Jerome was powerful, abnormally powerful for someone in F rank. From what I remembered from the novel; F+ ranks were powerful but nowhere near as much as Jerome was. I couldn't be fully sure if the chains would hold. But I had to keep acting like I was winning. I had to crush all his hopes.
"I am leaving. Have fun in jail."
I stood up and faced the door. At the same time, I sent all the evidence and photos from Jerome's phone to mine. I sent them on my back-up cloud. Now I could access them anytime from any device I wanted. Plus, if I happened to go 'missing' and someone investigates my cloud then, they will find all the evidence. I took a step forward.
"Wait. WAIT. Let's negotiate."
"There's no point in negotiating."
"Wait. I-I know you bought drugs. I'll tell the police if they catch me."
"Hahaha let's see who has a better chance. You telling the police I was buying drugs even though you are a criminal and don't even have any evidence of me buying drugs anymore or me showing all the evidence I collected to the police and then you and that 'niece' of yours going to jail. She will probably get rejected from TROP because of this."
"...I-I also uploaded that picture of yours to cloud."
"Bahaha, I don't believe you. I already checked cloud on your phone. Even if that was true, it's all the clear evidence I have vs a blurry picture that you can't even make heads or tails out of. Besides my family has money to hire lawyers who can make all of that drug bullshit go away with a snap of their fingers.
"..."
Jerome became silent. I turned towards him and smiled as menacingly as I could. But I knew I was at my last line. I was still afraid of him exposing my trade even without any evidence and my legs were already weakening from taking that single step and I was dying to sit back down. Regardless, I turned towards the door again and took another step and that's when everything went wrong.