Chapter 1397 - The Basement Incident (4)

Aiden felt Sarah's hand squeezing his and he understood that he should calm down.

"Let's go back to the topic of me assaulting Meili." Aiden said dryly and turned on the television. "If I can have your attention here…"

The video played, showing Aiden in a room, surrounded with boxes. 

Aiden paused the video: "In case you forgot from where you came out earlier this evening, here is a reminder: this is the security footage from one of the cameras in the basement. And if you pay attention to the time and date in the lower-left corner, you can see that this happened about half an hour ago."

Aiden threw a side-glance at Meili whose face was devoid of color.

He moved his fingers slightly in the air, but no one paid attention. A second later, Meili felt a small prick at the back of her neck, however, her whole body felt weird because of anxiousness, so she didn't think much about it.

Aiden resumed the video. It showed Aiden turning to Meili and asking: "Why are you here? … Did you come here to stare at me without a word?"

A second later, Meili responded: "You are the most handsome man I've ever seen…"

All the girls watched the video in complete silence. Only the voices from the television were heard, clear for everyone to hear that Meili made repeated advances and that Aiden refused her all to the point where Meili slapped herself, tore her top, and ran out of the room while screaming.

Aiden turned off the television and glared icily at Meili who looked like her soul left her body. 

It was not only Aiden. All the eyes in the room were focused on Meili. 

Meili was so nervous, that her lower jaw was twitching left-to-right uncontrollably. 

Aiden sneered. "I told you that I will not say anything. There is no point in using words when the video showed everyone present what happened. You had everything planned, except that you missed the security camera."

"I checked, there were no cameras.", Meili said and swiftly placed her hand over her mouth. 

Aiden shook his head while controlling his urge to snap Meili's neck. How dares she lie that he assaulted her? What if Sarah believes it? Does Meili think that she can get between him and Sarah and get out of it unscathed?

Sarah stood next to Aiden and spoke to all the girls: "Thousands of people are sexually assaulted daily, most of them are females. And those are only the numbers which report their assault. The victims struggle to come forth and speak out about the horror they went through, because it's difficult to relive that experience, because people will judge them, people will say that it was their fault, people will not believe them. And not many people care if it was consensual or not. Some of the girls will get foul treatment just because they were near a man even if he didn't touch them. When we realized that Akmal is holding you here against your will so that he can sell you to the highest bidder, we didn't need to discuss if we will save you or not because helping you out of that situation and getting you back with your families is the right thing to do. We don't expect your gratitude. We don't expect even to hear an insincere 'thank you'. But we expect that you don't scheme against us." 

Sarah narrowed her eyes at Meili. "Your fake accusation is a direct slap to every girl present in this room. And you are well aware that Aiden and I are married and on our honeymoon. I don't know why you came up with this lie that my husband assaulted you, but I know that I've never met anyone as malicious as you. If this is how you treat people who saved you, I don't want to know how you treat others."

Sarah took a deep breath and her eyes swept over other girls. "You heard from both sides. It's up to you to decide who is lying, and how that person should be punished. The two of us will step aside and give you space to discuss this matter without our interference. Please, feel free to ask Meili for clarifications. No matter what you decide, we will not give up on sending you home. Everything will remain how we planned. However, if you choose not to trust us, you are free to leave. No one will stop you. And you can keep the clothes."

Sarah and Aiden walked out of the family room while holding hands, leaving behind more than thirty girls and several members of the army of Chaos in complete silence.

Sarah and Aiden went to the study room. 

"What will you do to Meili?", Aiden asked.

"Me? Nothing."

"You plan to let the girls handle it?", Aiden guessed.

"Yes. She is a spoiled brat and it's not my duty to teach her how the world works. After the girls are done with her, we will send her back to her family. She is not worth our time."

Aiden agreed that Meili is not worthy, but that does not mean that he is not ready to waste his time to teach her a few lessons in how to be grateful. But he will leave that for later. 

"Can we change the topic?", Sarah asked. She does not want to talk or think about Meili anymore.

"Sure, is there anything specific you want to talk about?"

Sarah confirmed. "Remind me to ask Akmal if he has the passports which belong to the girls. If we have those, we can send them back on commercial flights. It will be less work for us. Other than that, we have new bases…", Sarah grinned and showed Aiden property deeds for two other lots with mansions. One in Phoenix, Arizona, and the second one in Salt Lake City, Utah. Aiden likes that the properties are large, they can build structures as needed.

When they finished discussing those properties, Aiden told Sarah what he found in the basement and his theory that Akmal is a middle-man and how there is a good chance that his buyers and suppliers will contact him soon. Sarah agreed how that is a valid possibility and took a note to talk to Ernesto and Noah about this. Ernesto will be vigilant related to this base, and Noah will warn two teams who are going to the other two locations.

After the quick sync up, Aiden looked at Sarah and smiled. 

"Thank you."

Sarah didn't understand from where is that coming. "For?"

"For trusting that I didn't do it."

Sarah understood that the topic went back to the incident with Meili.

"Wrong answer, my love.", Sarah responded and wrapped her hands around his neck. "You have my trust from day one, and that is not questionable, and you don't need to thank me."

Aiden's arms snaked around Sarah's waist. "What is the right answer?"

"That I trusted how you would have a way to clear this up without breaking a sweat."

Aiden smiled. He likes it when Sarah says that she is confident in his capabilities. "When I saw her lingering in the hallway, I had a feeling that she will try something, so I got a drone to follow me. It was more as a precaution in case she tries something when I am not looking because with the truth serum, we don't need to worry that she will conceal things. However, I learned my lesson and I instructed Eve that if Meili has any intention to use weapons or drugs against me, that the drone takes her out."

"You are wise, my husband. Always thinking things through. It is more effective with the video. They will assume that she is busted and decided to tell the truth. Otherwise, the girls might be suspicious as to why Meili started talking suddenly."

"I know that it's not nice, but when I heard her lying without batting an eye on how I assaulted her, part of me regretted not stopping you when we were on the second floor. If Akmal had his way with her, maybe that would teach her a lesson. She is lying like that only because she never suffered, and she is unable to be empathetic."

"Don't worry about it.", Sarah shared her thoughts. "When someone is working against us, that person does not deserve a nice treatment. It might be selfish, but I will not allow anyone to come between us. For me, there is no one more important than you."

Aiden approved. "Don't ever stop being selfish about me."

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