?Chapter 1283:


    eptance wed its way in. This was happening. This was the brutal truth.


    From somewhere behind, frantic voices started shouting along the riverbank.


    “Over here, hurry!”


    “Lift him out gently!”


    Those urgent shouts slipped through the haze in Sadie’s mind, adding anotheryer of turmoil to her grief.


    The mention of the second body sent a new wave of dread through her. Sadie’s head snapped up, her face streaked with tears and stunned disbelief.


    Searching the riverside with stinging eyes, she tried to make sense of the scene.


    A group of restaurant workers, sleeves rolled up, were hauling another lifeless figure from the freezing river.


    What emerged this time was unmistakably a man.


    Clothes stered against his frame, he looked like he’d been battered by the current and the cold.


    Every inch they dragged him closer to drynd, Sadie’s nerves frayed further.


    Recognition came all at once—the mud-caked skin, the bloated face, and that familiar thinning hair left no room for doubt.


    It was Malcolm.


    Shock paralyzed Sadie. She stood rooted in ce.


    Disbelief widened her eyes; she couldn’t process what she was seeing.


    Malcolm… gone as well?


    He died with Tina in this river?


    That idea was almost too much to ept.


    Thoughts whirled in Sadie’s head as she started to piece together the clues.


    Malcolm had shown up at Nirvana, his movements suspicious. Worried he might be up to something that would threaten Wall Group, maybe plotting with Alex, Tina had decided to follow him. She’d even managed to send ine a message, sharing her location.


    Magic begins at g α? ησ ν?? ??s


    “Malcolm is at Nirvana…” Those words still echoed in Sadie’s mind.


    Afterward, Tina had vanished without a trace.


    Now, the search had ended with her lifeless body being discovered. Both Tina and Malcolm—gone, their fates sealed by the same cold current.


    Both bodies ended up in the same stretch of riverbank.


    No way could that be chalked up to mere chance.


    Nothing about this scene pointed to a simple drowning.


    A cold determination settled over Sadie’s expression as her suspicions grew.


    Layers of secrets seemed to be woven into the tragedy before her.


    Someone had made sure Malcolm wouldn’t survive that day.


    And that person had worked just as hard to keep Tina from uncovering what really happened.


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