Jack put away his gun and walked into a room with the two CSIs.

It was a room with a thick Persian carpet, crystal balls on the shelves against the wall, lizard tails, toads, and other strange things soaked in unknown liquids.

There was a dresser against the wall of the room, and on one side of the dresser, the wall was plastered with various newspaper clippings and pictures of the Riodans.

Some of them are newspaper copies, and many more are printed directly from pictures downloaded from the Internet, as well as various thriller tabloid headlines.

It reads "T.C. Riodan's cheating", "The third woman of Riodan's family", "Riodan's illegitimate child", "Natalie's grievances", and so on.

"It's really perverted." Old Inspector James Bryce muttered to himself.

"It seems that you are right, she really thinks of herself as Natalie." Nick Stokes takes a picture from the wall and hands it to Jack.

The photo is a stitch, half Natalie Riodan's face, half Karen Chavala, looking indescribably weird and terrifying.

There are more similar photos on the wall, some stitching together half of Karen Chavala's face, others stitching a quarter, or even less, with only one eye left.

This is like a figurative interpretation of how Karen Chavala's self-perception is gradually destroyed and gradually occupied by another soul.

There are a lot of things on the dressing table, and many of the dressing items and perfume bottles are also marked with the initials "NR", which is Natalie's initials, indicating that these were once relics that belonged to Natalie.

Jack guessed that Karen had asked for it from TC in the name of psychic.

"Well, is there a possibility that Karen is really scared by the feeling I have here." Sarah Seidel muttered quietly.

Nick and the old detective glanced at each other, feeling that the cold hairs she said stood on end, everyone is not a god chattering person, but the atmosphere here is really in place.

"Knock knock knock."

The sudden knocking sound startled everyone present, and Jack was the first to react, and hurriedly walked out of the room, followed the sound, and walked through the corridor to the bedroom.

The knocking sound came from behind a closet in the bedroom.

"There's a door behind the cabinet."

Jack shouted to everyone behind him, and then stepped forward to remove the closet, and Nick, who was following closely behind, hurriedly followed to help.

The closet was high, just blocking the hidden closet door, revealing only a little bit, which the police officer who had just entered the house had missed.

The wardrobe was carefully removed, and Sarah Seidel opened the small door, and behind the door was a small space, with a small bed, and a little boy still in his pajamas, sleepily rubbing his eyes and looking at everyone.

"Hi little guy, great, it's okay, it's okay, are you okay?" Sarah looked surprised and gently hugged him into her arms.

"Hubble, we're cops, don't worry, everything will be fine."

She gently stroked the boy's back, comforting him in a somewhat incoherent whisper.

Everyone, including Jack, breathed a sigh of relief, more than 10 hours had passed now, and everyone had prepared for the worst.

Just as the old detective mentioned the golden three-hour principle of missing children, generally speaking, if a young child goes missing for more than three hours, the chance of survival is infinitely close to zero.

Jack's hand subconsciously touched his trouser pocket, and then stopped, because he saw that Inspector James Bryce's old face was smiling like a blooming chrysanthemum, and he had already taken out his mobile phone and was calling Russell.

"Russell, I'm Bryce, we found Hubble, he's alive, it's okay. Yes, it looks like just a sleep, what a lucky kid, but we didn't find Karen. ”

Russell seemed to say something on the other side of the phone, and the old detective looked up at everyone in dismay.

"He said he found Karen."

——

Although Hubble is only a five-year-old boy, he is really cute and well-behaved, and he doesn't cry or make trouble along the way, looking curiously around in Sarah Seidel's arms.

The round blue eyes are clear and pure, with the innocence that is unique to human cubs and has not yet been touched by the troubles of the world.

Jack pulls out a lollipop that he had walked off a police officer's desk before he left to tease him, causing the little guy to giggle.

The police car sped all the way and soon appeared at the door of the luxury villa, where Russell was waiting there early with an anxious-looking TC Riodan.

"Daddy!" As soon as he saw his father, Hubble shouted through the car window.

Russell stepped forward and pulled the car door, Sarah was a little reluctant to put him out of the car, and the little boy walked on his short legs, and before he ran two steps, he threw himself into his father's arms.

"Thank you, thank you." TC picked up his son, and thanked him repeatedly, with tears in his eyes.

After shaking hands with everyone and thanking them, he took the children back to the villa first, while Russell led the group along the path all the way to the pool behind the villa.

There is a female corpse floating in the pool, and two CSIs, whom Jack has never seen, are salvaging with tools by the pool.

The female corpse was face down, and it was impossible to see her face, but Jack didn't have to guess to know who she was.

"TC came home and watched this scene, and he was so frightened that it was a nightmare again." Russell's expression was a little speechless.

"She probably thinks she has to go to that world to really become one with Natalie, right?" Jack saw at a glance the wedding ring on the corpse's finger.

Half an hour later, Jack and Russell sat in the living room, and TC placed two cups of coffee on the coffee table in front of them.

"Thank you again for helping me get Hubble back, I really can't imagine if I lose him again, I still have the courage to live in this world alone."

Jack took the coffee and moved his butt a little unaccustomedly, this was the first time he had sat and chatted with the client after the case was over.

Just now, Russell told TC the whole case from beginning to end, as it was.

Jack pondered his words for a long time before he slowly spoke, "Mr. Riodan, I'm not too used to communicating with the parties, or the victims' families, and usually, this is another colleague's specialty.

I beg your pardon if I am offended in my words. ”

TC hurriedly waved his hand, and when Russell told the case just now, he gave most of the credit to Jack, which made him dare not underestimate the young and excessive FBI in front of him at all.

Jack continued, "I can understand some of your actions, after all, whether it is the death of your wife or the background of Hubble, this is the privacy of your family, and you have no obligation or responsibility to explain all this too much.

But have you ever considered for Hubble how the status of an illegitimate child will affect his future growth?

And the death of his mother, if you don't clarify the outside world, what kind of eyes will he use to view you in the future? ”

Seeing that TC was about to stop talking, Jack made a gesture to signal him to calm down.

"I don't want to blame anything, but judging by the results, Sherby Bryce's death is inseparable from your previous negative attitude.

And if I'm not mistaken, you've developed some degree of drug dependence, right? ”

Jack deliberately said it very tactfully, in fact, the drug chloramine used by TC, the powder after crystallization is commonly known as "К" powder, which has a strong addictive nature.

The well-dressed guy in front of him, since the death of his wife, has been addicted to the mental anesthesia brought by the drug in the name of depression.

Maybe the truth is really as he said, disdainful of explaining to outsiders and exposing his family privacy, but it is more likely that he has long since lost this kind of thought.

TC's expression was a little embarrassed, there was a kind of embarrassment that his privacy had been exposed, maybe it wasn't that Jack had just rescued his son not long ago, and he was already angry at the moment.

Jack didn't really come to persuade him to quit DU or anything, he didn't have to say these words, after all, if he was a little careless in his words, he might be bitten back.

It's really that he saw that the little boy Hubble was too cute, so he took this opportunity to click on the other party a little, whether it had any effect or not, he could be regarded as asking for a year of access, after all, what if the other party listened to the persuasion?

After all, this world is still subtly different from the real world in his previous life, as we all know, in the world of American dramas, addicts quit when they say they quit, and after quitting, they are a good man.

However, Jack has no interest in verifying this, and has not yet encountered a similar real case around him.

(End of chapter)