Contract Marriage: The Replacement Groom novel Chapter 22

22 Questioning Maya 1 

The last person to be interrogated was Maya. (1) 

“Miss Maya, you are Miss Jeslyn’s assistant, am I right?” Spid asked. 

“Yes.” 

“When she entered the house with her grandfather, where were you?” 

“We entered together.” 

“How many of you were in the sitting room at that time?” 

“Just the three of us.” 

“Where were the guards and the helpers?” 

“We didn’t look for them, however, none of them were in sight.” 

“You were there when Miss Jeslyn told everything to her grandfather, yes or no?” 

“Yes.” 

“She looked for her phone, yes or no?” 

“Yes.” 

“What did she ask you to do afterward?” 

“She asked me to call the hotel management.” 

“Did you?” 

“Yes.” 

“Who did you call?” 

“The manager.” 

“At what time?” 

“I can’t remember.” 

“What did the manager say?” 

“He said they’d look for it and contact me,” 

“Give me the manager’s number” 

“Huh?” 

“Bring her phone here. Spid gestured to one of the court staff and they handed him Maya’s phone. 

“What’s the manager’s number?” Spid asked while looking at Maya. 

“Ahem. Hotel manager,” she replied after coughing. 

Spid nodded, “Unlock it, he stretched the phone to her. She accepted it and unlocked the phone with a doubtful look on her face. She handed it to him and Spid returned it to the court staff. 

“Please, connect it to the flat-screen TV and help us display the call history of ‘hotel manager’ dated 

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1/4 

the 6th of October 2022, from 3:50-4:15 PM.” 

The court staff nodded and started to scroll through the phone until she got to that day. 

She shook her head and said: “There’s no record of the hotel manager.” 

“No hotel manager,” Spid said while everyone was looking at the large TV screen. 

“I cleared my call log,” Maya responded. 

“Why?” 

“Because I don’t like to keep records of calls on my phone. Seeing too many contacts on my call log isn’t pleasing to my eyes,” She explained. 

“I understand Miss…” he turned to the judge. “Your honor, point to note. She hates leaving her call records on her phone.” 

The judge nodded and penned it down. 

Spid looked at his watch and remained silent for a few seconds before. The moment the longest hand touched 12, his eyes brightened and he continued his trail. 

“Madam, please continue scrolling,” he told the staff. 

The court staff nodded and continued to scroll through Maya’s phone. To everyone’s surprise, even 2 years of call records were found on her phone. 

“Th- that’s not my phone!” She cried out when she saw her call log. 

“Oh? Ma’am, what phone are you holding?” Spid asked the court staff. 

“Q-Pine X908, android version 11, with one sim slot. The court staff read out the details on the back of the phone. 3 

“Is that not your phone, Miss?” 

“That’s my phone, but these contacts…” 

“Aren’t they yours?” 

They are, but I deleted them already!” 

“When?” 

“A long time ago.” 

“How are they still on your phone but only the hotel manager’s contact is not there?” 

I-” 

“Ma’am, please help us dial the hotel manager, Spid interrupted her. 

Maya started to panic. She wanted to stop it but how? Seeing from the large screen that the court staff was about to hit the call button, she immediately screamed. 

“Stop! I didn’t call the manager!” 

“Your honor, she didn’t call the manager… so, why did you lie to Miss Jeslyn and how did the missing phone suddenly appear out of nowhere? From your words, you three were the only ones in the sitting 

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room.” 

“I don’t know how it got there, maybe she didn’t search properly.” 

“Or, maybe you were the one holding the phone all along, preventing her from calling the ambulance on time!” Spid raised his voice with squinted eyes which caused Maya to flinch. 

“N-no, I didn’t do that,” she shook her head vehemently. All her strong facade and confidence were crumbling down right in front of her and she couldn’t do anything to save them. She hurriedly looked at lawyer An with pleading eyes, begging for help. 

“Of course you did-” 

“Objection my Lord, he is pressuring my client and attempting to force her into giving false testimony!” 

Lawyer An couldn’t take it anymore. He has been watching how Spid confuses his clients and forces them to say something contradicting what their argument is based on. The moment he gets that, he’ll give them a massive blow to seal the debate. 

Maya is the core of this conspiracy and once she falls, that’s all, they will all lose and who would take the blame? The young Miss will surely skin them alive. 

“Lawyer An, how about you let me finish my statement next time?” Spid articulated with narrowed 

eyes. 

“Lawyer An, sit down! Another word from you and you are out of this court!” The judge fumed. 

Lawyer An has been giving him a headache with all his objection cries. No one objected when he was carrying out his interrogation, yet he has been objecting to almost everything S.P says. 

Lawyer An sat dejectedly on his seat with dimmed eyes. He could foresee their future and it wasn’t looking bright. 

“Thank you, you’d honor… Miss Maya, I believe you didn’t do it because you were busy cutting the telephone wire.” 

“Ah?” 

“Hmm… while Miss Jeslyn was searching for her phone, you were cutting the telephone wire.” 

“No, I didn’t do that!” 

“Then what were you doing standing by the telephone wire?!” 

“I-” 

“Your honor, the sitting room has a lot of space but the telephone was placed under the staircase. How did Miss Maya find under the stairs, a wonderful spot to make the call to the manager, whom she actually never called?” 

The judge smiled and wrote down a few words. (2 

By now, the audience watching from in and out of the courtroom has known the truth of the matter and some were already bashing and accusing Jeslyn’s family of being evil, especially Christine.