Chapter 2

But I wasn't the killer!

I had left the hotel much earlier that day. After that, I never went back.

Who knows what could have happened during that long period?

Today, Scarlett and I had planned for me to go to her stepfather's house to announce our relationship.

And to propose to her right then and there.

I left the hotel to first tell my parents about our relationship.

Then, I planned to prepare everything for going to her house today.

But instead, she died in the hotel.

I was filled with regret. If only I hadn't left that day.

Perhaps this tragedy wouldn't have happened.

Scarlett was dead, and I was in agony.

But I had to put my grief aside for now.

The police had already prejudged me as the killer.

If I sank into my sorrow right now…

If I couldn't defend myself.

Then I would become the scapegoat for her murder.

And the real killer would walk free!

So, I forced myself to suppress my pain, reading through the information on the files, word by painful word.

According to the crime scene report:

Scarlett's time of death was between 5 PM and 7 PM yesterday, and the location was the apartment-style hotel where she and I had checked in.

The police investigated the hotel's front desk records and the hallway surveillance footage.

From 4:30 PM, when we entered the room together, until 5:30 PM, when I left the room alone.

No one else had entered or exited the room during that time.

It wasn't until 5 AM today, when Scarlett's stepfather, seeing she hadn't returned all night, showed up.

He found the hotel, inquired at the front desk, and, accompanied by the front desk attendant, went to the room.

He found the door unlocked, and after calling out with no reply, he entered the room.

That's when he discovered my girlfriend, completely naked, dead on the bed in a strange, contorted position.

Based on the crime scene investigation and the autopsy report, the police quickly reached a conclusion.

Scarlett died from mechanical asphyxiation.

She had been sexually assaulted before her death.

The fresh bruises on her body were clearly not from a normal lovers' encounter.

Moreover, her body was in a peculiar position, her limbs bound.

…

Seeing this,

My heart skipped a beat.

Because the information described in the report.

It perfectly matched what Scarlett and I had done that day.

But when I left, I had clearly untied her.

If no one entered or exited the room afterward, then who bound her again?