Chapter 4 - The Mayor's Lie
"They told me you were dead," Jason choked out, tears of profound, agonizing heartbreak finally flooding his dark eyes. "The Sheriff... he looked me in the eye and told me I failed. He told me they dredged the car and you were both gone."
Amanda wiped the tears from her face, her profound gratitude instantly shifting into cold, lethal anger.
"We didn't drown, Jason," Amanda stated clinically, her voice echoing perfectly across the dead-silent restaurant. "I managed to break the window after you were swept away. We washed up on the riverbank two miles down. But we weren't taken to a hospital."
Jason stared at her in sheer, unadulterated confusion. "What do you mean? The entire precinct was looking for you."
"The precinct wasn't looking for us," Amanda corrected flawlessly. "Mayor Sterling was."
Jason physically stopped breathing. The air in the upscale steakhouse was completely sucked out. Richard Sterling was the incredibly wealthy, ruthless Mayor of the city, a man who ruled the local police force with an iron fist.
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"Mayor Sterling is the one who ran us off the bridge," Amanda whispered, her eyes flashing with pure, unfiltered disgust. "He was driving his luxury SUV completely drunk. When he realized what he had done, he didn't call for an ambulance. He called his private security team. They found us on the riverbank shivering in the mud."
👉 Amanda took a slow, heavy breath, preparing to reveal the horrific cover-up that destroyed Jason's career.
