Chapter 57: Chapter 57: Stealing a Fortune Will Land You in Jail
"Sis..." Ethan Sterling whined playfully, a cheeky look on his face. "You’ve been gone a whole year. Do you have to start interrogating me the moment you’re back?"
Cecilia Sterling shot him a look and huffed, "You’re always giving Mom a headache, so I’m not going to make things easy for you. I brought back a lot of presents for you, but now I’ve decided to give them all to Ronald."
Ronald was her cousin, her aunt’s son.
Upon hearing this, Ethan Sterling’s eyes went wide. "Don’t do that, Sis! Our other sister said you bought her a ton of stuff. What did you get me? Let me see!"
"We’ll talk after our chat tomorrow."
With that cool remark, Cecilia Sterling ignored Ethan’s pestering and his attempts to act cute, leaving him behind as she went back to her room.
Lying on her bed, the familiar scent and feel of the room put Cecilia Sterling at ease. She slept dreamlessly through the night—the most sound and peaceful sleep she’d had in a long time.
The next day was bright and sunny.
Cecilia Sterling had just groggily opened her eyes when she heard a soft knock on her door. "Cecilia, I’m heading to work. I left breakfast for you in the microwave; it’s warming up. Remember to eat it when you get up."
"Got it, Mom," Cecilia replied.
Hearing that her daughter was awake, Jasmine Sterling pushed the door open. She looked at Cecilia, her voice gentle. "What do you want for dinner tonight? I’ll go straight to the market after work and buy everything to make it for you."
Cecilia Sterling smiled, feeling as warm inside as the morning sun. She thought for a moment before replying, "Bak Kut Teh."
"I knew it," Jasmine Sterling said, a knowing expression on her face. She glanced at the time. "I have to get going. If you’re still sleepy, you can rest a bit more. Just remember to eat your breakfast."
After her mother left, Cecilia Sterling climbed out of bed. Just as she was about to go to the bathroom to wash up, she heard a crisp DING.
As someone who had read her fair share of reincarnation novels, she instinctively froze. ’Is it the System?’ she thought.
But after waiting for a long moment and hearing nothing else, she blinked as she realized.
Oh, right. The breakfast in the microwave was ready.
After washing up, she was enjoying a delicious breakfast of white cut chicken and soup dumplings when she suddenly received a voice message from her mother on WhatsApp.
Cecilia converted it to text: "Cecilia, I left my work badge at home. It should be on the cabinet in the entryway. Could you bring it to me after you finish breakfast?"
Cecilia quickly replied, "Is it urgent?"
"No rush. As long as it’s here before noon."
Around ten o’clock, Cecilia found her mother’s ID badge and took a cab to The Royale International Hotel in Xylos District.
Her mother was a housekeeper. She had been working at this five-star international hotel for over ten years and was now the leader of Housekeeping Team One.
Her daily duties consisted of cleaning guest rooms and promptly handling any requests from the guests.
It wasn’t easy, but the working environment was decent—at least she wasn’t exposed to the elements. For that reason, Jasmine Sterling was quite satisfied with her job.
The only downside was her limited education; having only finished middle school, she couldn’t be promoted to mid- or high-level management positions like manager. Team leader was the highest she could go.
At the hotel’s front desk, Cecilia politely inquired, "Hello, I’m looking for Jasmine Sterling from Housekeeping Team One. She forgot her ID badge."
"You’re Jasmine’s daughter?"
The front desk agent, noticing Cecilia’s beauty, couldn’t help but ask.
Cecilia smiled and nodded.
"Jasmine should be cleaning rooms on her team’s assigned floors right now. Here, use my keycard to take the elevator to the 26th and 27th floors to look for her. If she’s not there, you can try asking at the main housekeeping office on the fifth floor."
The agent handed her a staff keycard, adding, "The rooms that need cleaning will have their doors propped open. Be careful not to disturb any of the occupied rooms. And please remember to return the keycard to me when you’re done."
Cecilia took the keycard and nodded her thanks.
She messaged her mother first to ask which floor she was on, but there was no reply. So, Cecilia had no choice but to follow the front desk agent’s directions and start searching.
She started on the 26th floor, walking quickly down the corridor. Whenever she spotted a housekeeper in a room with an open door, she would check if it was her mother. The hotel was massive, with dozens of guest rooms on each floor alone.
From Suite 2788, the sounds of an argument drifted out.
"Well, isn’t that just bizarre? It’s not a tiny trinket. A brooch as big as the base of a cup isn’t just going to grow wings and fly out of the room, is it?"
"Then do you think it’s possible someone in your party put it away? Or that you might have put it somewhere and forgotten?"
"What is that supposed to mean? Are you suggesting I staged this? Take a look at who you’re talking to! Do you really think we’d go to the trouble of framing a housekeeper?"
"Sir, that’s not what I meant at all. I was only exploring the possibility. Our goal is the same as yours—we just want to help you find what you’ve lost, right?"
In the middle of the suite’s living room, a housekeeping manager in a suit was apparently handling a crisis. Opposite him stood a slim man with a furious expression, clearly enraged.
And standing next to the manager was none other than Jasmine Sterling—the housekeeper who, at the guest’s request, had cleaned this very room earlier in the morning.
Just half an hour earlier, the guest in this suite had called down to report a missing valuable, demanding that someone from housekeeping come up to handle the situation. That was what led to the current scene.
The slim man pointed a finger at Jasmine Sterling and demanded, "From the moment we checked in until we discovered it was gone, you are the only staff member who has entered this room. How can you say you didn’t see the diamond brooch on the table?"
Jasmine Sterling met his gaze. Despite his aggressive and intimidating demeanor, she showed no trace of fear, replying politely but firmly, "I’m sorry, sir. I really didn’t see any brooch."
She had worked at this hotel for over ten years; this wasn’t her first time dealing with a situation like this, so she remained calm.
Her calm demeanor only made the slim man more furious. "So you’re not going to confess? Fine! I’ll call the police. Stealing something this valuable is a serious crime. You’ll go to jail! Don’t say I didn’t give you a chance!"
"Sir, you can’t accuse me without any proof. Since you’ve lost a valuable item at our hotel, we encourage you to file a police report. We will cooperate fully with the investigation," Jasmine Sterling stated with quiet dignity.
The slim man was holding his phone, intending only to threaten the housekeeper into giving the item back. He never expected her to call his bluff.
At that moment, the man who had been sitting silently on the sofa with a grim look on his face finally stood up. He turned to the slim man and said, "We can’t call the police. We’d have to go to the station and give a statement, and we don’t have time for that. The event starts at noon."
The slim man’s face fell. "Gideon, what do we do then? That brooch was loaned to us by the brand. It’s worth over five hundred thousand! We have to pay for it if it’s lost!"
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