In truth, Stephen and James’ meeting had been under police surveillance the entire time.

James was currently a suspect in custody. Since he had personally admitted that he was the mastermind pulling Jacqueline’s strings in the poison case, his statement qualified as a confession, making it a key piece of evidence in this criminal case.

Now that they had James’ confession, the police could proceed with their investigation.

Stephen had also sent his subordinates to assist the police. That was when they discovered that a servant at the Jacobson residence had witnessed Jacqueline dousing Caleb’s tonic with an unknown substance.

The servant had chosen to stay mum on the matter due to her desire to keep out of trouble.

Now that the truth had come to light and Jacqueline had long since been expelled from the Jacobson family, she didn’t hesitate to spill the beans to the cops once she was questioned.

When Rowena heard the news, she could do nothing but clutch her chest in grief and anger.

“How could this happen? How? I only thought Jacqueline was a foolish girl who had been taken advantage of. I thought she was a good person at heart. I never expected her to poison Caleb, her adoptive father!” Rowena’s eyes were filled with tears, clouding her vision.

“How could she do this to us? How could she be so vicious?” she cried.

Sophia had a mocking smile on her face as she sat by Rowena’s hospital bed. “Rowena, I told you that Jacqueline isn’t as she seems. Yet, you’ve never once taken my advice seriously.”

Sophia had long warned Rowena that Jacqueline was manipulative when she saw how Jacqueline had targeted Tessa by fillin Rowena’s ears with nothing but lies about Tessa. However, Rowena had never listened to her.

In actuality, Rowena had never really liked Sophia, especially since Sophia was her daughter-in-law.

A harmonious family was an ideal that could rarely be found in reality. Even wealthy families were no exception to conflicts within the family.

Although Rowena had despised Amara when Caleb cheated on Sophia, it didn’t stop her from also finding fault in Sophia.

In her opinion, Amara was immoral for seducing a married man. Meanwhile, Sophia was a failure for not being able to keep her husband in check.

In fact, Rowena had found Sophia far more lacking than her son, despite Caleb being the one involved in an affair. After all, she was biased enough to think that men had needs, and Caleb had only made a mistake because Sophia failed to satisfy those needs of his.

Then, when Amara had tried to

break the family apart, Sophia had dared to threaten suicide. Rowena immediately thought that Sophia did not have the poise expected of a mistress of the house. She didn’t have the spine and brains to save herself. Worse yet, she had nothing but an emotional meltdown.

So, she disdained Sophia and despised Amara.

Sophia had long been aware of Rowena’s dislike for her.

Still, it didn’t matter to her now as they’d only maintained a facade of peace over the years for the family’s sake.

Now that Rowena was once again hospitalized for her weak heart, Sophia had to visit her a few times a week out of duty. Her actions didn’t mean that she cared about Rowena’s survival.

From Sophia’s perspective, Rowena’s death would spell her freedom.

She didn’t think she was being cruel or heartless. After all, she was only returning the zero emotional value that Rowena had deigned to grace her with.

That was also one of the driving forces behind Sophia’s desire to personally inform Rowena that Jacqueline had poisoned Caleb.

Rowena had exploded then, shouting and cursing at everything and everyone. Once she was finally done with her meltdown, she promptly shoved all the blame on Sophia once again.

“You’ve raised such a fine daughter, Sophia!” Rowena questioned sharply, her face twisting into a horrid scowl, “What have you been doing all these years?”

Sophia let out a scoff. “You truly are a master at shifting the blame. If ‘m not mistaken, Jacqueline has spent far more time by your side than mine. Isn’t she your precious little granddaughter?”

Sophia saw no reason to keep up the pretense now that things had come to this.

So, she chose to confront Rowena.

“Are you saying that I’m to blame here?” Rowena was furious.

“Let’s see here. You’re such anoveldrama

fantastic mother figure that you’ve gotten yourself a Caleb and a Jacqueline. You’re so good at

parenting that each of your charge is even more horrid than the next!” she remarked snidely.

“Y-You!” Rowena clutched her chest as she desperately gasped for breath.

Just then, they heard a knock at the door.

Sophia looked at the time and saw that it was time for Rowena’s meal. Thus, it

was probably one of the nannies bringing Rowena her meal.

Sophia instantly composed herself and said calmly, “Enter.”