"President Rokujo was trying every possible way to recruit you into his company, and his seat happened to be right beside yours. You understood his personality and state of mind very well." Jiang Xia looked at Torimaru Naoko.
"At a time like that, all you had to do was say you were allergic to grapes and couldn't drink the wine in your glass, then casually lament something like, 'What a shame to waste such expensive wine.' To please you, he would take the initiative to drink that poisoned glass, creating the illusion that you had narrowly escaped death.
"Also, I heard that President Inozuka had several possible venues for the competition. The reason he ultimately chose that villa was your suggestion—the villa's lobby manager happened to be your childhood sweetheart and knew about your grape allergy. After the crime, having him reveal that fact and testify for you would make you even less suspicious."
Torimaru Naoko took a deep breath. As someone skilled at manipulating other people's mental states, having someone see through her inner thoughts like this made her deeply uncomfortable.
She could only do her best to remain calm. "Physical evidence. I told you, I only look at phys—"
"There's physical evidence too." Jiang Xia picked up a photograph. "Do you remember this?"
Torimaru Naoko focused on it and saw a pure white wedding dress in the picture. It looked very familiar. It was the "burial clothes" she had custom-made to fit her own measurements—the clothes she intended to die in.
Torimaru Naoko frowned. There was no material on that wedding dress that readily retained fingerprints. Even if there had been, after the crime, she had tried the dress on in front of the police. Anything related to her found on it would not have been strange.
So