Chapter 6
འ་་ཅ་ ཕ་ད “ད་ད་ ས་༦ པས ་་་ས་་J P-པpe ་་ ་་་པ ་་ས་་སད ས་པཎ་ཅ་་་དྭ པ་ ཅས་་ཕ་་པ 9ས་ པས་་་ པ་ ་་་་པ་ས་ཆ. ་ ས་ས་་་་་ཕ་་་ ་པ༷ ་་ཕཔ་་ ་་་༤ .“9ཕ་་་9 out who this stranger was.
Even if I found out, it wouldn’t make any difference to me.
“So why waste the time?”
But I didn’t know how to explain all this to Norma.
Noticing I wasn’t responding to her, Norma went on, talking about the latest gossip.
“Gloria, did you know? The people who badmouthed you at yesterday’s welcome party today, their family business is being targeted. My dad said that the company involved is suspected of deliberately interfering with prices. What a coincidence, huh? It just so happens that the ones who are in trouble are those exact people.”
When I heard this, a few thoughts flashed through my mind.
The truth of the matter seemed to be slowly coming into focus.
A certain someone’s figure passed through my mind so quickly that I couldn’t quite grasp it.
I shook my head, silently mocking myself for overthinking, and pushed those unrealistic thoughts out of my mind.
“Gloria, don’t get carried away. Only you will end up hurt in the end. Yes, when it comes to feelings, always remember not to
get too carried away. After all, the one who falls first is the one who loses.”
That day, rich people were stirring quite a stir in the high society circles in Javia.
Many heirs and heiresses from prestigious families found their credit cards suddenly frozen by their families. They were quickly sent overseas for further studies. Even Gary, who was rumored to be the heir to the Johnson Group, couldn’t avoid getting caught up in it.
As for Kathy, whom Benjamin had been keeping hidden, she was found by Benjamin’s mother, Carol Clarke, and swiftly sent away to another city under the pretext of a company personnel adjustment.
But not long after, Benjamin personally brought her back and insisted on marrying her.
He even went as far as staging a hunger strike for Kathy.
It was laughable, a grown man causing such a scene over love, threatening to starve himself to death.
Soon after, my aunt, Karen Patel, who had married abroad, returned under the excuse of visiting relatives.
“I don’t know how Kathy managed to get close to her, but she seemed to be constantly by Karen’s side, fussing over her and offering care at every turn.”
As for why my aunt’s surname was Patel, it was a long story. She was the daughter of my grandfather’s war comrade. Abandoned by her birth mother, she had been adopted by my grandparents and raised as their own.
Over the years, they had treated her like one of the Johnson family, until she stubbornly decided to follow an artist she met while traveling abroad, and gradually lost contact with us.
Karen, with her usual enthusiasm, held Kathy’s hand, chatting and laughing, filling the air with warmth.
Her gaze toward me, however, was calm and indifferent, as if I were the outsider in the room.
I didn’t mind. I had known since childhood how my aunt treated us.
Just as I was about to turn and leave, Karen suddenly asked, “After two years abroad, have you forgotten the basic manners of greeting your elders?”
I smiled and calmly shot back, “I must’ve learned it from you. You moved abroad and can’t even remember to call home.”
The underlying tension, in my words, was clear to everyone present.
Only the Johnson family didn’t seem to care. After all, this scene had played out countless times between Karen and me whenever we met.
As the drinks flowed and the atmosphere became lively, Kathy approached me, holding a glass of red wine, her hips swaying as she walked.
Standing in front of me, she wore a warm, graceful smile.
“Ms. Johnson, we had some misunderstandings at the welcome event. Let me use this opportunity to offer you a toast. I hope you’ll show me some grace, and I apologize for any offense I may have caused.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Benjamin’s gaze fixed on us, with Gary wearing a concerned expression.
I couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow.
11:40 AM
Finally, the moment I had been waiting for had arrived. I almost thought they would keep quiet and play dumb.
Kathy seemed so harmless at first glance.
Even the words she spoke sounded fine at first.
But those who knew better could tell every word was a trap.
To put it bluntly, with one move, she could frame someone.
She spoke of misunderstandings, yet at the same time asked for forgiveness.
If I accepted that drink, it would be like admitting that I had been deliberately making things difficult for her.
If I refused, I’d be seen as high and mighty.
Looking at Kathy’s gaze, I smiled and simply said, “I’m sorry, Ms. Palmer, I’m allergic to alcohol.”
Kathy looked momentarily stunned, her eyes falling on the glass in my hand. She then asked, “But you were drinking just now,
weren’t you?”
“What an idiot.”
She didn’t even know how to back off when offered a way out.
I raised my glass with a smile and replied, “You must’ve mistaken it. This is just a soft drink.”
My refusal was as clear as day. I couldn’t have been more direct.
Kathy turned around, looking utterly wronged, and threw herself into Benjamin’s arms, tears streaming down her face as she
softly muttered, “Ms. Johnson still won’t forgive us… What should we do?”
Karen, who had always disliked me, stepped forward without a second thought, accusing me without even asking. She said, as
the heiress to the Johnson family, I shouldn’t bully Kathy, a weak woman.
The way she said it made it sound like I was some kind of tough guy.
But none of that mattered.
I walked straight toward Karen, step by step.
“So what if I’ve been doing that? What are you going to do about it? If I were you, I’d first figure out who I really am. You’re nothing but a thankless adopted daughter of my grandpa, and you have the nerve to criticize me? I call you Aunt out of respect. If I didn’t, what would you even be?”
Karen’s expression grew complicated when she heard this. She wanted to complain, but with all of us being younger generations, there was no one there to speak up for her.
Everyone else assumed I was being arrogant, deliberately looking for a fight.
But only I knew what I was really doing. I needed to shift everyone’s attention onto our emotional drama so that my grandpa
could quietly root out the pests in the company.
As for being misunderstood or having people gossip behind my back, I had long gotten used to it. “After all, who doesn’t have people talking behind their back? Who doesn’t talk about others behind their back?”
“Life and death didn’t matter. If you didn’t like it, then deal with it. That’s a phrase that’s been popular online lately.”
Time slipped by slowly, and soon, it was the day of Benjamin and Kathy’s wedding.
Everyone’s attention was on the couple about to get married.
But to everyone’s surprise, officials from the prosecutor’s office showed up and arrested several high–ranking members of the company. Each of them held significant power in Javia’s social circles.
The Johnson Group was affected as well, though fortunately, the damage wasn’t severe.
The wedding not only didn’t happen, but the groom’s father was also arrested publicly, handcuffed, and taken away. It was a huge embarrassment.
Carol, who had never agreed with Kathy marrying her son, couldn’t hold back her fury any longer. She immediately announced the cancellation of the wedding, showing no mercy to Kathy or Benjamin.
As guests at the wedding looked on and whispered, Kathy collapsed in front of Carol, crying and insisting that she and Benjamin were truly in love.
Just then, the big screen, which was supposed to be showing wedding photos, instead displayed pictures of Kathy in bed with
different men.
Benjamin saw this and immediately turned red with rage. He grabbed Kathy by the neck and demanded to know why she had done this to him.
“Why? Obviously, because he is easy
to
fool with his money and naivety.”
But Benjamin wasn’t the only one shocked by the scene. Gary, the big fool, was also deeply shaken. He kept shaking his head, trying to convince himself it wasn’t true.
“Unfortunately, eyes don’t lie.”
Kathy was a professional con artist who targeted rich men for marriage scams. She had built up a fortune through this method, and her actions had long since crossed the line into criminal territory.
But those rich men, for the sake of face, had never exposed her.
It wasn’t until one of them went bankrupt, lost his family, and finally couldn’t take it anymore that he reported the case. On the day of the wedding, both the bride and the groom’s father were taken away by the police and judicial authorities, their wrists adorned with glaring silver cuffs.
The Clarke Group was quickly swallowed up by other well–established companies.
About half an hour before the plane took off, Benjamin called me. He asked, “What if…”
Before he could finish, I interrupted him, “Benjamin, people need to look forward. The moment you and Kathy were together, there was no longer any what if in this world.”
After hanging up, I looked at Matthew, who was standing a little distance away, with confusion in my eyes.
As an adult, I understood exactly what the look in his eyes meant.
Maybe, someday in the future, our relationship would change, but it definitely wasn’t going to happen now. #Extra Chapter#
Many years later, as Matthew watched the girl sleeping peacefully in his arms, he smiled and said, “Gloria, I’ve always wanted… you.”
The End
