Aaron Sawyer walked in. "President Grayson?"
"I need you to go to the finance department personally and transfer 7.5 million to Vesper’s private account," Milton Grayson instructed.
"Yes, President Grayson."
At the end of the hallway, Gwen Grayson had just hung up the phone when she turned and caught a glimpse of Aaron Sawyer entering the finance department.
A flicker of suspicion crossed her mind, and she quietly followed him.
When she overheard Aaron Sawyer instructing the finance director to transfer 7.5 million to Vesper Grayson’s private account, she bit her lip hard, her eyes filling with anger and indignation.
’This is too much!’
Her father had never been so generous with her, yet here he was, secretly giving Vesper Grayson so much money.
When Aaron Sawyer came out, he was met with the sight of a red-eyed Gwen Grayson and froze.
"Miss Gwen, what’s wrong?"
Gwen Grayson clenched her fists, suppressing her emotions. "Assistant Sawyer, does Dad often have you secretly transfer money to my sister?"
"Huh? Miss Gwen, you’ve misunderstood," Aaron Sawyer said, quickly waving his hands. "Nothing like that has ever happened. The 300,000 you and Miss Vesper receive each month is disbursed on a fixed schedule by the finance department."
"Don’t try to fool me! I just heard what you said!"
"Well..."
Aaron Sawyer was at a loss for words, unsure of where to even begin explaining.
He was just following orders and didn’t know the reason behind it.
Seeing him struggle for an answer, Gwen Grayson felt a lump in her throat.
She turned and ran off.
Aaron Sawyer felt a headache coming on. Fearing the situation would escalate, he quickly turned back to report everything to Milton Grayson in detail.
...
Vesper Grayson spent the entire day finally getting through the core documents.
She massaged her throbbing temples with her slender fingers and let out a soft sigh of relief.
She got up, walked to the window, and gazed at the city’s neon lights. Her stomach began to growl.
She called Shiloh Sloan.
"Want to go out for dinner?"
"Okay. Pick a restaurant and send me the address."
Her voice was hoarse, and Vesper immediately sensed something was wrong.
"Have you been crying?"
There was a pause on the line for a few seconds. "Yeah. I just left the sanatorium."
Vesper understood at once.
She had gone to see her mother, Melanie Sloan, again.
Years ago, in order to secure a deal, Shiloh Sloan’s stepfather, Quentin Chandler, had done the unthinkable. He drugged her while she was still a minor and tried to send her to a project partner’s bed, hoping to trade her innocence for business benefits.
Fortunately, the plot was discovered in time, and an irreversible tragedy was averted.
After the incident blew up, Melanie Sloan, far from blaming her husband, tearfully begged Shiloh Sloan to let Quentin Chandler go.
Shiloh Sloan didn’t back down and insisted on taking Quentin Chandler to court. Because the case involved a minor and was heinous in nature, Quentin Chandler was ultimately sentenced to six years in prison.
From that day on, the relationship between mother and daughter was completely shattered.
Unable to withstand the blow, Melanie Sloan fell ill and never recovered. The Sloan Family sent her to a sanatorium, while Shiloh Sloan went to live with her uncle, to whom she had no blood relation.
Even so, Shiloh Sloan couldn’t let go of that fragile mother-daughter bond. She visited the sanatorium regularly, trying to maintain a family tie that was already riddled with holes.
When Shiloh Sloan appeared before her, one side of her face was clearly red and swollen. The lingering redness in her eyes made it obvious she had been wronged.
"She hit you?"
"I’m used to it by now!"
Shiloh Sloan tried to sound nonchalant, but her reddened eyes betrayed her true feelings.
She once had a happy family, but her father died in the line of duty during a mission.
Her mother was grief-stricken, but she pulled herself together for Shiloh’s sake.
The two of them, mother and daughter, relied on each other to survive.
When others mocked her for not having a father or bullied her, her mother was always the first to rush to her side. Like a mother hen protecting her chick, she would spread her wings and shield Shiloh behind her. She would cook her delicious meals, coax her to sleep with a gentle voice, take her to the amusement park...
In middle school, Melanie Sloan met Quentin Chandler.
He was a real estate developer. Despite being rejected multiple times, he didn’t give up and pursued her with even greater fervor.
Under his barrage of sweet talk and relentless pursuit, Melanie Sloan finally fell for him.
From then on, she became Mrs. Chandler, a vine clinging to a man, her entire world revolving around Quentin Chandler.
She hung on his every word.
As for sending Shiloh Sloan to the project partner’s bed, Melanie Sloan might not have wanted to, but she knew about it. Yet she did nothing, tacitly approving her husband Quentin Chandler’s actions.
If Vesper Grayson hadn’t followed her father to the hotel that day and discovered that Shiloh had been drugged...
...the life of a seventeen-year-old girl in the prime of her youth would have been ruined.
Vesper Grayson handed her a glass of warm water, her expression complex.
"She’s so unreasonable and doesn’t see right from wrong. Why do you still go visit her?"
"Maybe I’m still clinging to the warmth of the past, to that tiny bit of a mother’s love in my heart. You know, every time I visit her, she never asks if I’m doing well. She just endlessly blames me for sending that bastard to prison, accusing me of ruining her family and destroying her happiness."
Her voice choked with emotion as she fought back tears.
"But what about me? Why doesn’t she ever think about me...? Why doesn’t she stop to think about what kind of hell I would have faced if they had succeeded, or whether I would have even survived?"
’How can a person become so selfish?’
Vesper Grayson, her heart aching for her friend, offered a few words of comfort.
"Let’s eat. Don’t exhaust yourself over someone who isn’t worth it."
"Yeah." Shiloh Sloan forced a smile. "I still have you and my uncle."
...
Luke Lockwood had sent out countless men to search every corner of the city, but they couldn’t find a single trace of Vesper Grayson.
Things at the company were even more of a mess. Zenith Group, as if acting on a premeditated plan, was pressuring him at every turn during a series of key meetings, leaving him exhausted and struggling to cope.
He was gradually losing absolute control over Zephyr Group, a company he once had firmly in his grasp. The feeling of being attacked from all sides was nearly crushing him.
Late at night, reeking of alcohol, he stumbled back to the villa in Repulse Bay.
The motion-sensor light in the entryway flickered on, illuminating the vast, cold living room—a stark contrast to the warmth in his memories.
He carelessly tossed his expensive suit jacket onto the sofa, roughly yanked his tie loose, and let it hang limply around his neck. He then collapsed onto the sofa as if all his strength had been drained.
He called out hoarsely into the dark, empty air.
"Vesper, make me some tea to sober up."
In the empty living room, only his voice echoed, meeting with a long silence.
A moment of clarity flashed through his dark, alcohol-fueled eyes, only to be immediately swallowed by an even deeper gloom.
’Vesper Grayson is gone.’
’Not only is she gone, but she viciously stabbed me in the back—by selling half the shares of Zephyr Group, the company I poured my blood, sweat, and tears into building, to my arch-rival, Zenith.’
’She did it on purpose. She deliberately used this method to get back at me, to get revenge for his betrayal.’
"Vesper Grayson, you’re ruthless!"
He let out a low laugh, a sound filled with an indescribable loneliness.
Luke Lockwood closed his eyes, and scenes from the past flooded his mind uncontrollably. Before, whenever he came home drunk from a business dinner, no matter how late it was, a warm lamp would always be left on in the living room. Vesper Grayson would be waiting for him with a cup of warm tea to help him sober up. She would nestle into his arms like a gentle kitten, offering him a soft kiss, and in that moment, all his exhaustion and frustration would seem to melt away in her tenderness.
He didn’t understand. How many successful men didn’t have a few women on the side? He thought he had been restrained, sticking with only Ivy Joyce from start to finish. If Vesper Grayson hadn’t always found excuses to reject him, to not let him touch her, he wouldn’t have had a moment of weakness and found another woman to satisfy his desires.
’She couldn’t expect me to be a monk my whole life, could she?’
’What more could she possibly want?’
’If she were willing to come back, I could overlook the fact that she sold the shares to Zenith.’
The sound of an electronic lock disengaging came from the entryway.
’Vesper’s back?’
Luke Lockwood shot up from the sofa, the alcohol-induced haze clearing in an instant. His dark eyes were fixed on the entryway, an irrepressible tide of anticipation and hope surging within them.