“Why hasn’t the car rolled yet?” Chloe blankly rested her head against the back seat for a long time, and when she startled and snapped back to reality, she only then realized the car was still idling in the yard without having moved an inch.
The middle-aged driver turned his head back, smiling amicably and replying: “Miss Chloe, Mr.
Julian just instructed that he will ride in the same car to visit your parents with you.” What?
Right as Chloe was widening her blue eyes in astonishment, the car door behind her was suddenly pulled open.
After that, Julian, in an active Casual outfit consisting of a short-sleeved black Polo shirt and khaki Chino pants, stepped into the car, leisurely sitting down next to her.
Out of 365 days a year, Julian suffered from a workaholic addiction, wishing he could eat, sleep, and camp at the headquarters for 366 days.
It was very rare for Chloe to see him shed his powerful Suit to dress comfortably and ordinarily like this.
In a flash, the words she wanted to question him with just got choked right in her chest, unable to swallow down and unable to spit out.
Thump, thump.
Chloe felt her heartbeat pounding so crazily that she feared the driver sitting in the front seat could also hear it clearly.
She hurriedly turned her face to look out the window, lowering her eyes to hide her embarrassment, clearing her throat to cough twice to regain her composure before asking: “Don’t you have a board of directors meeting at the company today?” Only now did her brain Load the information; this isn’t right, the script was that she was planning to go back for a family meeting to discuss divorce, with Julian being present and tagging along as a stumbling block, how could she smoothly close the deal?
Or should she just lay her cards on the table, letting him sit in as an auditor and join in right away for speed and neatness?
Chloe sneaked a glance at Julian’s god-like side profile, seriously weighing the feasibility of this risky plan.
Probably…
if he was set free, he would be very happy and excited to agree to sign the papers, right?
“Actually…” Chloe shifted her gaze to the man sitting next to her: “If your schedule at the conglomerate is busy, you don’t need to force yourself to put on an act and go with me.” Normally she never saw him having the free time to be thoughtfully attentive to his wife’s family’s diplomacy like this, why did he suddenly act up and become unexpectedly considerate today?
Thinking to this point, Chloe again felt a wave of frustration well up; she lowered her eyes and frowned, not bothering to pay attention to or look at Julian anymore.
“The secretary has already arranged the work at the conglomerate smoothly.” Julian attentively looked at Chloe’s stubborn side profile: “Besides, it’s been quite a while since I visited Uncle, Aunt, and Wesley; coincidentally, this time there are some new investment projects I need to discuss privately with Wesley.” Wesley Vance, Chloe’s biological older brother, used to be a classmate in the same cohort at Harvard Business School with Julian.
Hearing that unintentional explanation, the corners of Chloe’s lips curled up into a bitter mocking smile, not smiling sarcastically at anyone else, but smiling at her own silly delusion.
It turned out it was a business trip to discuss business matters, making her just now accidentally secretly rejoice, thinking he ditched work because he wanted to accompany her.
Life was truly ironic; having one’s illusions shattered by reality happened as often as daily meals.
“Oh.” She hummed a bland, utterly sad acknowledgment, despondently resting her head against the leather-upholstered seat back, closing her eyes pretending to sleep without bothering to open her mouth to utter another word.
Julian again tightly furrowed his brows; it seemed…
he had phrased it wrong and made the situation worse?
But which terminology did he say wrong and where?
She didn’t like him showing concern by going along to visit her family?
Sigh…
truly terrible, if he now used the excuse that the company had a PR crisis and needed him to go back to handle it, he didn’t know if it would still be in time to salvage this atmosphere…
Along the highway stretch, both sank into a suffocating, silent atmosphere.
On the outside, Julian still maintained the demeanor of a big boss, constantly staring at the iPad Pro screen swiping back and forth checking emails, but actually inside that sharp mind, this was the first time he seriously set up a SWOT analysis to re-evaluate the marital relationship between him and Chloe.
The bitter conclusion drawn was: The daily communication between the husband and wife was truly too impoverished, pitifully lacking.
Chloe’s manifestation in this marriage was always perfect to the point of being soulless; no arguing drama, no clingy jealousy, and her demands for material things or time were also extremely sparse.
Julian had previously always buried himself headfirst in work, and also had no rich romantic experience in cohabiting between the two genders.
If Chloe didn’t open her mouth to demand, he would foolishly assume everything was still fine and not proactively do anything romantic.
Perhaps it was precisely because of that dull state that it led to the cold, distant, lukewarm distance between the two of them as it was now.
Previously, Julian was emotionally colorblind, not seeing anything wrong with this state; this arrogant bachelor even thought that a stable marriage of a long-term strategic nature wasn’t it supposed to be peaceful and boring like that?
But Chloe’s erratic changes lately were like a freezing bucket of ice water splashed right in his face, making him wake up.
He startlingly realized he had always been addicted to the feeling of liking to watch Chloe smile gently at him, using that sweet, coquettish voice like pouring honey into his ears to call the name “Julian,” much more than this deadly silence.
The cold war was an incredibly new and thorny concept for Julian.
Since there was no instruction manual, he could only rely on survival instincts to clumsily strive to mend and beg for Chloe’s attention.
Of course, that was just his delusion; as for Chloe on the actual outside, she completely did not realize her dry-as-a-tile husband was struggling to “coax” her.
For more than half an hour sitting in the car, Julian constantly had to try to force a serious facial expression glued to the iPad, silently conducting a psychological warfare in his head.
The car entered a high-end, isolated residential area in the Hamptons suburbs, parking in front of a three-story villa bearing a Colonial architectural style.
This ultra-luxury real estate area was located quite far from the bustling center of Manhattan, looking outwardly as if bearing a long-standing historical mark, with one side of the wall fully covered by a trellis of vibrant green ivy.
Chloe stepped out of the car first, reaching out to press the doorbell.
A slightly plump middle-aged female housekeeper came out to open the door.
Seeing Chloe, she clearly froze for a moment in surprise, then immediately bloomed a radiant smile: “Miss Chloe came home unexpectedly?
I didn’t hear Madam mention this schedule.” Saying that, she respectfully stepped aside to make room in the hall for Chloe, taking from the built-in shoe cabinet nearby a pair of soft fluffy slippers and placing them on the marble floor.
“I didn’t notify Mother in advance, it was just a last-minute decision.” At this moment, the housekeeper finally sharply saw Mr.
Julian following behind, hurriedly and clumsily taking out another pair of men’s leather slippers: “Mr.
Julian also took the time to visit; Mr.
Arthur and Madam will definitely be very surprised and overjoyed.” After all, a busy billionaire like Julian Quinn was ranked as a VIP guest; over the past two years, his figure was only seen dropping by on Thanksgiving or Christmas.
“Helen, who rang the bell?” From the massive living room echoed a gentle female voice bearing the characteristics of the upper class.
After that, a meticulously maintained woman with a standard figure, an elegant and graceful walking posture, and sporting a trendy curled-in bob hairstyle stepped out.
“Madam, it’s Miss Chloe and Mr.
Julian visiting home,” the woman called Helen respectfully replied.
“Oh my God!” Victoria, upon seeing Chloe, immediately spread her arms wide, stepping forward to embrace her and kiss her cheeks: “My precious baby, my busy daughter finally remembered the way to visit home!” Having finished the intimate greeting, she released Chloe, and seeing the elegant Julian standing at the door, she immediately brushed Chloe’s hand away, rushing straight over enthusiastically: “Julian is here too, hurry up and come inside, it’s very cold!” Following that, she raised her shrill voice to call out echoing up to the second floor: “Arthur!
Hurry down right now, your precious son-in-law is here to visit!” Chloe felt like a flock of black crows was flying over the top of her head cawing “caw caw.” She blushed a bit embarrassedly, looking at Julian being enthusiastically pulled toward the living room by Mother Victoria.
Seeing that on his angular face he still maintained a proper polite smile without showing any annoyance, she finally let out a sigh of relief.
After that, her small mouth pouted again in dissatisfaction.
Strange, why did she still have to lower herself to care about his feelings at this moment?
Ultimately she had to delude herself into saying it was just a habit; habit was truly a terrifying conditioned reflex.
It seemed she had to set up a rehab plan to fix this ugly habit.
Chloe silently scolded herself; if she constantly put Julian’s thoughts and face first like that all the time, then could this rotten marriage still have divorce papers filed or not!
Looking at Mother Victoria sometimes attentively pouring Earl Grey tea, sometimes peeling a plate of fresh fruit for Julian, Chloe felt an eyesore jealousy welling up in her heart, bitterly speaking up in a sulky tone: “Mother, I want to eat fruit too.” “Stop it, stop it honey.” Victoria frustratingly waved the fruit paring knife toward her daughter: “What are you joining in to fight for?
Go upstairs and find your sister-in-law to play and chat.” “…” Chloe was speechless and kept quiet, looking at the beautifully carved apple slice that had been shoved right into Julian’s hand, while that thick-faced man, after saying “Thank you Mother,” didn’t act polite at all and brought it right up to his mouth to eat.
Choke on it and die, you hypocrite.
Chloe angrily stood up intending to go upstairs; right at this moment, a young girl with bright eyes and beautiful eyebrows, dressed incredibly stylishly, was carefully supporting a middle-aged man carrying the dignified air of a veteran businessman walking down.
That was exactly her father – Mr.
Arthur and…
“Sister-in-law Lily.” Chloe smiled forcefully and called out.
That young girl’s appearance looked incredibly youthful and naive, dressing like a freshman college student, but was actually fully twenty-one years old.
Every time she faced her, Chloe gritted her teeth wanting to hurl a curse at her older brother Wesley calling him an animal; grown old yet pretending to be young and still going around seducing and grazing on tender grass, a shameless jerk.
Lily, meaning her older brother Wesley’s precious young wife, had just turned twenty-one and hadn’t even had time to get her college diploma before being lured home to be a wife by this old fox Wesley using money and romance.
Thinking back and forth, Wesley was already thirty-three this year.
Perhaps understanding her older brother’s playboy nature too well, no matter how Chloe looked at it, she felt that naive little girl was deceived and led into a trap.
Arthur, as soon as he saw Julian, the two men carrying capitalist blood immediately shook hands with beaming faces, sitting back together and talking endlessly to discuss the Wall Street stock market situation and company mergers of the day.
The three women, including Chloe, also gathered in a salon corner to discuss fashion; she took out a few exclusive GY Fine Jewelry accessories and distributed them as gifts to Mother Victoria and sister-in-law Lily.
Before long, older brother Wesley driving a supercar also just arrived home.
The macro-level conversations of the three men became even more dry and headache-inducing.
The three women were truly starving and couldn’t wait, so they decided to head to the dining room to have lunch first.