By now, Zoey might not even care for an apology from Laurence. He had been in the wrong for judging her so haughtily and treating her with such prejudice. It would seem very pretentious of him to apologize to her now. Laurence closed his eyes, his lashes trembling as he forced down the bitterness that rose in his throat. He gave his uncle, Cadence Scott, a call. When he picked up, Laurence asked, "Did Jasmine Teller come to you for help recently? To award the municipal constructions of Loreton district to Crescent Constructions?" It wasn't surprising that Laurence knew about this, as Sarah had mentioned it to him. Jasmine wasn't good at getting projects. She lacked the connections and was never ready to humble herself to ask for projects from people she thought were below her.As the construction company had no ongoing projects and capital turnover was slow, they faced some financial issues. Even after giving the boot to the employees who had labored hard for many years under Robe
Zoey wasn't foolish enough to think Laurence was in her neighborhood by chance. There existed a finite number of coincidences under the heavens.Amid the wind and snow, they exchanged a long, meaningful glance. Neither had anything to say.Zoey quickly averted her astonished gaze. Feigning ignorance, she turned in the direction of home. Laurence rushed to take a step toward her.On snowy days like this, it was no surprise the streets were empty. There were only a few passersby around them. A group of children immune to the biting cold played in the open grounds at the end of the street, enthusiastically building snowmen with gloves on.One of them ran toward Zoey, almost knocking her over, but the man behind caught her before she fell. There was hardly anyone in the world who wasn't afraid of his glacial glare. As the playful child met those cold eyes of his, he ran far away in fear, rejoining his friends and their snowmen.Zoey broke away from Laurence’s grasp without a word. She
Zoey was clearly nervous as she faced her uncle. Hearing his words only made her want to dig a hole in the ground and stick her head in forever. It was clear that he was not someone she could easily deceive. Yet it seemed like he was turning a blind eye to her lies instead of exposing her.Softly, she reiterated, "Not a Scott."The solemnity on Jason's face was out of the ordinary as he asked sternly, "Are you really keeping this child?"Zoey looked up and met his eyes. She nodded, "Yes." At first, it was because she had no choice. However, she found herself gradually growing attached to the baby now.Janet struggled to process her daughter's confession; perhaps it was due to her old age that necessitated extra time to digest the information. She was in a trance for a good while. Two months had barely passed since her divorce, but now, not only did she have a new boyfriend, but she was expecting a child with him. While she knew young people were often ahead with today's trends, t
The minute Zoey received his reply in her inbox, she took time to mentally prepare herself before opening the file. As luck would have it, she only found three comments annotated—a drastically reduced number compared to the last time. She forwarded the email to Katie and the two had a quick run-through before they started amending the plan accordingly. Once the revised version was completed the next day, Zoey went to the office building of the Scott Group for the meeting. They had specifically requested her presence—perhaps Laurence had too much on his plate lately to be picking on her.He was also absent from the meeting. Zoey heaved a sigh of relief upon realizing he wouldn't be joining the meeting. The lead of the Carol Bay project was replaced by a very capable-looking middle-aged woman. On one of the two toilet breaks she took, Zoey bumped into Amanda, who was there to discuss some matters with her uncle. The minute the lady laid eyes on Zoey, they were pinned on her for a go
Sarah was in pain all over. She was so angry that she trembled as she shouted, “I’m going to call the police!”Zoey was standing nearby. She smiled and asked, “Do you have evidence, though?”Whenever Sarah hurt someone, she did it in places without surveillance cameras. Zoey had done the same. There was no footage of Zoey pushing her, so she had no evidence even if she did file a police report.“Do you have evidence, though?” Sarah had asked Zoey the same question countless times before. Whenever Zoey was blamed or wronged, Sarah would say this with a sly grin. Now that Sarah had gotten a taste of her own medicine, she found it was a terrible feeling. She was so angry that her chest hurt. She had never felt so wronged before.In the private room, the dinner had come to an end. The seat next to Laurence was left empty. It was apparent that the person who occupied it was not coming back. The atmosphere was rather tense. After saying a few words to each other, everyone left. After the
Laurence only went home around 1 am.His mother was waiting for him in the living room. She had noticed he had been busy the past few months but had no clue what he was busy with. It seemed he was keeping himself busy to distract himself from problems that plagued his mind.“Why are you home so late? Did you work overtime again? Were you the only one working overtime?”Laurence did go to the office to do work. He couldn’t sleep early anyway, so he thought that he might as well do that.“Things at the company have been hectic lately.”“Are you sure?”“Yes.”Mrs. Scott scrutinized him and only believed him when she could tell he wasn’t lying. “You should take care of your health nonetheless.”She was very sleepy but forced herself to stay up to see him. She had already forgotten what she’d wanted to say to him. Instead, she handed him a photo album. “The helper found this when she was cleaning the guest room today. There are two photos of Zoey in it. It should be hers. Return
Laurence was not a stubborn man. The only thing he was stubborn about was refusing to admit he had fallen in love with someone he didn’t use to care about. He was biased against her and told himself repeatedly that she wasn’t his type. Yet, he couldn’t forget her and wanted to get back with her. Laurence did not want to go back on the words he had said in the past. However, all his struggles were in vain. He regretted everything he had said and done. … Zoey had been pregnant for about five months. Her body was still weak. The doctor suggested she take maternity leave so she wouldn’t push herself further. She took the advice.Her uncle, Jason, accompanied her to her doctor’s appointments. At first, the nurses thought he was her husband. Zoey knew her uncle was busy, and she felt bad about taking up so much of his time. She no longer went to the studio. Instead, she employed Rose to help sort things out. Things at the studio were in a relatively stable stage. Hence, Zoey did not h
The wind howled.It had been a while since Laurence last called Zoey. They never contacted each other for work or personal issues. Zoey had been going out less often, so she never bumped into him on the street. They’d last met on the night of the dinner party. Since then, they hadn’t met at all. Zoey thought Laurence would not come looking for her anymore. She did not expect him to call her. She didn’t know what he had to say to her. They usually corresponded through email or held face-to-face meetings for work-related matters.Zoey kept quiet. Laurence did not seem to know what to say either.“I love you. I can’t live without you. Let’s get back together. It’s all my fault.” There were many things he wanted to say, but he couldn’t. Instead, he said, “It’s been a while since we last met. My mom’s birthday is next month. She likes you a lot. I wanted to ask if you'd like to attend her birthday party.”He was using his mother as an excuse.Zoey hesitated. Mrs. Scott had treated he