“Should I take Elias and Emma away if Warren Ford comes to see them again?” Roger asked.Stella paused and fell silent. She ended up not giving him a definite answer.After a while, she turned to her children and asked them, “Do you guys like that old man?”Elias and Emma scrutinized their mother’s expressions to find out how she was feeling.“Just tell me the truth,” Stella said helplessly. “You’re not allowed to lie.”Hearing this, Elias and Emma nodded earnestly.Stella sighed. It appeared that the children liked their great-grandfather, after all. But then Emma quickly climbed onto her lap and whispered in her ear, “But I like Mommy more than anyone else in the world!”“That’s right!” Elias echoed his sister. “Mommy is the most important person in the world!”In fact, they only liked Warren Ford because he was nice to them. The children would show affection towards any stranger that treated them kindly anyway.Stella understood what her children were trying to tell her,
Soon afterward, Stella suddenly smelled a pleasant aroma—This time, she was sure she was not just imagining it. The aroma clearly wafted in from the direction of the kitchen. She got up from the balcony and carefully put down the tablet in her hands before heading towards the living room.As she suspected, she saw a tall figure there.Stella almost stopped breathing as she slowly tiptoed into the kitchen, only to see Weston standing there wearing an apron. There was also a pot of boiling water on the stove next to him.Weston then deftly cut up some vegetables and plopped them into the pot before covering them with a lid. He turned around and saw Stella standing there at the door, her face looking sickly and pale. He frowned, then walked up to her and touched her face with the back of his hand to check if she had a fever.“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Are you feeling unwell?”“Are you out of your mind?!” Stella swatted his hand away, still recovering from the shock. “How can you
Stella’s refusal of him was strong and unambiguous. Weston sat on the couch and covered his eyes with one hand. After a long silence, he finally pleaded in a raspy voice, “Just let me stay here for a little while, okay?”Stella walked up to him. Only then did he put his hand down as he looked at her.“I’ll just sit here for a while, and then I’ll go, okay?”Stella ignored him and just stood over him and looked down at him. After remaining silent for a while, she finally relented and told him, “You’re only allowed to sit here for a while, and then you’ll leave, understood?”Weston nodded.Stella turned around and walked away. She headed towards the balcony to put away her things and returned to her bedroom.Half an hour later, she came back out to check on him and saw Weston getting up to get himself a glass of water from the water dispenser, and in his hand was a white bottle of medicine. He poured half of the pills into the bottle and popped them into his mouth.Stella froze.
“I’m not letting you go.”Weston showed a rare sign of defiance, and as he spoke, his lips brushed against her ear.Stella tried to get up by pressing her hand against his chest, only to be held even tighter by him.“Don’t leave me…” he repeated, this time with a feeble pleading voice.Stella again remembered how pitiful he looked while taking his medication, and she began to give in.Weston sensed this change in her and hugged her gently as he kissed her forehead. Then his kisses slowly moved downwards until he reached her collarbone.Stella took a deep breath. She had lost all her will to resist now and even started to undo the buttons on his shirt herself.“What are you doing?!” Weston asked after a pause.“Stop pretending,” Stella looked down at him. “Isn’t this what you want?”She then undid all his buttons, exposing his muscular chest covered in a dazzling array of scars. The sight shocked her. She realized that ever since they were separated, he must have had to suffe
Everything after that happened in a blur.In the end, Stella fell into a deep sleep. Weston cleaned her up and carried her back into the bedroom. He put her down on the bed and watched as her long hair cascaded down her body like a majestic waterfall.He leaned down and kissed her.Stella frowned and turned over.Weston continued to watch her sleep. Then he tucked her snugly under the blankets and adjusted the temperature on the air conditioner before getting up and leaving the room.He went out and stood on the balcony, smoking a cigarette. The screen of his phone lit up and went dark again, but he paid no mind to it because he was too busy thinking about how Stella had been acting earlier.She was clearly rejecting him at first but then gave in after seemingly having thought of something. What exactly was the reason behind her change of heart?He did not know and did not want to think too hard about it. He was afraid that he would not be able to accept what he might find out.
If he had brought her over intending to give her the company, she wouldn’t have known what to do…Though many of the employees were newly recruited, Stella had been a regular visitor even before the company was reformed, so many of them were familiar with her.There were quite a number of people sneaking over to peep in, but they did it very furtively.Most of them just took a glance and went about their business. It could be seen that their professionalism was high.“I’m done looking…”Stella stood in Weston’s office in the end and looked at him. “The company is great. The whole building is huge and spacious. The employees were professional. I can visualize that you are climbing to the peak of your life.”Her compliments were half-hearted. Weston heard a small number of praises, but most of them were teasing.He laughed a little and suddenly hugged her from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder. “How can it be considered the pinnacle of life? After all, I’ve only just come o
When it ended, it was already time to get off work.Stella’s clothes were all over the floor. She had no energy to pick them up.The well-fed man was extremely patient. After buttoning his white shirt and putting on his garments, he came to dress her.Stella was served by him the whole process.Her energy consumption these days was too big until she felt a bit sick, so her attitude toward Weston was not that gentle anymore. She put her hand on his muscular arm and dug her nails into it. “Why didn’t you do it gently when I asked you to?”Her tone of voice was clearly with rancor, but Weston chuckled after pausing for a moment. “Though you were telling me to go gentle, you had been holding me and not letting me go. If I went gentle and slow, you grunted instead. What did you want me to do exactly?”She was speechless.She flushed and got angry by herself, not wanting to pay more attention to him.Weston helped her get dressed, pinched her cheek, and said, “Go home?”She shook he
Stella found his current appearance to be a little frightening. “Are you okay?”The man just said with conviction that she also had a good time. How could he suddenly say such things?And what he said was true. She did have a good time too…So she took it as a sign that Weston was getting off on the wrong foot.…After arriving at the apartment, Stella was prepared for Weston to stay there.But what she did not expect was that just as she arrived home, he said to her indifferently, “Rest well. I have something to do.”She froze for a moment and looked at him. “You are going back?”He nodded and said, “There are still some things left unfinished at the company.”She did not say anything and simply sized him up.He stayed at her house shamelessly last night. Not to mention his work, she felt he would not leave even if it was the end of the world.Today, he had to leave because of something matter. Instead, this was too abnormal.But she did not say anything, and her face was
Stella had rarely ever woken up before him.He had always been terrifyingly strong, but their lovemaking last night must have consumed a lot of his energy, leaving him so tired that he was still sound asleep.She stared at him and suddenly felt like doing something naughty. She pinched his nose and held her fingers there, trying to suffocate him. Unsurprisingly, he soon knitted his handsome brows and quickly woke up.He was surprised to see her mesmerizing eyes as soon as he woke up, which made him pause. He then took her hand into his and kissed it again and again.“Are you okay?” he asked with concern, remembering how wildly he ravaged her last night.She had only been willing to be intimate with him because she was under the influence of a drug, yet he had taken advantage of her and had his way with her over and over again last night.Stella did not speak. Seeing her like that made his expressions turn a little colder. He fell silent for a long time before he got up and sl
The moment Stella saw him, she flew into his arms and clambered onto his body. She kissed him again and again, trying to search for his breath so she could explore his body even deeper. All she wanted was to let him extinguish the fire burning inside her.Half an hour had passed, and the effect of the drug on her body was its strongest now.Weston swallowed his saliva. Without any hesitation, he pinned her against the bathroom mirror and kissed her vehemently on her face, her shoulders, then her neck.Stella could not stop herself from letting out loud moans. The sounds she produced only drove Weston wilder. Even the corners of his eyes began to turn red now.Luckily, there was still a thread of reason in his mind. He pushed her away and, while panting heavily, asked her, “Who am I, Stella?”But Stella’s mind was occupied with her primal urges. She ignored his question and grabbed his shirt collar, saying, “Let’s do it…” The sight of her filled Weston with a desire to just give
Weston paused, then simply replied, “Okay.”When he saw her changing into a pair of high heels, he followed her around and asked, “Where are you going?”“Oh, to a private concert.”Then she added, “If you’re going to spend the night here tonight, then please take care of Elias and Emma. But if you have to leave, I’ll ask Roger to come over instead.”“Don’t worry,” he said. “Just go out and enjoy yourself. I’ll be at home and take good care of the kids.”Stella paused suddenly, feeling inexplicably weird about what Weston had just said. It sounded like she was forcing him to stay at home and take care of the kids while she went out to have fun without a care in the world. She turned around to look at Weston, feeling like he was acting like a poor neglected housewife.She shook her head and tried to shake this terrifying thought out of her mind.When they arrived at the concert, Hayden offered his arm to her like a gentleman. They then walked into the private concert together, w
Stella’s words rendered Weston speechless. She was right. He had been the one to agree to let Stella date other people, so he must seem like a fool saying all those things to her.He withdrew his hands and forced himself to calm down a little. “I have no intention to stand in your way,” he told Stella. “I was only worried about Elias and Emma. Since they’re also here, I think you need to take their feelings into consideration.”The children could sense the strained atmosphere between the adults, so they just waited patiently on the couch with Roger, occasionally poking their heads out to look at their parents.Seeing his kids like that, Weston slowly added, “I’m only here to see the kids, so both of you can go ahead with your date.”Stella said nothing and just took Hayden’s hand and left.When they got downstairs, Hayden glanced at her and asked, “Are you sure you want to just leave him like that?”“I don’t know,” Stella massaged the point between her brows. “I’m not sure wh
Hayden Quirk arrived half an hour earlier than Stella did on their first date.“You’re much earlier than I expected,” he joked as Stella walked in.Stella was actually on time, but she still felt a little guilty when she saw him already waiting for her when she arrived.“The traffic is terrible today,” she said.“Don’t worry about it,” Hayden said, handing her the menu. “Mr. Ford expected me to wait for you for at least an hour.”“I seriously don’t know what you guys are up to,” she grumbled, exasperated, “but I hope it will at least be over soon. Just don’t drag it out and cause me any trouble.”She ordered a few dishes, then handed the menu back to him. Hayden took it from her, ordered a few more signature dishes that the restaurant was popular for, then looked at Stella with a faint smile.“Did you think this is all just a joke?” he asked.“What else could it be?”“I am serious about this,” he told her, his voice suddenly turning grave. “Since even Mr. Ford agreed that we s
Weston raised his eyebrows at Ben’s words. “But he’s divorced. He has an ex-wife.”“What’s wrong with having an ex-wife?”Ben found Weston’s comment strange. “This man has good qualities. Upon investigation, he has a very good personality too. He was an active member during college. He also has an amazingly beautiful resume. It’s normal that a man like him has been married before… Besides, hasn’t Ms. Sealey been married before herself? She even has two children.”Weston’s expression turned cold at once. “Are you discriminating against her?”“I’m not.”Weston said, “Or do you think she can only find a divorced man for her second marriage?”Ben panicked. “I wouldn’t dare!”With Weston’s ridiculous amount of nitpicking, they could find no one that would match Stella.Hayden sat beside and quietly reviewed Weston’s latest psychological health report. As he turned the page, he suddenly said, “I’m actually a little interested in Ms. Sealey.”Hayden laughed a little and turned to Wes
Stella opened her eyes and shot Weston a cold look. Then, she turned her head the other way.Weston did not touch her again. He knew she was probably angry with him, so he stayed silent.A few moments later, he reminded her, “Don’t be angry. That man is unreliable.”Stella propped her chin in her palm. “And what does that have to do with you?”Weston pursed his lips, setting his jaw in a tight line. He said, “I’ve promised to stop pestering you. It’ll be a promise. I’m fine with seeing you with another man, but at least find someone who makes me feel at ease.”“Why do I need your approval when I’m just looking for a date?” Stella found his words funny. “You’re just my ex-husband. Don’t you think you care too much?”Weston rubbed his brow, and his voice suddenly went cold. “If you don’t want me to keep pestering you like I just did, maybe you should listen to me.”Stella questioned, “Are you threatening me?”“No. I’m suggesting.”Stella was lost for words. Then, she suddenly
Stella froze for a moment when she heard the voice. When she turned around, she saw that Weston had appeared behind her at some point.Weston stared at the man behind Stella with a cold gaze and an icy aura around him. Weston had always emitted a strong aura around him. Anyone who saw him would immediately be terrified because of his intimidating aura.The man froze for a moment at Weston’s sudden appearance. He took a step back and quickly steadied himself before greeting Weston, “Mr. Ford.”He still had the same calm and gentle look. “I’m sending Miss Cicily back.”“I know. Don’t ever show up in front of her again,” Weston told him. “You don’t have to send her back. Stay away from her.”It would be a little inappropriate for the man to act a fool at Weston’s straightforwardness, so he tugged at his collar and asked Weston with a polite smile, “Mr. Ford, you should give me a reason, shouldn’t you? I’m having a good time with Miss Cicily.”“You’re the one who thinks she’s having
Stella smiled. It seemed like he had come prepared.Stella enjoyed chatting with the man. He was sincere and introduced himself properly as soon as they started chatting.The man was also a pianist and came from a scholarly family. Although not super wealthy, he was doing considerably well in the middle class. Stella would not need to worry about the quality of life with him, but that was about it. She certainly could not live a luxurious life.Stella had a good impression of him. She also talked to him a little more about piano music.Stella twirled her hair and smiled. She told him with a nice voice, “I’m sure Roger has already told you about my situation.”“I know.”The man looked at her gently and set the coffee in front of her. He said to her, “I’m very interested in you. I think we’re very suitable for each other. Our living standards nowadays have improved quite a bit. Not many look for a partner purely because of material qualities. People with emotional needs will search