Deirdre pushed herself to get out of bed. The phone in the living room was still shrieking incessantly—almost like an audio representation of suffering without end. She got out of bed with great difficulty and walked through the door. She then picked up the phone—And Brendan’s annoyed snarl greeted her. “Took you long enough!”Deirdre’s fingers tightened around the receiver. As if he had not played a part in this! It had been cold the day he had stripped her naked in his study and forcibly had sex with her. She had felt both chills and a heat rush after that and had unsurprisingly come down with a fever. Even now, she was working her way through a brain fog.Not that he would care, anyway. All he cared about was spilling his seed and making himself feel good. To him, she had always been a subhuman at best. “I have a headache. I just woke up,” she croaked.Brendan snickered. “Would it kill you to cut back on your malingering? It’s almost late evening, for Christ’s sake.”Deird
God. Every part of that cordiality sounded so manufactured and phony. Deirdre was in no mood to play the game, so she placed the box on a rack next to the door and turned on her heel.“Miss McKinnon, wait.” Charlene stopped her as she rose from her seat with a smile. “What’s the hurry? Don’t you wanna look around? You know, enjoy the vibe now that you’re here?”“Not interested,” Deirdre rebutted nonchalantly. She had never been interested in what the affluent upper-class considered haute couture or their glamor. The only reason she had even wanted to be Brendan’s wife was because she had loved him.Of course, even that had gone away.“I brought you your necklace,” she stated placidly. “If there’s nothing else you need, excuse me.”“But there is oneeee thing,” Charlene replied quickly. Her smile deepened. Then, she fished out her phone gracefully and played a video. The whimpers and cries of a dog being tortured filled the air.Deirdre stopped dead in her tracks. She could feel
“Bren!” Charlene sputtered and fled right into Brendan’s arms in terror. She gawked at Deirdre, fear widening her eyes as she yelped, “She’s gone crazy, Bren! She’s lost it and she is trying to kill me!”Remnants from Deirdre’s chokehold were still etched around her neck, sore and stark. A little up ahead, Brendan could see tears flooding the corner of her eyes. The sight provoked something ugly within him.Exasperation. He had only left Charlene alone for a while, but it had been enough time for this to happen. Had he been there one second sooner…He lunged, his fingers digging into Deirdre’s shoulders like talons, his strength so totalizing that it could crush bones. “Deirdre f*cking McKinnon! You’ll never f*cking learn, will you?! Even after all this punishment, you still can’t stop harming Lena!”Deirdre’s tears rolled down her cheeks endlessly, wetting the floor. Her chest was aching so much that even breathing had become hard. She glowered at Brendan, her eyes beet red, and r
Sam approached Deirdre gingerly. “Miss McKinnon? Come on. We should go,” he said. “That… That was too reckless of you, miss. You shouldn’t have acted out that way during an important event like this one. Things could have gone really bad, and… You know Mr. Brighthall wouldn’t possibly let you off lightly.”Deirdre knew he was speaking the truth. As she cast her eyes on the ground, her tears rained down on the cold, hard floor before she replied, “Did you know? The homeless man who murdered Bliss… was Charlene’s employee, Sam. She hired him.”Sam was bewildered. “What?!” Deirdre pressed her hand against her chest, but it did nothing to relieve her from her pain. “She told me… that Bliss kept looking in the direction of the mansion when… when it was about to die,” she croaked. “It… was waiting for me to save it, Sam. And what was I doing at the time? I… I was s-shopping for new clothes! I f-failed Bliss. I k-k-killed it!”“No, Miss McKinnon,” Sam rebuffed with a frown. He had recove
Deirdre returned to her room in the mansion and sat on the edge of her bed in a dissociative trance.Minutes crawled, possibly hours. She had no idea how long it took until she finally felt sleep catching up to her. She lay down. Then, suddenly, her door swung open from a kick. Brendan lurched like a mad beast and pinned her wrists against the floor. The air chilled, but Deirdre could almost feel frost coming from the man’s eyes furiously scanning her face.“Didn’t even lose a sleep over the sh*t you do, did you?” Brendan bellowed, his rage-powered might crushing her shoulders.“That f*cking injury on Lena’s neck! Nothing could make it go away, and everyone saw it, McKinnon! They were talking about it behind her back and among themselves during her own party all because of the stupid sh*t you did! She wouldn’t even come home after the party! That’s how humiliated you made her feel, you black-hearted b*tch! Do you even know how to f*cking stop!?”Pain flared like wildfire across h
At that moment, Deirdre’s mind went blank. She reflexively rushed toward a corner and tightly stuck against the wall.She heard Brendan's disdainful smirk. “McKinnon, I didn’t know you were afraid of death. I thought you weren't afraid of anything, and that was why you’d dare to injure Lena.”The chill storehouse was far warmer than the chill in Deirdre’s heart. She stared into space with reddened eyes and said in a quavering voice, “Brendan, would you regret it if you were to realize one day that Charlene is the Devil behind everything that had happened? That she killed Bliss and has arranged all these?”Brendan was subconsciously startled. ‘Lena killed Bliss. She was the culprit behind all these…’For an unknown reason, he felt a quick moment of sharp heartache when he thought of the possibility. It was instantly transformed into a detesting frown, and he glared at Deidre.“McKinnon! Even after all these, you still can’t stop yourself from slandering Lena, can you!?” Brendan’s l
Deirdre McKinnon eventually was about to end her miserable life in the most embarrassing and ridiculous way possible.She fell and was just reachable by the hound. She sensed that the savage hound was opening its mouth from the odious stench before she passed out.In her fever, Deirdre seemed to be in a dream. She dreamt of a puppy wagging its tail, eagerly approaching her. It should be Bliss because it kept licking at her face. Meanwhile, her body temperature dropped.Finally, the rain stopped.Brendan was standing on a balcony. The smoke of a cigarette he stubbed out remained, lingering underneath him. Raising his head, he looked into the hazy sky. It was another hour before sunrise.Downstairs...Sam, wearing a coat, strode into the mansion through the gate. While brushing the rainwater off himself, he saw his colleagues on the sofa. He was startled for a moment and felt somewhat worried. “What has kept you all here today?”Sam didn’t receive any direct reply, and only a body
Was the person he hugged Deirdre McKinnon? Was the person the stubborn Deirdre who wouldn’t stop provoking him?Why did it seem like he was hugging a cold, lifeless corpse?Brendan couldn’t even sense her breath. This made him worried. Before he could recollect himself, he had strode into the house and rushed upstairs.Everyone in the living room was shocked, looking at Brendan rushing in. His eyes reddened while carrying Deirdre, who was in a life-threatening phase. They were surprised to see the panic on Brendan’s face, which didn’t appear even when the Brighthall Group was placed in a menacing state.Brendan turned on the hot water tap of the bathtub and put her in. “Deirdre! Deirdre!”He gnashed his teeth and commanded, “Wake up! Do you hear me!?”Why would it turn out like this when he merely wanted to punish her by locking her in the storehouse?Brendan couldn’t figure it out and never knew the punishment would eventually fall on him.Brendan was afraid. He was afraid tha