Chapter 3
My brother’s ashes were light, fitting into a small ceramic urn.
I knelt before my father’s grave, hugging the tombstone, my fingers tracing the engraved words.
“Dad, Alex has come to keep you company.”
“You won’t be in pain anymore where you are.”
I went to the hospital, holding my mother’s withered hand against my face.
“Mom, I’ll take care of you from now on.”
The money I’ve saved from taking on private jobs over the years is enough to pay for medical expenses. I don’t need the Winters family’s support anymore.
Leaving the hospital, my feet unconsciously led me back to our old house one last time.
I dug out an old photo album from the corner. There was a photo of Alex when he was fifteen.
He was on the green field, wearing a jersey, smiling like the sun.
Holding that album, I returned to the Winters mansion.
Pushing open the door, it was still the same deafening music and flirtatious laughter.
Caleb was slouched in the center of the sofa, Mia nestled against him, surrounded by several young and beautiful female artists, all signed to his company, chattering away.
Over the past seven years, I’ve grown tired of this scene.
He had made me dress up as a bunny girl, as a snake woman, just to give them more amusement.
But today, I won’t play along anymore.
I walked over and put the divorce agreement on the coffee table in front of them.
“Caleb Winters, sign it.”
Caleb picked up those few pages, his gaze falling on the title. He snorted.
“Aria Sinclair, you really don’t give up, do you? Coming with this again?”
He crumpled the agreement in his hand, contemptuously throwing it on the ground.
“Getting smarter now? Forgot how you were begging me to open the door yesterday? Now you’re putting on this act again?”
“Want a divorce? I’ll tell you what, in this lifetime, you can forget about it!”
I don’t know why, but tears suddenly fell, without warning.
Caleb looked at the wet trails on my face. He reached out his hand, almost touching my cheek, then suddenly stopped, throwing his hand back even more forcefully.
“Put away this crying act of yours! Who are you trying to fool? I’m telling you, Caleb Winters doesn’t fall for this!”
I looked at him, forcing back the tears: “Caleb Winters, it’s been seven years. I’ve used everything I have to atone. Now Alex is dead. This debt, I don’t want to repay anymore.”
“What did you say? Alex is dead?” Caleb’s face changed.
Mia bent down to pick up the album from the table.
She acted as if she had discovered something particularly interesting, speaking in an affected voice: “Is this your crippled brother? He looked quite lively back then.”
She then picked up Alex’s letter, “What’s this? Oh my, this handwriting is so ugly! It’s like chicken scratch. He wasn’t illiterate, was he?”
The people around laughed uproariously.
Mia fanned herself with the letter, her hand slipping, the letter fluttering to the ground. She raised her foot, about to step on it—
That letter was written by Alex, using fingers that couldn’t bend properly, painstakingly forming each stroke!
I lunged forward, grabbing Mia’s hair, pulling her down and pinning her to the carpet!
“Don’t touch that!”
Caleb answered a phone call, his face turning ashen as he hung up. He turned back and with one move threw me off.
My lower back hit the corner of the coffee table hard, the pain making my vision go black.
“Aria Sinclair, have you gone mad?! Seducing me wasn’t enough, you’re even going after my uncle?! Does our Winters family owe you or something?!”
He dragged me by my hair like a dead dog: “Shameless! Go kneel in the ancestral hall! Apologize to my father, to Mia!”
He kicked away the prayer mat in the ancestral hall, “Kneel properly!”
I looked at his twisted face, hunched over as I knelt down, my forehead slowly touching the stone tiles.
The ancestral hall was very quiet, with only the sound of my heavy breathing left.
I don’t know how long I knelt there. My consciousness gradually blurred, sinking completely into darkness.