In the Sterling villa. Elizabeth was talking with her mom who was on the bed and drinking coriander juice against her will. “Rebecca is so stupid,” Elizabeth blurted. “Why would she go out when we repeatedly kept telling everyone to not go out? Look what the Sehla family has done now. They will try to use this opportunity to humiliate us as much as possible.” “You reap what you sow,” Dorothy sighed. “She carelessly went out. Now, she’s suffering.” “Yeah, but she’s not the only one who’s suffering. Everyone in this house is now feeling anxious because of her.” “You’re right.” Elizabeth shook her head. “Anyway, you don’t think too much about it, Mom. Just sleep and focus on healing.” Dorothy nodded. After Elizabeth left the room, Dorothy waited a few seconds before taking the sweet box out from under her pillow. She opened the box and put a sweet in her mouth and enjoyed the taste. “Grandma!” Lisa’s voice shocked Dorothy and made her cough. “What’s that in your hands? I thought Mo
Marcus walked out of the station and sat on a bench under the tree shade. He called someone on his mobile. “Mr. Bernard, this is Marcus. I need your help with something. It’s very urgent.”“Whoa, chill, dude,” a throaty voice spoke from the other choice. “You haven’t contacted me in a freaking long time. I ate a lot of biscuits yesterday, and I’m having a hard time shitting right now. Is it okay if I call you later in the afternoon?”“I told you it’s urgent, didn’t I?”“Yeah, but I spent at least an hour in the bathroom,” he responded.“You’ve gotta get your stomach looked at. Who’d spend an hour squeezing their intestines in the bathroom?” Marcus blurted. “Anyway, this is serious, Mr. Bernard. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have called you.”“Ugh… okay. I guess I can keep the shit inside for a few more hours,” Bernard reluctantly said. “Tell me, what happened?”“Jim is behind bars. The police captured him and are wrongly accusing him of doing some illegal things and more.”“Oh, that’s bad.”“
Brian entered the station with multiple lawyers and waved the papers in his hand. “Here’s the bail.”Selena and everyone was immediately relieved to hear that.The inspector calmly checked the documents and slightly frowned as he looked at Brian. (How did this man get the signature from the high-court’s judge?) He also noticed that the magistrate was among the people Brian brought, so the inspector was forced to smile. “Please sit down first, sir.”“Why would I sit in this filthy place?” Brian retorted. “You better bring her out before I lose myself.”“S-Sure thing,” the inspector quickly glanced at the officers, and one of them hurriedly opened the cell.“Come out, Rebecca,” Selena said.“Mom, what about this man?” Rebecca looked at Jim who was sitting next to her in the same cell. He was still cuffed up on purpose. “Didn’t you get bail for him?”“We don’t even know who that man is,” Selena said. “If we bring him bail, then the reporters will make it seem like you and he are somehow
Jim’s words, ‘can I have your number,’ left almost everyone there in shock.Rebecca just didn’t know how to respond. She wanted to reject him, but he clearly helped her fend off the ruffians. But if she were to give her his number, wouldn’t that mean she was interested in him? Rebecca didn’t have any feelings for him, so she wasn’t sure if she should give her number or not.“I know this isn’t the right time,” Jim quickly said, “but if I have your number, I thought I could contact you some other time. If not, you can just visit my restaurant sometime in the future.”“Uh… I think I’ll do that then?”“D-Do what? Giving me your number, or…”“I’ll visit your restaurant some day,” Rebecca said.Jim smiled, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t disappointed. To this day, most women would drool at him, but very few women had grabbed his attention. Even now, Jim felt like talking with Rebecca even though Veronica and Selena were around. There was something about her that was different. But si
In Sterling villa. An invisible dark cloud was hovering on top of Rebecca who was in deep sleep. She was having many dreams, but one dream suddenly popped into her mind. It was her kissing and having sex with Jim, the man she had recently met at a restaurant. It woke her up at once. She found herself sweating. She tried to wipe the sweat off her face, but then realized that her hand felt very stiff. She couldn’t fold her fingers, which showed signs of her body lacking water. She grabbed a bottle from the fridge and hydrated herself. Within seconds, she was able to open and close her fist again. She sat down on the bed, looking a bit dull. She did not like the fact that she had such a nasty dream all of a sudden. She never had such a distasteful dream before. She never even imagined having sex like that with anybody, so the dream she had really made her feel bad. She blamed herself for having such perverse thoughts. And she didn’t want to go back to sleep anymore. It was already 5
Early in the morning.Jim, the young chef, was reading a book written by Selena Sterling, and he loved the health and beauty tips she had given throughout the book. Also, the one quote that really hit him was: Life is a labyrinth of emotions, and love is the only route you’ll find your way.“Dad, did you know of this quote?” Jim asked his dad, Marcus, who was working in the kitchen.“Of course, it’s one of her most popular quotes,” Marcus said. “Hundreds of thousands of people sent her love letters after she said those words in an interview. It became big news back then. Just imagine thousands of letters showing up at your doorstep every single day… It must be pretty daunting. Maybe that's why she never made such statements afterward. But she used to be a pretty daring woman in the past. When she married a movie producer, I thought she was like any other actress who got trapped or tricked by him, but then I saw evidence that those two had been in love for a while before that. I felt l
In his room, Jacob was watching an old movie of Selena and remembered the old days and felt happy about it. “She was so lively back then…” Suddenly, Selena entered the room, shouting his name. Jacob immediately changed the channel. “Watching television shows, are you?” she shook her head. “You’re becoming a couch potato day by day. I know you’re depressed, and I’m depressed, too, but if you do nothing about it, then it’s going to turn you old soon.” “Did you come here just to tell me that?” Jacob indifferently asked. “No. A guy contacted me on mobile,” she said irritatingly. “And he sounded like he was part of the mafia. He had the audacity to demand me to join his group, or he’ll cause us more trouble. He also said he parties with popular celebrities in the industry every week. You must have an idea of who it could be, right?” “Mm…” Jacob thought for a moment. “It’s a group that’s called Nexus.” “Nexus?” she had never heard about it. “Every member in that group is filthy rich,
The next morning.Rebecca was walking in the garden, instead of going out for a walk because of all the things that had happened the last time she had gone out.Veronica accompanied her, but her body language showed that she wasn’t interested at all. She was only doing it for the sake of giving company to her sister and was also making sure Rebecca wouldn’t go out.“Is it necessary to get up early and exercise?” Veronica asked.“If you get lazy, you get fat, and if you get fat, your brain doesn’t get the right amount of oxygen,” Rebecca said, “and that’ll affect your thinking. But if you exercise, then it’ll reduce the stress and also improve blood oxygen levels.”“Reducing the stress, huh…” Veronica slightly smiled. “I guess you’re finally thinking of moving on?”“Moving on?” Rebecca didn’t like that phrasing of words. “What the heck is wrong with you?”“What?” Veronica’s heart skipped a beat. “Did I say something wrong?”Rebecca shook her head, not even bothering to reply.“I said i