Free Web NovelChapter 270: Chapter 273: Felix Preston Sued Her
"Finn Quincy, have you lost your mind?!"
Fiona Dalton pointed a finger at Finn Quincy’s nose, her voice sharp with anger as she questioned him.
"Hmph," Finn Quincy sneered, his voice dripping with disdain. "Lost my mind? I think you’re the ones who have lost your minds! You couldn’t just live a good, peaceful life. You had to go around stirring up trouble and making a mess everywhere! And look what happened. You’ve turned the Quincy Group into a muddy swamp, and not even God himself could save it now!"
"...That’s not... What do you mean, *we* turned it into a muddy swamp?" Fiona Dalton, unhappy with Finn Quincy’s accusation, shielded Cecilia Quincy behind her and confronted him. "Finn Quincy, you need to have a conscience when you speak. What does the Quincy Group ending up like this have to do with us?"
"What do you mean, ’what does it have to do with you’?" Finn Quincy retorted. "If it weren’t for your terrible parenting, would our children have turned out like this and caused so much trouble everywhere?"
"If they hadn’t caused trouble, would the Quincy Group have been dragged down with them?"
Fiona Dalton was a little dumbfounded. "Are... are you blaming me for this?"
"I’m not just blaming you!" Finn Quincy admitted without hesitation. "I’m blaming all of you!"
"Take Cecilia Quincy! She does nothing productive all day except pick fights with Charlotte Shaw! And what happened? Charlotte barely retaliated, and Cecilia was utterly ruined, a pariah everyone shuns!"
"Then there’s Willow Quincy, who’s even more twisted by nature! Of all the fine young ladies in Aethelburg, he had to fall for his own sister! And now he’s a suspect in that same sister’s disappearance case!"
The more Finn Quincy spoke, the angrier he became, his eyes turning red with fury. "I worked my fingers to the bone to raise two children, and not a single one of them has made me proud!"
Fiona Dalton started, "I’m telling you..."
"You, shut your mouth!" Finn Quincy cut her off viciously, turning to point a finger at her nose. "Fiona Dalton, you think you’re any better? We’ve been married for decades, and I’ve never once made you worry about money! You don’t have to do a single thing all day except stay home and teach the children, and you couldn’t even get that right!"
"Just look at them! Look at what you’ve turned our two children into!"
"..."
Fiona Dalton felt deeply wronged by his scolding, but she couldn’t find a single word to refute him.
"Hmph!" He snorted again. Having vented most of his resentment, he couldn’t be bothered to argue with Fiona Dalton and her daughter any longer. He simply turned and stormed out of the room, still fuming.
"*Sob sob sob...*"
Cecilia Quincy was still crying in Fiona Dalton’s arms.
Fiona Dalton held her, patting her back gently while comforting her in a soft voice. "There there, Cecilia, don’t listen to your father’s nonsense. You’re not useless at all! Compared to that Charlotte Shaw, you’re a thousand times better!"
"Hmph..." Cecilia Quincy felt incredibly wronged. Her tears were like a flood from a broken dam, impossible to wipe away completely.
"Mom, Dad kept scolding me..."
Fiona Dalton coaxed her, "He was wrong to scold you. He went too far! Don’t you take any of his words to heart."
"Mhm..." Cecilia Quincy agreed reluctantly, then asked, "Mom, are the troubles the Quincy Group is facing serious? Dad has been in a terrible mood for a while now."
"Sigh..." Fiona Dalton sighed and said with a frown, "I don’t know, either. I’ve never been involved in the company’s business, so I have no idea what the situation is right now."
Wiping her tears, Cecilia Quincy sat up from her mother’s embrace and asked tentatively, "Then do you think the Quincy Group has any spare capacity to help others right now?"
"Help others?" Fiona Dalton tilted her head to look at her, asking suspiciously, "Help who?"
"...No, nobody." Cecilia Quincy blinked, her guilt obvious. "I was just asking. C’mon, Mom, just take a guess for me."
Fiona Dalton said, "You want me to guess? Seeing how your dad is at his wit’s end, I guess that even if he had the capacity, he wouldn’t help!"
"He hasn’t even cleaned up his own company’s mess yet. How could he possibly be in the mood to help someone else..."
"...Oh." A look of despair suddenly crossed Cecilia Quincy’s face.
Fiona Dalton looked at her, sensing something was off. "What’s wrong, Cecilia? Does one of your friends need help from the Quincy Group?"
Cecilia Quincy thought for a moment, then said with some hesitation, "...Sort of."
Fiona Dalton shook her head, her expression uncharacteristically stern. "Cecilia, I advise you not to help. No matter how close you are with this friend, you can’t help them right now. And you absolutely cannot bring this up with your father!"
"You saw what he was like just now. If you don’t want another scolding, you’d best stay out of his way! Understand?"
"I understand..." Cecilia Quincy replied in a very small voice.
Fiona Dalton patted her shoulder and said no more, only reminding her to be obedient for the time being before leaving the room.
She was pouting sullenly, the tears on her face not yet dry, when Finn Quincy suddenly knocked on her door.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK—
"Cecilia Quincy, open the door."
Finn Quincy’s voice sounded fierce. Cecilia Quincy didn’t dare to delay, quickly jogging over to open the door.
Finn Quincy stood outside, holding a manila envelope.
"Someone sent this for you. Open it and see what’s inside."
As he spoke, he handed the envelope to Cecilia Quincy, his expression inscrutable.
"What is it?" Utterly confused, Cecilia Quincy took the envelope and opened it right there in front of Finn Quincy.
Finn Quincy stared at her intently, his gaze dark and sullen.
She opened the envelope, pulled out the few thin sheets of paper inside, and casually glanced at the contents.
"Aethelburg People’s Court, Notice of Lawsuit..."
Seeing those words, Cecilia Quincy couldn’t quite process them at first. Her eyes scanned down the page, and it was only when she saw "Defendant: Cecilia Quincy" that her mind snapped to attention.
"A notice of lawsuit!!"
Her eyes widened in astonishment, and she looked at Finn Quincy with a mixture of terror and confusion.
"Heh..." Finn Quincy gave a sarcastic laugh. "That’s right, a notice of lawsuit! Cecilia Quincy, what kind of trouble did you stir up this time that made someone so angry they decided to sue you!"
Cecilia Quincy looked completely bewildered. "...No, I—I haven’t caused any trouble recently!"
Finn Quincy: "If you didn’t cause trouble, would someone sue you? Take a look at who the plaintiff is on that notice."
Cecilia Quincy did as he said, and on the notice of lawsuit, she saw a very familiar name—
Felix Preston.
Plaintiff: Felix Preston.
"...It’s... it’s Felix Preston who’s suing me." Cecilia Quincy’s face paled instantly. In that moment, a hundred different possibilities flashed through her mind.
Finn Quincy stared at her, his face devoid of expression, and demanded in a glacial voice, "Why is Felix Preston suing you?"
"..."
She hung her head, guilty and too afraid to say a word.
