Free Web NovelChapter 73: Chapter 73: Never Looked for Her
Mia’s mouth fell open. "Mommy..."
The next moment, Christian calmly walked over and lifted the hem of his shirt, revealing a scar on his waist the size of a fingernail.
Mia’s eyes widened in an instant, and she glanced at ’Zachery’ several times.
’This is the young master, right? And that little dummy Zachery is still at Imperial Crest, isn’t he? So why does the young master have a scar that’s identical to Zachery’s!’
Penelope Sullivan’s heart ached for him. "Oh, dear, that scar is still so deep. Does it hurt?"
Christian pulled his shirt down. "It doesn’t hurt anymore."
He walked back to Mia’s side, meeting her dumbfounded expression with a slow smile as he poured her a glass of lemonade.
Christian himself wasn’t sure how things had gotten so coincidental.
Zachery had a scar, and he had one in the very same spot.
His daddy had told him he got the scar when he was three, from wrestling and roughhousing with another little boy.
Penelope Sullivan clucked her tongue and teased, "Our dear Zachery is so considerate now. For a second, I almost thought he’d been replaced! But a scar like that can’t be faked, right, Yara!"
"But you have to be more careful when you walk from now on, sweetie. Falling down must hurt so much!"
Estelle Lockwood ordered their food, and she couldn’t help but smile as she watched Zachery eat so obediently.
’Actually, the reason Zachery fell wasn’t because he was unsteady on his feet. It was because he got into a fight.’
’Henry Kendrick had called her that day to say Zachery had snuck out and started a fight with another boy on the street. They had wrestled, fallen down together, and both ended up with a scar on the waist.’
’By the time Estelle Lockwood arrived, the other boy had already been picked up by his parents, leaving Zachery behind to cry sullenly by himself.’
’Afterward, Zachery adamantly refused to admit that he fell because he’d lost the fight. Everyone else just assumed he had been careless and wasn’t watching where he was going. Penelope Sullivan had even fretted over him about it several times.’
To save the little guy’s pride, Estelle Lockwood didn’t expose the truth. "Zachery is a big boy now. He doesn’t fall down while walking anymore, right?"
Christian nodded obediently.
Mia: "..."
’Am I crazy, or is the whole world crazy? How can they possibly get away with this?’
...
「Imperial Crest.」
When it was time for dinner, Zachery sat at the table and waited for a moment. "Grandpa Chapman, why isn’t Daddy here yet?"
Chapman said gently, "Young Master, Mr. Sloan isn’t feeling well today. Dr. Grant is upstairs taking care of him, so he won’t be coming down. Will you be all right eating on your own?"
’That scumbag dad of mine isn’t feeling well?’
Zachery’s eyes darted about. He immediately jumped down from his chair and shot upstairs. "Grandpa Chapman, I’m going to go see Daddy!"
"Hey, Young Master, you should eat first..." Before he could finish his sentence, Zachery had vanished.
Zachery slowed his pace, tiptoeing to Nathaniel Sloan’s bedroom door. He pressed his ear against the wood. There were voices inside.
Zane Grant’s voice was pleading. "Nathaniel, I know how much you miss Estelle Lockwood, but Dr. Lockwood really isn’t her! What good does it do to take your anger out on Dr. Lockwood? See? You’ve already scared her off!"
"Besides, if Dr. Lockwood really were her, why would she come back to you and not even reveal her identity? It must mean you did something wrong. You need to take a good, hard look at yourself!"
Nathaniel Sloan pressed his temples, his head splitting. At Zane’s words, his lips twisted into a sarcastic sneer, his voice laced with an unspeakable pain.
"I’d like to ask that myself. What did I do wrong that made her leave me so cruelly?"
Zane Grant opened his mouth, but he was at a loss for words.
Outside the door, Zachery’s eyes flew open. ’No, wait a second. What did my scumbag dad just say?’
’He has the nerve to ask what he did wrong? And he’s blaming Mommy for being cruel?’
’What did he do wrong? He did *everything* wrong!’
Zachery rolled up his sleeves. ’That does it! I’m not putting up with this anymore!’
He shoved the door open. "Daddy, right now you’re acting just like a scumbag husband who cheats and then tries to blame his wife! Coddling the mistress with one arm while asking your wife, ’Why are you so cruel? All I did was cheat on you. Why are you leaving me?’ Daddy, just listen to yourself! Does that sound reasonable?!"
The room was plunged into a dead silence. Zane Grant’s jaw dropped. "Christian?"
’Isn’t Christian being a little *too* spirited right now!’
Nathaniel Sloan, regaining a bit of clarity, retorted, "I did not cheat."
Zachery sneered. "No? Then what’s Noelle Lockwood to you? How did she become my mother? If she’s not the one you married, then where did I come from?"
This was the part that infuriated Zachery the most!
’Back then, his scumbag dad abandoned Mommy for the child in that trashy woman’s stomach!’
’Thank goodness the young master is a good person, or he would have gone after his scumbag dad with everything he had long ago!’
Zane Grant thought, ’Christian has this all wrong!’ He quickly interjected, "Christian, your daddy has nothing to do with Noelle Lockwood! As for you..."
’How was he supposed to explain this? Bringing it up would mean airing all the Sloan Family’s dirty laundry. Christian was still just a child; knowing too much wouldn’t do him any good.’
’But... but Christian really wasn’t Noelle Lockwood’s son! He was the only child Estelle Lockwood had left behind!’
This only made Zachery more self-righteous. "Daddy, when you do something wrong, you have to be brave enough to admit it! If you and Noelle Lockwood weren’t involved in some shady business, why would your ex-wife have left you?"
"And don’t even get me started on you letting Noelle Lockwood move into your marital home! Your ex-wife..."
As he brought this up, Zachery felt a lump form in his throat. He wanted to tear this man limb from limb. He took a moment to steady his emotions before continuing.
"Your ex-wife’s death was so suspicious, yet you never investigated. Why didn’t you ever stop to think about who might have wanted her dead, and who benefited most after she was gone!"
"You didn’t investigate a thing. You just let them close the case as a suicide. And even if you suspected she wasn’t dead, you never once looked for her!"
Zane Grant didn’t understand why ’Christian’ was so worked up. ’Maybe this is that special bond between a mother and her son,’ he thought.
He glanced at Nathaniel Sloan, who was still tormented by his headache, and sighed. "Christian, you’ve misunderstood Nathaniel. That fire back then... it really was started by Estelle Lockwood. Nathaniel suspected Noelle Lockwood and the rest of the Lockwoods, but they would have no reason to kill their own daughter, right?"
"Besides, your daddy has never stopped searching for her all these years. As long as there was even a sliver of hope, he would pour everything he had into the search. When you were three, he even took you to the USA..."
But before he could finish, Zachery shoved him away forcefully.
When Zachery heard Zane Grant say, "confirmed it was suicide, confirmed Estelle Lockwood started the fire," the rims of his eyes instantly turned red, and he staggered back two steps.
"Lies! All you adults do is lie! You’ll trample all over the truth just to protect that venomous snake of a woman! I hate you!" freewёbnoνel.com
With that, he turned and ran.
"Hey, Christian!"
Zane Grant started to go after him. He wasn’t finished speaking yet!
’When Christian was three, Nathaniel Sloan heard that a woman who looked just like Estelle Lockwood had been spotted in the USA, so he’d taken Christian with him to look for her.’
’They didn’t find her in the end, and Christian had even ended up with a scar on his waist from a fight.’
’But no one could ever say that Nathaniel Sloan didn’t care about his wife.’
"Nathaniel..." Zane Grant turned back around.
The light in Nathaniel Sloan’s gray eyes flickered uncertainly. He pressed his temples and said in a hoarse voice, "He really hates Noelle Lockwood. Find a time. We’ll publicly announce Christian’s true parentage."
