Free Web NovelChapter 80: Like A Fool
Wendy had guessed that Mrs. Lucas’s repeated emphasis on them eating together had been Michael’s idea to begin with. He had always been arrogant and did not like asking other people for help. She knew that it must have been difficult for him to ask for Mrs. Lucas’s help this time.
After Mrs. Lucas’s departure, Michael said, "You promised Grandmother that we’d eat together."
Wendy ignored him. She figured that she could just do whatever she wanted since Mrs. Lucas had already left.
When Michael saw Wendy walk past him with blatant disrespect, he finally grew furious.
Grabbing her wrist, his gaze was cold as he spoke in a sinister tone, "Wendy Stewart, have I been too nice to you over the last few days?"
"Hah..." Wendy snorted, "You can be nice to someone else. I don’t need that from you." She tried flinging Michael’s hand away, but he only tightened his grip on her.
Michael stepped forward and backed her into the wall. He said, "You have to eat with me today whether you want it or not!" As he said that, he started dragging her out of the apartment.
Wendy’s wrist was in pain from Michael’s death grip, but she forced herself to endure it instead of crying out in pain. This was the version of Michael that she was more familiar with someone who was bad-tempered, quick to anger, domineering, and unable to accept being said no to.
After dragging her downstairs, he opened the door to the passenger seat. When Wendy merely continued standing where she was, he threatened her, saying, "if you don’t get in the car, I’ll have to call Grandmother."
"Michael, when did you become such a coward?"
Wendy mocked him, "is Grandmother the only thing that you can threaten me with?"
"I don’t really care as long as it’s effective," said Michael as he whipped out his phone to make the call.
Mrs. Lucas had just left their apartment. If Michael really called her right now, she would probably come right back and give Wendy the same advice from earlier. On top of that, she would personally escort Wendy into the car.
Wendy could not help but think that Michael’s current behavior was extremely repulsive.
Regardless, she still got into the car.
In the car, she remained quiet. The atmosphere grew very tense. She did not know where Michael was going and wondered if he really intended to take her out for a meal. After arriving at their destination, Wendy gout of the car to see flower petals all over the ground. Petals from white and red roses alike formed a gigantic heart shape on the ground. Suddenly, more flower petals fell from above.
She reached out to catch a few petals before rigidly turning her head to look suspiciously at the man standing beside her. There was a proud smile on Michael’s face as he said, "All women like flowers, right?"
Wendy really wanted to roll her eyes at him.
In the following moment, he grabbed Wendy’s hand again and started dragging her into the restaurant in front of them. He said, "I booked this entire restaurant for today. Let’s go upstairs, there’s a spot with an incredible view."
Wendy had been curious about why both Mrs. Lucas and Michael had talked so much about eating together. It all made sense now.
Unfortunately, this romantic gesture no longer meant anything to her.
After heading upstairs, they sat down at a table on the balcony. The owner of the restaurant personally approached them and handed them a menu.
Wendy did not feel like eating, but since Michael handed her the menu, she casually picked a few dishes. She wanted to finish this meal quickly and head back home as soon as possible instead of remaining here to entertain Michael’s shenanigans. freёwebnoѵel.com
The dishes were quickly served. A few violinists appeared beside their table, as well. Soon, a sweet tune reached Wendy’s ears. Ignoring everything else, this was indeed a good environment to dine in. Since they were already here, Wendy decided not to make things difficult for herself. She bowed her head and dug in.
Michael kept scooping food into her bowl, but Wendy merely shifted them to another bowl and then continued to eat by herself. When the plates were almost empty, she stood up and said, "I’m done eating. If there’s nothing else, I’ll head out first."
"Wait a minute..." Michael clapped his hands, and someone immediately appeared at the stairwell, holding a huge bouquet of red roses. He approached Wendy and offered it to her.
For the second time since arriving here, she wished that she could roll her eyes.
She thought, he just gave me flowers at home yesterday, and now he’s trying the same thing?
"And both times are just Simple red roses .."
"I don’t like it," Wendy refused him impatiently. "Go away."
The man holding the bouquet felt awkward. Michael said, "Won’t you look at what’s inside?"
"I don’t care what’s inside, I’m sure I won’t like it," said Wendy in an irritated tone as she turned her head to look at Michael. "Michael, I only promised Grandmother that I would have dinner with you, I didn’t promise her anything else. I can’t be bothered to entertain your childish gestures."
"Childish?" said Michael with a surprised frown.
He could not believe that Wendy was calling him childish. Didn’t all women like flowers and romantic gestures? Furious, he said, "There’s a necklace that I personally bought today hidden inside the bouquet."
Wendy did not want to continue pursuing this matter with him. She turned around to leave. However, the ground floor was as far as she got.
A bodyguard stood in her way, blocking her from leaving.
Michael approached her from behind and said, "It’s fine if you don’t like it here, we can go and watch a movie." With that, he took her hand and led her back to the car.
Wendy gazed at the many bodyguards surrounding them. She knew that she could not get away. Glaring at Michael, it struck her just how much she hated his forceful methods. She said coldly, "What else are you having us do after a movie? Why don’t you just tell me everything from the start?"
"That’s all I’ve arranged for today," said Michael.
The truth was that he had planned these activities for yesterday, but Wendy had refused to come out with him. In accordance with Michael’s planned agenda, they went to the cinema. Even though the plot of the movie was quite interesting, Wendy still treated him as if he was invisible.
After emerging from the theater, Michael glanced at Wendy’s expression. His heart pounded when he realized that nothing had changed. He had followed the instructions in the guide Mr. York got for him, ’99 ways to win a woman’s heart, but they were not effective.
"We’ve eaten dinner, watched a movie, and now it’s getting late," said Wendy with a sullen face. "Can I go home now?"
At least he had managed to lure Wendy out of the apartment today. Michael consoled himself by considering this a small success. When they got to the car park, a man suddenly run toward Wendy and tried to snatch her purse. She tightened her grip around her purse and found herself getting dragged forward by the unknown assailant.
"Wendy!" Michael reacted quickly and ran up to grab Wendy.
"Let go!"’ The assailant brandished a dagger, threatening Wendy. He said, "Let go right now! There was nothing very valuable in Wendy’s purse, and she did not mind letting go of it."
However, things were happening too quickly, and she did not have enough time to react. Instead of letting go, she instinctively tightened her grip around her purse even more.
When Michael saw the assailant raise the dagger, he swiftly grabbed his hand. Then, he shoved Wendy away so that he was the one facing the man. By the time Wendy regained her balance from stumbling back, she saw Michael’s hand bleeding. Meanwhile, the man with the bloody dagger had already fled.
Wendy immediately stepped forward to inspect Michael’s wound. She said, "Are you okay? Let me call an ambulance."
"I’m okay, it’s just a small cut. I’ll be fine after applying some ointment," said Michael.
However, Wendy still felt a little shocked by the sight of Michael’s hand dripping with blood. She insisted, "Let’s just go to the hospital. I can drive, give me the car key."
Even though she was still mainly giving him the silent treatment and acting coldly toward him, it was different now that he had gotten injured because of her. She could not simply abandon him right now and show no concern.
After getting into the car, Wendy wiped the blood off his hand and said, "I didn’t even think there were still actual robbers these days. Did you see what that man looked like?"
"No," said Michael with a shake of his head. "He was wearing a hat, and I didn’t pay attention to his face because I was too focused on trying to save you."
"Let’s call the police later. This place is surrounded by security cameras, I’m sure he won’t be able to get away with it. Men like that need to be caught and thrown in jail for at least a couple of years so that they can’t hurt anyone else," said Wendy as she handed Michael a tissue to clean up his hand. When she saw more blood oozing from his wound, she frowned.
With a look of concern in her eyes, she said, "Try to stop the bleeding first, I’ll drive to the hospital."
When Michael heard Wendy mention calling the police, he coughed softly and said, "It’s no big deal, let’s just drop it."
"Let’s just drop it?" Wendy was very surprised to hear Michael say that. Knowing Michael’s personality, he should have immediately summoned someone to uncover the identity of the robber and give him a good beating before sending him to the police. After all, Michael was not known for being merciful. However, Wendy did not put much thought into it, as she was too preoccupied with driving him to the hospital as quickly as she could.
After arriving at the hospital, she immediately unbuckled her seat belt and got out of the car so that she could go over to Michael’s side to open the door for him. Since it was his right hand that was injured, she didn’t think it was a good idea for him to open the door himself.
However, Wendy had just gotten out of the car when a piece of paper fell out along with her.
Wendy assumed that it must have fallen out because they were in such a rush earlier. She bent down to pick it up and was just about to put it back in the vehicle when she saw the words on the front page, 99 ways to win a woman’s heart.
That title made Wendy curious. One quick look through and she immediately knew that this was a compilation of nonsensical resources from the internet. Since Michael was usually a confident man, and at times even over-confident, it was strange that he had something like that with him. She flipped it open.
The pages looked quite clean, but there were a few that were filled with scribbled notes. She ended up flipping to a page that talked about how a man could fake an incident in which he rescued the woman from danger. Michael had drawn a check mark beside that line.
Suddenly, Wendy understood what was going on. It was now clear why a random robber would appear in the parking lot of a huge shopping mall, and why Michael did not want to call the police. He was the one who had orchestrated this entire incident. Wendy continued flipping through the document and came across the pages that recommended strategies like bringing the woman out for a romantic meal at a restaurant and taking her out to a movie.
"Wendy..." Michael had been waiting in the passenger seat for some time now.
Since Wendy did not open the door for him, he could only do it himself. He got out of the car and walked over to the driver’s side, only to see Wendy holding the document and reading it intently.
In the following moment, Michael snatched it out of Wendy’s hands. She looked up at Michael and snorted. His injury had been staged. She suddenly felt like a fool. Earlier on, she had just been thinking about how bad she felt seeing that Michael had only gotten hurt because of her.
