Half an hour later, Niamh returned to the equine park and saw Felipe making a call. It seemed like it was something urgent as he had a solemn expression on his face.
Felipe hung up the phone immediately when he saw Niamh.
His smile was like the warm spring breeze. “Eveline, go take a shower. I’ve booked a table at a restaurant so that we can go grab a bite later.”
“Okay.” Niamh nodded.
She took a shower and changed. Then, she noticed that her phone had run out of battery when she got into Felipe’s car.
After charging her phone, she saw that there were more than ten missed calls and they were all from Kendrick.
Niamh felt that something was wrong. When she was about to call him back, she saw a message from Kendrick telling her that Lily was missing.
“Lily’s missing?” Niamh’s heart started beating erratically.
Felipe looked at her in puzzlement. “Eveline, what did you say?”
“Felipe, Lily is missing.”
“Isn’t she with her grandma? How can she go missing all of a sudden?” he asked, looking at Niamh’s concerned and worried face. He held her hand. “Don’t worry, our daughter will be fine.”
Felipe comforted her, but there was a calmness in his eyes.
Montgomery Manor.
Kendrick was waiting restlessly for Niamh. When he saw Felipe with her, he felt repulsed.
The two men looked at each other as sparks started flying silently.
“What’s going on? Where did she go missing?” Niamh asked frantically.
When Kendrick was about to say something, two policemen walked into the house hurriedly. “We’ve found the missing little girl. However, you need to prepare yourself as she’s showing no signs of life.”
Niamh felt a sharp pain in her heart when she heard that.
Her vision went black and she fell to one side lifelessly.
“Nia!” Kendrick ran over and supported Niamh who had already fainted. At this moment, he was just like Niamh. He was in so much pain that he could not breathe.
His baby. His and Niamh’s daughter was dead?
Kendrick was holding Niamh, and at that moment, he felt as if he had lost all of his senses. His body was plunged into the cold.
“Sir, w-what are you talking about? My granddaughter is showing no signs of life?” Eloise asked in disbelief.
The police nodded firmly with regret. “Yes, the little girl is dead.”
“No!” Eloise and Sean could not accept this news.
On the other hand, this news broke the elegance and calmness on Felipe’s face. “Did you investigate thoroughly? How can my daughter just die like that?”
Kendrick looked at Felipe. He did not want to argue about who was Lillian’s real father at this moment.
The thing he wanted to know the most right now was what happened to Lillian.
After Niamh regained consciousness, the group of them followed the police to the outskirts of town.
Niamh spotted Lillian lying on a stretcher on a patch of yellow grass.
The little girl looked like she was just asleep. She looked so serene, but she was not breathing anymore.
Niamh walked over slowly as tears blurred her vision.
However, before she could get close, her legs gave out and she collapsed on the floor.
Kendrick ran over to help Niamh who had crumpled to the floor. “Nia, Nia, don’t cry. Don’t be scared. I’ll go. Let me go.”
He comforted Niamh as his own heart was breaking into a million pieces. However, after he said that, he was pushed away by Felipe.
“Kendrick, don’t be pretentious. Nia is my woman and Lily is my daughter. If Lily is really dead, then you’re the murderer!”
Felipe accused Kendrick of this crime. Then, he helped the limp Niamh over to the stretcher.
When Niamh got close to Lily, her tears escaped from her eyes like a burst dam.
She removed herself from Felipe’s grip and knelt next to Lillian. She caressed her sleeping face with trembling fingers but could only feel coldness under her fingertips. The coldness traveled all the way to the bottom of her heart and spread to every cell of her body.
“Lily,” Niamh called out softly, the child’s face becoming blurrier through her tears.
“Why did this happen? Why?”
She doubled over in pain and held the lifeless little girl tightly. The debilitating pain was gnawing on her consciousness.
“Lillian, why did you leave Mommy? Please don’t leave Mommy, okay? Lillian… Didn’t you want me to take you and Jack to the pirate ship in the amusement park? I’ll take you tomorrow, okay? Don’t go to sleep, Lillian…”
Kendrick’s heart was in so much pain when he saw this.
He did not want to accept this. He could not forgive himself. His flesh and blood had left this earth forever because of his negligence.
Kendrick’s eyes were red and he was sobbing so hard that his throat started to hurt.
He walked over to see Lillian for the last time. However, Felipe charged over and grabbed his collar. His eyes were filled with flames of malice.
“Kendrick, you just can’t bear to see Eveline living a good life, huh? You killed Eveline once and now you can’t even leave her child alone. How can you be so cold-blooded?”
Kendrick grabbed Felipe’s hand, his gaze even sharper than Felipe’s.
“I never wanted to kill Lily. She’s also my daughter!”
“Your daughter?” Felipe scoffed. “That’s my daughter!”
“Felipe, you can fool everyone but you can’t fool me. Lillian is my daughter!” Kendrick insisted that he was Lillian’s birth father.
Felipe’s eyes glinted, and when he was about to say something, Niamh quickly walked over from behind him.
Kendrick looked at Niamh. “Nia…”
Slap!
Niamh slapped Kendrick heavily across the face.
Kendrick’s face was turned to the side from the slap and the excruciating pain crept into his heart.
Niamh glared at Kendrick with tears in her eyes. She was biting her lip tightly. “Even if you didn’t want to kill Lily, she still went missing under your care. You won’t be able to get away from this responsibility no matter what you say!”
Her eyes looked pained. “Kendrick, why do you have to make me hate you?” Niamh said before turning around. Then, Felipe chased behind her.
Kendrick did not even get to see Lilian for the last time before she was brought into the car.
After a while, everything around him plunged into silence. Kendrick stood there alone while stuck in a daze.
He had not protected the woman he loved back then and caused her to die in his arms. Today, he made the same fatal mistake again.
Kendrick could not forgive himself for his negligence. He punched a tree nearby and roared in pain. Then, he let out a wail before falling to the ground.
“Lillian…”
…
Lillian’s passing interrupted Niamh’s plan to go back to F Country with Felipe.
Niamh stayed in bed for a few days as she could not handle the loss. She handed Felipe the responsibility to handle Lillian’s funeral.
Whenever she thought about the little girl who looked like a little fairy when she laughed, Niamh felt that it was getting extremely hard to breathe. However, she could not even cry anymore.
Yet when Jackson asked her where Lillian was, she could not stop her tears from falling.
Half a month later, the police captured the human trafficker who had kidnapped Lillian.
That person used a toy as bait to make Lillian go with him. However, after he got Lillian, she started making a fuss and kept asking for her mother. Therefore, he strangled her to death in a fit of anger.
After Kendrick got news about that, he went to the police station and met the human trafficker.
That man knelt on the ground and begged for forgiveness. He told Kendrick that he did not mean to do that.
Kendrick looked at the human trafficker and did not fly into a fit of rage. On the contrary, he walked away calmly.
After he walked out of the station, he saw Niamh walking over with an umbrella.
It was the end of fall, and there was a light drizzle that was being carried along with the wind. The coldness would penetrate into one’s skin. It was bone-piercing.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.