Frustrated, Felipe took the gun and shot the ground before he loosened the hand around Cathy’s throat. Then, he turned and walked away.
Cathy opened her glistening eyes and swallowed all the hurt back into her stomach.
‘Hate me if you want, kill me if you wish.
‘I refuse to let you make mistake after mistake like this, Felipe. I will not let you dig your own grave.
‘I refuse.’
Niamh and Kendrick brought Lillian to the hotel and booked a suite.
The two had yet to have a moment of calm at all ever since they arrived at F Country.
Niamh was now taking a bath with Lillian in the bathroom, and at the same time, she was correcting her daughter about Kendrick’s identity. As Lillian blinked her round and innocent eyes, she still thought of Felipe whenever her daddy was brought up.
Niamh could only give up for now. They had plenty of time to get this right, and Niamh was sure that as Lillian spent time with Kendrick, it would only be a matter of when before she changed the way she called him.
After the bath, the little girl hopped toward Kendrick. “Lily hasn’t seen you in so long, Handsome Mister. Will you play with me?”
While Lillian still called him ‘Mister’, Kendrick found himself liking it too much to correct her.
He picked her up and placed a loving smooch on her soft cheek. “Would you like it if this handsome mister plays with you every day, Lillian?”
“That’s great! I want to play with Jackie too!”
“Okay, we’ll all play together.” Kendrick felt his heart squeeze indescribably as he stared at her adorable and sweet features.
“Go take a bath first, Kendrick.” Niamh handed him his sleepwear as she carried Lillian to the bed.
By the time Kendrick came out of the bathroom, Niamh had already put the little girl to sleep and seemed to have fallen asleep herself as well.
Kendrick walked toward his daughter who had drifted off into a dreamless sleep and caressed her small cheeks with the tip of his finger.
“I’m sorry, Lillian. Daddy’s sorry for not being there for you and your mother when the two of you needed me most.”
He felt guilty and remorseful.
Lying by Niamh’s side, he was reminded of how cruel he used to be. He could not forgive himself.
As a husband, he had allowed another woman to hurt his pregnant and suffering wife.
Kendrick turned to look at Niamh’s sleeping face and slowly reached his hand out.
He took his hand back in regret and turned around before his fingertips could touch her.
‘You may have forgiven me, Nia, but I cannot forgive myself.’
Niamh opened her eyes to see Kendrick facing away from her.
She had heard everything he said. She could feel the regret and remorse oozing from Kendrick, as well as his internal conflict when it came to forgiving himself.
Staring at his back that was mere inches away, Niamh no longer felt that they were miles apart.
Leaning over, she lifted her arm to hold Kendrick from behind.
Deep within his own self-blaming throes, Kendrick was stunned when he felt Niamh suddenly pulling him into a hug. Warmth seeped into his chest.
“I know you can’t forgive yourself for the things you’ve done to me, but I mean it when I told you I don’t hate you anymore.
“Let’s just live happily together for the rest of our days, Kendrick.”
Niamh’s clear voice drifted into Kendrick’s ears, falling into his heart like melodic notes.
He turned to face her, his chiseled features against Niamh’s ethereal and small face.
The two pairs of eyes locked. They were engulfed in comfortable silence.
His slender finger traced her brows as he got lost in her beauty.
“I love you, Eveline Montgomery.”
Niamh curled her lips into a smile as she pressed her forehead against Kendrick’s. “Yeah, I know.”
Kendrick yearned to hear an ‘I love you’ echo from Niamh’s mouth, but he found himself content at that moment to have Niamh’s forgiveness instead.
The following day.
Niamh wanted to book a flight back to Glendale, but Cathy seemed to plague her mind.
She called Cathy who answered but rejected Niamh’s suggestion. “You guys should go back, Evie. There are still things here that I need to do.”
Niamh felt uneasy. “Felipe is dangerous, Cathy. You can’t stay by his side anymore.”
“It’s because he’s dangerous that I need to stay by him.” Cathy’s tone was meaningful. “I think I understand how you felt back then, Evie, but Felipe is not Kendrick. I have to pull him back to the light. I can’t bear to see him make mistake after mistake like this.”
Cathy then hung up the phone. Niamh called again, but her phone was turned off.
Taking the opportunity of Felipe being out, Cathy entered his study and gathered all evidence of his crimes from his computer.
She made a copy of his every illegal trade.
Holding his phone, Felipe’s gaze grew frosty beyond words as he watched Cathy’s every move.
‘Is this why you begged to stay by my side, Cathy?
‘You don’t love me anymore, do you?’
His lips curled into a shadow of a smile as he instructed someone to follow Cathy.
Not too long after, he received notice that Cathy had gone to the police station.
Felipe shattered the glass cup with his hands as a storm of fury began to brew within him.
“Didn’t you want to stay by my side, Cathy? Why can’t you be obedient? Why can’t you just listen to me? Why? Why must you force me to this extent?”
He took out the hairband he was too reluctant to throw. His heart clenched unbearably as he coldly made the order. “If she enters, fire.”
Even after standing at the entrance of the station for a long while, Cathy still could not bring herself to make the step inside. She had no idea that there was a gun aimed at her heart.
‘I won’t let you make the mistake again, Felipe. Without washing off the dirt of your past, you will never have the chance to start again.’
Cathy thought to herself, only for her footsteps to come to a halt before she could enter the doors.
Staring at the USB in her hands, she could not bring herself to do it.
Felipe was on the way to the station when he suddenly received a call from Cathy. “Felipe,” she greeted, her voice sounding sweet but her tone resembling a plea. “Felipe,” she spoke, “Can you promise me to never involve yourself in illegal trade again? Will you give me the chance to love you? Like the first time we met, can we start all over again?”
Felipe’s heart froze at her last two pleas.
Thinking about the gun aimed at Cathy’s heart, his heart thumped erratically within him. “Where are you, Cathy?”
“I… I’m standing in front of the police station.”
“Don’t go inside!” Felipe’s voice trembled as he shouted.
“I’m not going to…”
Cathy looked up at the police station and was about to turn around. However, just as she spoke, a bullet whizzed past and pierced through her thin frame…
Cathy felt a piercing pain shooting through the area around her heart. As she looked down, her phone slid out of her weak hands.
Plop. The phone fell onto the pavement by her feet as blood slowly dripped onto the screen.
From the phone came the frantic shouts of a man.
“Cathy! Cathy! Answer me, Cathy!”
Felipe’s hand on the steering wheel shook as he sped to the police station. Dashing through the crowd, he was met with a pale girl sitting in a pool of blood.
Felipe’s heart felt like it had sunk into an ice cellar as his blood turned cold.
“Cathy.”
He pushed the people in front of him to get to the girl as he knelt on one knee and pulled her unconscious body into his arms.
“Cathy! Wake up, Cathy!”
Cradling her, he shouted her name frantically.
Yet it was to no avail.
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.