Celine Taylor bypassed her daughter, walked to the sofa, and sat down. Violet Aiken called a servant to fetch some ice cubes from the freezer for her mother to apply on her face. She then returned to her mother's side, sat closely next to her, and asked with concern, "Mom, did that bitch Lia Aiken hit you? Everyone despises her now, and yet she's still so arrogant. I'll call my brother back, and we'll seek justice for you together."
Violet wanted to pick up her phone to call her brother.
"It was Ivan Horne. You think that little bitch is despised by everyone, that's just how you see it. She's hooked up with Ivan Horne, and with him backing her, she lives carefree and unaffected by her bitch mother's influence."
Celine jabbed her fingers at her daughter's head a few times and scolded, "It's your fault for being useless. Ivan Horne was supposed to be yours, but Lia Aiken forcibly took him away, and yet you couldn't win him back. When I asked you to pursue other young masters of the Horne Family, you wouldn't go and instead ran back. You ran back to River City; do you think the young masters of the Horne Family will come knocking on your door for you to pursue them?"
Violet was concerned for her mother but got scolded instead. Pouting, she said, feeling wronged, "Mom, it's easy for you to say, but the young masters of the Horne Family aren't so easy to chase. Even if I followed Dad to T City, what could I do? On the first day, Ivan Horne had me thrown out of Valence Group."
"To this day, I've only ever met Ivan Horne, the eldest master of the Horne Family. I haven't met any other masters of the Horne Family at all and can't even find out where they go. How am I supposed to pursue them? I was going to take your advice, to please Lia Aiken and, through her, meet other young masters, but who knew Lia Aiken's scandal would be exposed? Then, in my excitement to watch the show, I came back."
Under her mother's glare, Violet's voice became softer and said, "Mom, I'm telling the truth. Staying in T City did no good. Starting from that day, Dad shut himself in the hotel room every day. If I hadn't seen waitstaff delivering meals to his room, I would've thought he was starving himself to death. Dad doesn't care about anything and ignores me, so I had no choice but to return."
"Useless!"
Celine jabbed at her daughter's head again, but deep down, she knew her daughter's words were true.
"Have you called your father? Has he refused to answer the phone today?" Celine inquired about her husband's situation.
Although nineteen years had passed, the revelation of past events had struck her husband deeply once again. Celine was madly jealous of her husband's former wife, the previous Mrs. Aiken.
Tom Aiken's hatred toward his ex-wife stemmed from too deep a love—such depth that it turned to hate.
The fact that such a woman had occupied her husband's heart for over a decade filled Celine with unbearable jealousy.
Celine had thought that with Lia Aiken's scandal exposed, she could once again trample on Lia Aiken. Yet, Ivan Horne showed no disdain and continued to protect her.
The more Celine thought, the angrier she became, feeling the heavens were unfairly biased towards that little bitch Lia Aiken.
"He hasn't answered. I've called him several times today, but he won't pick up." Violet said helplessly.
After a pause, she took Celine's arm and said worriedly, "Mom, when the incident happened that day, Dad met Lia Aiken. Do you think he might...? And who exposed what that bitch's mom did all those years ago? Those photos, they're really something."
Celine snorted coldly, "Lia Aiken is not your father's daughter; that's a fact cast in iron. Your father already loathes Lia and her mother; don't worry, he won't do anything. If I knew who revealed it, I'd have already sought them out, to encourage them to expose Lia Aiken further, to disgrace her completely."
Violet pouted, complaining, "Mom, you're good at bluffing against Lia, but it doesn't work on others."
Enraged, Celine gave her daughter a hard slap on the back and scolded, "You little brat, I'm your mother!"
Noticing her mother's furious expression, Violet quickly wrapped herself around her mother's arm, whimpering and apologizing.
...
Cemetery.
In front of a certain grave.
A man dressed in black bent down and gently placed a bouquet of chrysanthemums he bought in front of the gravestone. Beside his bouquet was another, but it had already withered, having been placed there for quite a few days.
"Nineteen years, only now I've come to see you. Do you hate me?"
The man squatted down, gazing at the photo on the grave. Even in black and white, the woman's stunning beauty couldn't be hidden. Lia Aiken resembled her greatly, though their aura differed greatly.
The woman on the gravestone had a sultry allure, exuding charms that made one think of her as a "vixen."
Lia, on the other hand, carried an elegance with an artistic air, beautiful without being overtly seductive.
The man reached out to touch the woman's memorial photo, murmuring, "I must apologize to you; I sent those photos I took back then to your daughter's boyfriend. I swear, I didn't intend to harm her, but I couldn't stop myself from doing so. Throughout these years, I lived like a rat in the gutter, fearing retribution from him. I found some satisfaction seeing your daughter get hurt by him, feeling it was deserved."
"I admit I used you and couldn't stand seeing your daughter live well. I never expected our private photos would end up online, causing such a stir, even leading to you still being scolded as a bitch after nineteen years."
"If I die in the future, I swear I'll come before you to apologize in person. If there is a next life, I hope we never meet again; your life was ruined because of me."
Back then, they both parted ways.
Yet after she started dating his brother and even married him, their loving marital bond stabbed at him, pushing him to take revenge on his brother by seducing her, sleeping with her, whispering sweet nothings while his brother was occupied with work, using their affair to blackmail her into maintaining their affair.
In the end, his brother caught them red-handed.
He dared not let her know that it suited his hidden agenda for his brother to catch them.
What he never expected was her death because of it.
The man mumbled on endlessly, recounting events of that time and how he'd lived these nineteen years.
From his clothing, it seemed he was living quite well, unlike the rat-in-the-gutter life he described.
After talking for nearly an hour, the man stood up, still gazing down at the woman's photo on the gravestone, and said, "I'm leaving, never to meet again."
After saying that, he took a moment of quiet reflection, sighed, and then turned to leave.
