Chapter 488: Chapter 488: The Child Is Still Alive
Ashley Shaw still frowned.
"What do you mean by saying it’s all coming to an end soon?"
"It’s..."
"Forget it, none of this matters anymore. I don’t care whether you were cheating or not at that time."
Warren Prescott said, "How can you not care? You should care... You’re my wife."
Seeing the sarcasm hidden in her eyes, knowing she wouldn’t easily believe his words, Warren switched back to the earlier topic.
"Anyway, you were mistaken. The person who made the deal with the truck driver wasn’t Jillian Lynch, it was Rosalind Lynch."
Ashley Shaw’s eyelids fluttered slightly.
"Isn’t she already dead?"
It was rumored outside that Rosalind Lynch was missing, but she inadvertently overheard from Grandpa Prescott that Rosalind was dead.
If it were just a disappearance, the Prescott Family would certainly have gone all out to find her and wouldn’t have hurriedly let her take Rosalind’s place as the bride.
Warren said, "I thought she was dead too, but she wasn’t... But rest assured, after your car accident, she truly did die."
Ashley’s heart jumped.
"Was it you..."
"Yes."
Ashley’s mind was in utter chaos.
Warren had said too many things today, leaving her brain in a tangle.
Taking a deep breath, she asked, "Did she do this because she resented me for taking the title of Mrs. Prescott?"
Warren shook his head, "No."
"Then why...?"
"After she came back, she looked for me once. She thought I married you just because she was missing at the time, her fate uncertain. But I distinctly told her that I married you because I had planned it for a long time. Whether she disappeared or not, the person I’d marry would only be you."
Ashley looked at Warren in shock.
Warren smiled faintly and said, "I’m sorry, because too many people were watching me then, especially those from that branch of The Prescott Group. They just wanted to find a weakness in me. I feared showing that my weakness was you would bring you danger, so I could only use this method to make the outside world think I was forced to marry you."
"Later, I kept acting indifferent towards you for those people to see."
"I thought that once the dust settled, I could explain everything to you, and you would still be waiting for me..."
"But I underestimated human nature and overestimated Rosalind Lynch’s character."
Ashley’s mind went blank.
Warren’s words implied that she wasn’t a substitute who took advantage of his vulnerability, but rather... this was all his plan.
He also... liked her?
But was forced to act like he disliked her due to potential dangers?
Ashley moved her lips, not knowing what to say.
After a long pause, Ashley finally found her voice, "If what you’re saying is true, you could’ve just explained everything to me privately."
If Warren had made things clear, she wouldn’t have been so heartbroken, wouldn’t have suffered so much.
But Warren had his concerns.
"Before we got married, I didn’t say anything because at that time you were very close with Leo, and I couldn’t be sure... who was in your heart, me or him."
"After we were married, I was certain there was only me in your heart, so I started worrying, fearing you might give something away and end up in danger..."
"So I held back."
"Ultimately, it was my overconfidence, thinking you’d definitely wait for me. So... I’m sorry. You can blame me; I can accept that. But I hope you can give me a chance to start over."
Ashley: "..."
She didn’t know what to say or whether she should believe Warren’s words.
Warren continued, "You might think I’m making a fuss over nothing... but at the time, besides the Lynch Family and that Prescott Group branch as threats, there was also a threat from ’above’."
"Above?"
"Yes. The core technology for the machine Xavier Quincy has was provided by The Prescott Group. They’ve always wanted to take it back, but I refused. Once that technology is taken by them, all technology-related projects of The Prescott Group would come to a halt."
Being in my position, I bear too many responsibilities. Besides ensuring Ashley’s safety, I have to be responsible for thousands of employees.
So I’ve been in a standoff with the powers above.
This battle of wits continued even after Ashley had her incident.
"The people above are all-pervasive. I couldn’t be sure if they’d installed bugs in our home... If they found out my weakness was you and used it to threaten me, I’d... definitely choose you. So I thought, until the standoff was settled, I would just hide it from you. It seemed like the best choice for us both. But I truly didn’t expect you’d run into trouble in the hands of someone like Rosalind, who had already disappeared."
Ashley’s heart was in disarray, her ice-cold defense slowly crumbling.
Warren continued, "I feel guilty towards Rosalind Lynch because her disappearance was caused by me. In my ’past life,’ I learned the truth about the swimming pool a bit later, which made me dislike her more. So I used her greed and the unstable situation of the Lynch Group to make her ’disappear.’ I just didn’t expect she’d come back..."
He never considered himself a good person, so he didn’t intend to hide how things happened from her.
But if he’d known Rosalind would resort to such unscrupulous means, he wouldn’t have felt guilty; he would have let her die outright, rooting out the problem completely.
At this point, Warren asked her, "Is there anything else you want to know?"
He seemed willing to share everything he knew.
Ashley was silent for a long time before she spoke, "If... if everything you say is true, and I still can’t let go of my heart’s resentment, what would you do?"
"Wait. Wait until you let go of your resentment."
"What if I never let it go?"
Warren said, "If you never let it go, then it’s my own fault. I should have figured out a way to tell you everything back then."
"What if I’ve fallen for someone else?"
Warren gripped the steering wheel tightly, his eyes full of conflict.
After a long pause, he said, "If you truly meet someone you like someday, if that person... can genuinely bring you happiness, then I will give you my blessing."
Having truly lost her once, truly experiencing those heart-wrenching moments, it didn’t matter to him if she still belonged to him or not, as long as she was safe and happy.
— I will give you my blessing...
Having heard so much just now, she was actually shocked, but deep inside her heart, there were not many ripples.
Because she felt that even if it all were true, it was all in the past.
But at that moment, hearing the words "I will give you my blessing," her heart suddenly felt an overwhelming bitterness, as if it could swallow her.
Ashley closed her eyes and said, "I want to sleep for a while. Please stop at the next service area."
Warren agreed and silently turned up the temperature inside the car by two degrees.
Soon, they reached a service area, and Warren drove the car in.
After Ashley returned from the restroom, he quickly handed her a cup of hot chocolate.
Ashley did not decline and accepted it.
The journey to Glanburn was over fourteen hundred kilometers long. Warren drove from daytime to night and then from night to the following noon, stopping and going constantly, until they finally arrived.
Seeing the massive building in the middle of the wilderness, Ashley inexplicably felt a wave of fear.
She feared everything was a lie, a deceit.
Feared the child... hadn’t survived and that Warren’s comfort was just a lie.
