Chapter 287 - Where Are You Ugly?

Once the couple left, both Jennifer Jiang and her brother sat at the table with a dazed expression on their face. 

Charles, who was the first who snapped out of their trance. He turned to his sister and swallowed. "Sister, do you think that they're telling us the truth?"

Jennifer shook her head, weakly. "I don't know."

"To think that that person could be that despicable. Accepting bribery and manipulating some documents is one thing, but to do that kind of thing to women?" Charles felt a shiver down his spine. "That person is not human at all."

A deep frown appeared on Jennifer's face. That time, when she has been working with Adam and Claire, they were really close to expose the truth about the General Attorney. But someone had exposed their plans and the General Attorney had sent his people to threatened both her and Adam.

While Adam was killed in the accident, someone had caught her and she was confined at a place. She was tortured mercilessly for days as they demanded a confession from her. The others wanted to find out what kind of information she had and who else had known about their findings. 

She did not want to cooperate and had almost died. Until now, her knees would hurt whenever she walked. When it rained, the pain became unbearable.

It was fortunate that she had managed to trick one of those men to let her go quickly find her way to escape. When she thought of what might happen to her if she was confined longer… Jennifer was scared. She did not think that she would be strong enough to go through life if anything like those would happen to him.

Perhaps what she had experienced was not as bad as what the other women had experienced, but it would still give her nightmares.

Suddenly, something came to her mind and her face grew pale. Jennifer stood up quickly, causing the chair behind her to screech.

"Sister, what happened to you?"

"Nothing." She forced a smile at her brother and gathered her belongings into her bag. "I just remember that there is something else that I should do."

"What?"

"Something." At this time, her mind was somewhere else. Jennifer saw the worried look on her brother's face and heaved a breath. "Look. I'll call you when I get home, alright?"

…

Edith looked out the window as Neil drove back to the apartment. The journey back was silent and Neil did not speak a word, knowing that his wife was in deep thought.

Once he had pulled over at his usual parking spot, Neil turned to Edith and sighed when he found that she was staring into space. Neil stretched his hand to touch her shoulders and soon, the girl turned around slowly to face him.

"We've arrived," Edith spoke softly. "Why didn't you say anything?"

Neil didn't answer but only stared at her face for a long time. "What's in your mind?"

Edith lowered her head and suddenly, her forehead was leaning on his shoulder and did not say anything. Her eyes stung and her tears were threatening to fall. Edith bit at her lips and inhaled a deep breath. The scent filled her nostril and Edith leaned closer to his body. 

She had listened to him as he briefed the siblings about what had happened to her mother. She felt something tugging at her heart and began to feel sad again when she thought of her mother.

After they had returned from Z Town, Edith had noticed everyone's look of concern, especially from her grandfather. She had tried her best to show them that she was alright and told herself not to think of the matter too much, lest it was going to make her sad again.

Her marriage with Neil had managed to take the matter off her mind temporarily, but after meeting the siblings and heard Neil briefing them about the matter, Edith became sad again.

Neil patted at her back. He did not know what was going on, but he could guess what was on her mind when she started to grip her hands tightly on the front of his shirt. Her head continued to tilt down and Neil had the feeling that Edith did not want him to see the look on her face at the moment. 

With a sigh, Neil pulled her closer and continued to coax her silently. After a while, his movement halted when Neil felt the wetness on his shirt. He looked closely and noticed the slight tremble on her shoulders.

Edith was crying silently without making any noise or too much movement.

Rather than her heart-wrenching cry on the day that he had found her at her mother's grave, Neil thought that seeing the way she had cried silently tugged at his heart even more.

Neil put his hands on her shoulders as he attempted to pull her up, but the grip on her shirts only became tighter. Slowly, Neil released his hands. Knowing that she didn't want him to look at her face at this moment, Neil decided to respect her wishes.

After a few minutes, Edith finally calmed down and pulled away from his embrace. Her head continued to tilt down as she did not want to let him see the look on her face.

It was then that she noticed the wet patch on his shirt. She stared at the spot in a daze for a few seconds and suddenly turned to find the tissue packet in her bag. Hastily, she tried to wipe the stains away and became frustrated when the wet spot only spread wider.

Suddenly, Neil grabbed at her hand, forcing her to stop. His hand moved to pinch her under her chin, then, he raised her face to look at him and started to dab her face gently with a clean tissue. He paused to stare at her face and kissed both her eyes.

Edith snapped out of her trance and pulled away. Then, she covered her face with both hands. 

"Don't look at me," Edith said before Neil had the chance to pull her hands away. "My eyes are a little swollen. I'm ugly."

Neil halted. A few seconds later, a chuckle escaped him. "Where are you ugly? My wife is beautiful even if she cried."

Edith peeked at him through the small gap between her fingers and saw the smile on his face. 

"Come over, let me look at your face." A helpless sigh escaped him when she did not make any move. "If you didn't wipe your face properly, everyone is going to think that I bullied you when we went upstairs."

Edith panicked a little bit when she thought of those people who would worry about her. She took down her hands and let Neil wipe her face again.

A chuckle escaped her when she thought of how Neil was treating her like a little kid.

"In the end, you're only worried that my grandfather is going to scold you, right?"

"You're wrong. I'm not scared of Grandpa. I'm more afraid of Hazel." Neil bopped at her nose. "You might not realize this, but Hazel is quite protective of you.. If she sees your face right now, she's going to think that I did something and blame it on me." He watched as she checked at her reflection in the mirror and asked, "Are you feeling better now?"

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