Stacy has taken care of a lot of women for Joshua, she always beat the ones she didn’t like, of course, not as hard as she did today, but all of them would start screaming and crying with just a little flesh wound, as if the world was going to collapse.
But only this woman, she was unpredictable.
Maybe that was the reason why Joshua treated her differently than the other ones.
Lambert moved his sight away from Abigail, he was a loyal servant, and what his employer did was none of his business.
“Can we leave?” Abigail’s expression softened while she turned to him and smiled.
Lambert put his little toy away and looked at the doctor.
“If you want to go home, remember to change the bandage.”
“Then we will stay here.” Lambert said naturally, Abigail was hurt pretty bad.
“No need, it’s going to cost a lot of money.” Abigail shrugged her shoulders and denied. Money was very important to her, something that doesn’t fall from the sky. If she was admitted as inpatient, it would probably cost her all of her savings. Even though, she won’t be the one paying, but she still thought that it was not necessary.
Lambert looked at her questioning, those other women would almost beg the doctor to admit them, to show how badly they were hurt. She really was special.
“You don’t have to worry, Mister Caunter will pay this for you.” Lambert explained to her, just as he has explained it to all the other women before. But the other ones would ask him, whereas he was the one to tell her.
“No, I don’t want to.” Abigail shook her head, her face was still pale from the incident, her lips also haven’t gained any color back, she looked frightening. If her eyes weren’t so bright and shiny, he would think that there was a chance for her to faint soon.
She insisted, and Lambert took her back to the Caunter house.
If someone asked her if she wanted to come back, her answer was no. She hoped that she never had to come back to this house.
But she was there to pay her debts, and before the three years were over, she couldn’t go anywhere.
“Thank you.” She said before Lambert left her sight.
The answer she got was only his back, she felt tired, so she went back to her room to rest.
Soft fingers were stroking her skin, giving her a slight feeling of numbness.
Who? Who was stoking her face?
Was it her mother? In her memories, her mother would always touch her face after she fell asleep. But her mother has already left her forever.
Was it her sister? Whenever her sister woke up before her, she would do that to wake her up. But she was in England, she wouldn’t come back.
The soft bed under her was telling her that she wasn’t at home, because at home, she only had a hard board to sleep on.
But, where was she? Her memories were circling in her mind, Breslin’s pretty confident face, her laughter, her cute clothes, oh no! Before she could realize, her sister vanished, and all she could see was the lifeless body laying under the big truck.
Michelle! She was full of blood, her body was soft, and her head was sunken, she was laying there forever.
Oh, she remembered, this was the Caunter’s house.
Abigail opened her eyes suddenly, and she saw the long fingers, they were resting on her face, as if they were testing how soft it was.
Who was that?
Abigail’s innocent eyes made contact with those dark cold ones, and breathed in deep.
Joshua Caunter!
She panicked and tried to get up, and accidentally touched her wounds, and she frowned.
“You…”
She couldn’t speak, she didn’t know what else to say to him.
“Why are you not at the hospital?” Joshua took her hand, his words had no emotion.
“I… I don’t want to.” Abigail answered after a while.
With Joshua watching her, she couldn’t resist at all, she wanted to hide from him, but there was no where to hide. Her eyes were moving, and gave away her thoughts.
“Because of money? I have more than enough.” Joshua’s eyes laid on her face, watching all of her movements.
“Oh… no…” She shook her head, she didn’t even understand herself.
Joshua blinked doubtfully, and reached out for her hair.
She thought Joshua wanted to do something to her, and closed her eyes, but she didn’t expect that he softly messed her hair. Abigail felt a little awkward and shook her head, silently.
“You can ask me for money, any amount, I will give you.” Joshua stood up, and said when he opened the door.
“Then…” Abigail’s eyes lit up, maybe she shouldn’t have those thoughts, but her sister was abroad, and needed the money, so she gathered all of her courage and asked, “Could… could you give me 10 grand? I will pay it back.” She said the last sentence quickly, afraid that Joshua might misunderstand.
“10 grand? Borrow?” Joshua went back to her, he didn’t understand if his ears had problems, or if Abigail had a problem.
“Yeah, but if its inconvenient… it’s okay.” He looked weird, was he unhappy about her asking him for money? Or, was the amount inappropriate? Abigail lost her courage again and lowered her head, staring at her blanket. She didn’t dare to move.
Abigail regret that she asked him anything, now that she was actually still in his debt.
“You only want 10 grand?” Joshua asked her curiously. Any other women would ask for a much higher amount, even reaching a million, but this one, only wanted 10 grand from him.
“Yeah.” Only Abigail could hear herself.
“You don’t want more?” Joshua thought and took out his checkbook, wrote down a chain of numbers. “Here’s 100 grand, take it as my compensation to you for what happened.”
“But… I only need 10 grand.” Abigail didn’t take the check, and repeated her amount. She didn’t want to take this money from him.
“That’s your problem.” Joshua got annoyed, and threw the check on her, turned around and left.
100 grand! That’s a lot of money!
Abigail has never even seen this amount of money before. But now that she was looking at it, her face showed none of the joy that she should be feeling.
…
It took about half a month of resting before Abigail was getting better. Her wounds didn’t hurt anymore, and the crust has also fallen off. She was looking at her hands, the medicine cured them pretty well, there was only a small scar left where the wounds used to be, but if she didn’t look closely, she wouldn’t notice.
She has been in her bed for too long, and wanted to go out for a walk, but she was afraid that Stacy still hated her and would make more trouble. Of course, she couldn’t take the risk for her baby as well.
She stroke her belly, the little life inside has already made it two months, and it wouldn’t take much longer before she would show, and her secret was out in the open.
That’s what she was worried about. Joshua was clear about that, and Stacy still hated her, if any of them found out about it, they wouldn’t let her baby live.
How should she get away from them.
She didn’t pay attention to her surroundings, and was hugging a pillow and only staring into nothing.
“Miss Abigail, Lambert is waiting for you downstairs.” Rowena came upstairs, and knocked on the door.
Lambert? What did he need?
Abigail was full of doubts and went downstairs.
Lambert was in a corner in the living room, respectfully waiting for her.
“Mister Caunter asks you to do some grocery shopping, and to bring him lunch.”
Lambert’s words left Abigail speechless for a while . Joshua wanted to eat her food?
“Is there something unclear?” Lambert asked, seeing Abigail thoughtful.
“Oh, no.” Abigail laughed awkwardly, as if she just remembered something, and said, “Wait for me, I will be right there.”
When she finished shopping, she was holding the check in her hands, and said to Lambert in a low voice, “Can I… can I go to the bank please?”
Lambert agreed, and her face lit up with a big smile.
“Thank you!”
She was always so nice.
She took the check, and another note with the bank information of her sister, and went into the bank.
“Can I only withdraw 10 grand?” She asked at the counter, while the clerk was getting the money ready.
“No.” The clerk answered, and handed her 100 grand.
But Abigail only needed 10 of it, the other 90 grand, she has to give back to Joshua. She thought about it, and then handed them back again. “Could you please deposit them under Joshua Caunter’s name?”
After she wired the money to her sister, she came back to the car with a new bank card.
“Sorry to keep you waiting.” She apologized to him.
When she finished cooking, it was just 11am.
It would be lunch time when she arrived at the office.
She was in a good mood today, and was even humming. She was able to send her sister some money, of course she was happy.
“Where are you going? Don’t you work?” Annie appeared from nowhere and saw the humming Abigail, it made her annoyed.
These days, Annie was like a little mouse in this house, always on the watch, afraid that Bill might say something he shouldn’t and that Joshua would get wind of it, then all of her plans would be ruined.
Her father has arranged a whole crowd of people, but Jacky was nowhere to be found. Now she was even more sure that Bill didn’t lie to her. She only hoped that Jacky would keep his mouth shut, and wouldn’t tell him too much.
She was nervous, and hasn’t been around for a while, plus Abigail was also injured, so they haven’t met in weeks.
“Miss Abigail is going to bring some lunch, could Miss Annie please let us pass?” Lambert saved Abigail again.
“Bring lunch? To whom?” Annie’s eyes went small, and she looked at Abigail questioning.
“To…” Abigail didn’t say more, she was suddenly surprised why Annie wasn’t the one to bring him food, since she was his fiance.
“Miss Abigail, it’s already late, let’s go.” Lambert rushed her, and Abigail nodded, passing Annie.
They arrived at Joshua’s building, and Lambert stayed back in the car, he usually wouldn’t go up unless Joshua needed him to.
Abigail was still in the car, and thought for a long while, before she reached out her hand, the bank card in her hand.
“Could you please give this to Mister Caunter, it’s the rest of his money, I don’t need it anymore.”
Lambert didn’t take the card, and Abigail got nervous.
“It’s inappropriate for me to give it to him, so please?”
“Alright.”
When Abigail heard him agree, she was so happy that she smiled like a flower.
It was break time, and the building looked really empty. The pretty receptionist led Abigail up to the 99th floor, Joshua’s own level.