Yvonne was dumbstruck and knew nothing but instinctively put her face on her father’s chest. At the same time, Estelle watched all this happen in astonishment, her head buzzing. As tears flooded her eyes, she turned to the stairs and stumbled out of the attic.
“Hey, have you forgotten the other two children?” Victor sneered and looked back. However, his smile suddenly froze. The two children who were supposed to be hung in midair were both gone, leaving a rope flying in the sea wind.
“Boss! Mrs. Hans! Here comes the police!”
Bang —-
The villa’s gate crashed open, and Vincent walked in the lead, anxiously looking for Estelle and Cristofer. Alongside him was a group of armed policemen.
“Shit!” Victor grumpily swore and gritted his teeth. Then he ran away from the other side of the attic.
Yohan shouted duly, “Officers! The bad man is upstairs! He ran backward! Go and catch him!”
The police officers shone the torch upward and saw a man flee. One team followed him as fast as possible, with the rest staying on the first floor to care for the injured.
Hardly had Vincent seen Estelle when he ran to her. “Mrs. Hans! Mr. Hans….”
He couldn’t finish his sentence when he saw Cristofer’s position lying on the ground. Cristofer was holding Yvonne with his face covered by blood, not moving at all.
“Mr. Hans!”
Cristofer’s wounded leg was folded at a weird angle, so he couldn’t stand up now. And his pants were soaked in blood, which made him look quite messy.
“Dad.” Yvonne wouldn’t get out of his arms and immediately started crying. “Wah, Wah. Dad, I’m sorry. Please don’t die!”
Children could be frightened looking at the situation, let alone she was frightened out of her wits just now. Estelle softly held her and said, “It’s all right, Yvonne. Dad is going to be fine. We’ll go home together later.”
As she talked, Yvonne gradually quieted down. On the other side, a policewoman, holding Christina in her arms and holding Yohan’s hands, brought them down.
The police quickly got everything under control and started searching for Victor around the villa. Although he promptly ran away from the back, he couldn’t get too far away with many policemen looking for him and would soon be caught.
Yohan’s eyes turned red when he saw that both his dad and mom were safe. He didn’t pretend to be tough anymore and threw himself into Estelle’s arms. He looked at Yvonne and sobbed, “Mom, are the girls all right?”
“They are all right. Don’t worry.”
“What about you, Mr. Hans? You’d better stop talking. I’ve already called the ambulance, and they will soon come here, though the villa is far from the city. Just hold on,” Vincent said in fear.
“I told you I was fine,” Cristofer wiped the blood on his face and smiled, “It looks horrible, but there’s nothing serious. Please take Christina to the hospital first and then take Yvonne and Yohan home.”
After the thrilling night, the two children didn’t want to leave like this. They both pulled his hands and shook their heads.
Yvonne looked at Christina, who was still sleeping in Eva’s arms and said, “I want to be with Christina. She must be scared if she can’t see us when she wakes up.”
“Me too,” Yohan said like an adult again.
Now that the children wouldn’t leave, Cristofer looked at their mom.
Sensing his gaze, Estelle opened her mouth and finally found her tongue back a while later, but her voice was so hoarse that she didn’t recognize it herself. “Come on guys, go with Uncle Vincent.”
The children finally nodded after their mom said so. Estelle watched them leave and then turned around to look at Cristofer, who was sitting on the floor weakly with mud and blood mixed on his clothes. He looked like a real mess.
“I look like a total mess, don’t I?” Cristofer asked. “My leg is injured. Otherwise, I won’t look like this.”
Estelle pursed her lips and crouched down so that she could look him in the eye.
“Seriously, you’ve seen how I swiftly jumped off the fence when I skipped class with you and ended up fine,” Cristofer tried to comfort Estelle again, only to find that tears blurred Estelle’s eyes.
Then he asked her with concern, “Are you crying?”
Estelle wiped the tears with her hands covered by mud and made her face dirty immediately. Then she laughed through her tears, “It’s all right. I look like a total mess, too.
The villa was in a mess, and the police officers in charge of arresting Victor were still searching for him while others were carefully looking for evidence in the attic. But Estelle ignored them and hesitantly put her hands on Cristofer’s leg as if touching a fragile feather.
Cristofer wanted to dodge her subconsciously, but his broken leg wouldn’t obey him. Even one slight move was so painful that he immediately started sweating.
“Does it hurt?” Estelle sniffed and asked while knowing Cristofer must’ve hurt like hell.
“A little bit.”
Cristofer knew he couldn’t fool her and didn’t want to lie to her anymore. When he raised his hand to wipe the tears for her, he stopped and laughed awkwardly, “My hands aren’t clean either.”
Estelle snorted and looked at his head, “Are you injured here? Why is there so much blood?”
“It’s nothing serious. Just some scrapes. They won’t ruin my face, I guess.”
Then Estelle bit her lips and looked at his legs again. Sitting next to her, Cristofer smiled and tried to stop her, “Please don’t look at it. It’s ugly. You don’t wanna make me more embarrassed, do you?”
It seemed that Estelle’s repressed emotions finally found their way out. She cried when she opened her mouth, “You are always like this, hiding your injury from me. You told me you had a car accident when they broke your arms. And now you are telling me you’re fine when you don’t look to be fine.”
Cristofer couldn’t feel his legs after the severe injury, but there were thousands of cuts and bruises on his body, so just opening his mouth to talk hurt. Though his face turned even paler, he felt extremely warm when hearing Estelle’s words. He then uttered with a bit of difficulty, “Estelle, are you worried about me?”
Estelle kept silent and pursed her lips when tears streamed down her face. And she held Cristofer’s hands so tightly as if he would disappear the next second if she let him go.
Cristofer stopped questioning her because he had his own thoughts. Then he spoke gently, “Don’t worry. I’m really okay.”
However, Estelle burst into even louder tears, saying, “Cristofer, if you become disabled, I won’t look after you anymore!”
When Estelle cried with tears covering her face, Cristofer felt relieved. It was a weird feeling, but he knew deep down that his Estelle, the straightforward woman who felt free to cry, finally came back at this moment. She could express all her real feelings. She would say it out loud when she was unhappy and cry when feeling sad. That was the real her, instead of the woman who had been trying to be strong and reserved for so many years.