Chapter 103 - Break The News (2/2)

Speaking through her sobs, she bared herself in front of her mother. ”That's my birthday wish growing up—for you to wake up so you would come and find me. Every year I would whisper the same thing. But you never came. Not dad. Not even Ollie. So I stopped wishing for it because I knew it would never happen. And when I finally had the courage to come home and I saw you for the first time, I found myself praying at night for the day that you will finally wake up.”

”It was my birthday,” Olivia paused when she felt something lodged in her throat. Forcing it down, she continued, ”It was my birthday when I saw you get up from your bed and kneeled in front of Henry Lin like he was some kind of god. And do you know what else happened that day? It was also the day he sold my hand for marriage as if I am a livestock.

”None of everything that he did hurt me because I'm used to him disregarding my very existence and how he hated me for simply breathing.

”But you know what hurt me the most? It's when you said that after all the things he did to you, you still wanted to come back to him all because you wanted a complete family.”

Wiping the tears on her cheeks with her knuckles, Olivia stood up and was about to leave when Amelia spoke.

”Hear me out, Olivia. Wait.”

Turning on her heel to face her mother, Olivia heaved a defeated sigh. She really didn't want to listen, but something told her to give her mother another chance, so she did.

Scrunching her nose, she lent an ear, but regret filled her entire being the longer she listened to Amelia.

”That day… when you said you caught me kneeling… I know it was the same day of the accident and I did that because I was asking for your father's forgiveness. I ruined our family once when I made the mistake of giving Sebastian those files that would incriminate your father. I thought what I was doing was for everybody's best interest, for the country's interest, but after waking up from a coma, and finding out that I lost you, I realized that I should have put my family first before everything else.”

”But you didn't lose me, Mother. Henry Lin shipped me as far away as he could and locked you up. You don't owe him an apology. He owed us an apology, which we both knew we would never get.”

”He sent you away to keep you safe,” Amelia rebutted, clutching her hands over her c.h.e.s.t.

Seeing no point in arguing with her mother, Olivia paused and exhaled through her nose with her eyes closed as the stories of Amelia's glory days were flushed down to the drain.

And when Olivia opened her eyes that showed nothing but grief for her mother, she fished her phone out from her purse, dialing a number she never thought she'd call.

Olivia gritted her teeth as she waited for the other person to pick up her call. And once it got through, it didn't take a second for Olivia to break the news, ”Prepare the cabin. Your prisoner is coming back tonight.”