Henry Lancaster had wanted to offer an explanation, but ultimately chose silence instead.
He returned ho and initially thought about calling Sean Harrison, but in the end, he just got back in his car and drove off again.
He parked in the underground garage of a five-star hotel in Veridia, then went straight to the presidential suite on the top floor.
This was the hotel with the best location and views in Veridia, and the presidential suite on the top floor overlooked the city’s most prosperous CBD.
Sean Harrison kept this suite year-round, typically using it for hosting clients and rarely staying in it himself.
When Henry Lancaster arrived, Sean Harrison was still busy with work.
"What are you doing back here?"
Sean Harrison was a little surprised.
"Rory was just waiting for at my gate," Henry Lancaster said, not hiding anything. "It looked like she’d been waiting for a few hours."
Sean Harrison looked over, his brow furrowed slightly. "And?"
Henry Lancaster relayed what had just happened before saying, "Mr. Harrison, you... you can’t be serious about breaking up with Rory, right? I think you two have such a great relationship. It shouldn’t have to end over sothing like this."
Sean Harrison glanced at him but didn’t speak right away.
The root of it all was the car crash a week ago.
Before that, with the help of a therapist, Sean Harrison had basically confird that his nightmares stemd from childhood mories. It was a psychological issue, not a ntal illness.
But during the car crash a week ago—from the mont it happened until long after—he found it difficult to explain what had transpired.
It was as if...
’I was having so kind of visual hallucination, and auditory hallucinations at the sa ti.’
But after he drove the car into Evan Hollis, his mory of the entire process beca extrely fragnted.
’It was as if I wasn’t the one who did it, but soone else.’
’That mory didn’t feel like my own. I experienced the whole thing from a third-person perspective...’
If his previous behavior could be attributed to psychological problems...
Then the act of the car crash...
...seed to confirm that he had truly developed a ntal illness while growing up, one that had simply never been triggered before.
Not until Evan Hollis and Charlotte Rhodes t again.
Sean Harrison picked up the phone and called Ethan Dixon, telling him to have soone confirm whether Rory Linden had gone ho.
Henry Lancaster waited for him to hang up, then couldn’t help but say, "Mr. Harrison... look how much you care about her. And Rory’s feelings for you run deep, too..."
"That’s not necessarily true. It’s only been half a year since we saw each other again. Before that, she’d basically forgotten all about . How deep could her feelings be?"
Sean Harrison crossed his legs and gazed out the window.
He, too, saw the cold, clear moon hanging in the sky.
"What do feelings have to do with ti?" Henry Lancaster said.
"I wish they did," Sean Harrison said after a mont. "There’s a high probability that my condition is hereditary. She said she only ever wants one child, and I don’t want that child to be unhealthy."
Even more unbearable was the thought of him being the reason for it.
How painful it must be to have a ntally unwell child—even without having experienced it himself, he could imagine.
"Then just don’t have kids. There are so many child-free couples these days."
Although Mr. Lancaster often pressured Henry Lancaster to get married and have children, Henry just let it go in one ear and out the other.
He wasn’t particularly fond of children, nor did he think he would be a good father.
"She wants one badly. And she has no other family; a child would be a closer blood relative to her than a husband," Sean Harrison said. "I can’t ask her to compromise on this for my sake."
He knew that if he asked, she would definitely choose to be child-free.
If he was the reason her life was destined to have regrets...
...then he would choose to let her go.
"I still think Rory’s feelings for you run deep."
Henry Lancaster thought about what he had just witnessed.
"It’s all temporary. We’ve only really been together for half a year. She’ll et soone new, and this mory will fade."
Sean Harrison’s tone was flat.
But he could clearly feel his heart ache with every beat.
A voice in his head protested, telling him not to let go.
But in the end, reason won out.
Henry Lancaster gave Sean Harrison a long, hard look. "Mr. Harrison, what about you?"
Sean Harrison looked at him, a strained smile touching his lips. "Don’t worry. Stick with , and I’ll make sure your company thrives."
"..." Henry Lancaster felt even sadder for him. "No, that’s not what I an. Mr. Harrison, if you do this, Rory really will marry soone else soday. Do you really have no thoughts on that?"
A long silence filled the room.
Sean Harrison hadn’t thought about it before.
He didn’t dare to.
He was avoiding it.
Now that Henry Lancaster had asked, he finally voiced his inner thoughts. "If that person treats her well, then I’ll wish them the best. If he doesn’t treat her well..." He tugged at the corner of his mouth. "Well, that’s convenient, isn’t it? I have this condition."
A madman isn’t held responsible for murder.
"Mr. Harrison..."
"That’s enough. You should go."
Sean Harrison showed him out.
After Henry Lancaster left, the room fell silent once more.
Soon, Ethan Dixon called to inform him that they had found Rory Linden.
The woman hadn’t gone ho; instead, she had gone to see Sherry Walsh.
"Understood."
Sean Harrison hung up the phone.
Not three seconds later, the phone rang again.
He was preoccupied with other thoughts and subconsciously assud it was Ethan Dixon calling back about sothing he’d forgotten to say.
He answered it directly, almost without thinking.
As he put the phone to his ear...
"Sean Harrison."
A clear female voice ca through.
It was Rory Linden.
Sean Harrison glanced at his phone screen, only then realizing it was a call from Rory Linden!
"Sean Harrison, why did you answer my call? Was it by mistake?"
’Of course. She knows so well.’
The man’s Adam’s apple bobbed. He opened his mouth but suppressed the urge to reply.
At that mont, Rory Linden was standing in the hallway of Sherry Walsh’s apartnt building.
She had only dialed his number out of habit.
She never expected him to actually pick up.
"It’s okay if you don’t talk. Just don’t hang up. Please, just listen to , alright?"
The woman’s voice ca through the phone.
Sean Harrison looked at the moon and just listened.
"I miss you so much. Whatever is happening with you, can you please tell ? No matter what you’ve done, I can accept it. Including everything you did back in school—you can tell anything, and I’ll accept it. Everything that happened in the past made you who you are today, didn’t it?"
The background behind Rory Linden was very quiet.
Her voice seed to have a piercing quality.
Sean Harrison still didn’t reply.
"Also, so what if Charlotte Rhodes likes Evan Hollis? She may not have been a good mother, but I am a good partner. I only love you. It doesn’t matter what was going through your mind when you hit Evan Hollis. I can understand."
As Rory Linden spoke, her voice had already taken on a nasal tone from holding back tears.
A long, long silence followed on the phone.
An unknown amount of ti passed.
Then, the woman’s voice ca from the other end of the line again. "Sean Harrison, I love you, and I trust you."
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