Chapter 24: Mother-In-Law [2]
"Like I said, you don't understand. There's more to a relationship between two people other than love. I understand that you may have some feelings for my daughter, but feelings alone won't—"
Looking at the amused expression of the young man sitting in front of her as she seriously tried to dissuade him from pursuing her daughter, Julia was starting to feel a little strange herself.
"...Oh, yeah....right....uh-huh..."
Because no matter what she said, Damien would simply listen to it with an acknowledging nod, before completely disregarding whatever she said with that amused smile still on his face.
'...Is he trying to make a fool of me?'
Little by little, a small hint of annoyance began to grow inside Julia's mind.
She didn't believe this young man to be really that dense, not even for a single moment. Then, wasn't he simply pretending like he didn't understand what she wanted to convey to him?
However, just a moment later when she brought up the subject of finding the right person, saying that they might not be the correct choices for each other...
The amused smile on his face slowly disappeared, replaced by a dark, almost gloomy look.
"...So, you're implying that she might not be the right person for me? You want her to find someone else other than me...?"
"Look, I'm not implying anything here. I just want you two to think this over seriously."
Of course, Julia didn't realize what was going through his head when he suddenly turned serious like that, simply assuming that her 'talk' was working and mentally giving herself a pat on the back for a job well done.
Perhaps it was true that this boy sincerely liked her daughter, and maybe she even liked him back. After all, at a young age like theirs, the allure of such fleeting emotions was indeed a little too hard to resist.
...But that didn't mean she was okay with letting her naive and innocent daughter be swept away by some random bloke who coincidentally happened to save her when she was in trouble.
Not to mention, she knew a problematic boy when she saw one. And despite saving her daughter, this guy called Damien Collins smelled of nothing but trouble to her!
"...So, that's why I was saying you two can think of these things maybe four, or five years later, if you still have the same feelings for each other by that time. You will also have become more independent, with a stable life and—"
"Hah. Okay, okay..."
All of a sudden, Damien raised his hand with a scoff, causing Julia to stop talking at once as she gave him a confused, questioning look.
Seeing this, he then cracked a derisive smile on his face, before opening his mouth once again with narrowed eyes.
"...I already got what you're saying. No need to beat around the bush like that anymore... In truth, you simply think I'm a bad choice for your daughter, don't you? You don't need to make it any more obvious."
Julia grew still, silently swallowing the rest of her words along with her saliva.
Her intentions were indeed exposed, but she had never intended to hide them in the first place. Instead, she was rather thankful that he figured it out himself without her having to be explicit about it.
Damien also figured as such, knowing enough of her personality to make that guess. Still, he didn't come all this way here to simply give up now, did he?
"...Now that we have the stupid pretenses out of the way, can we get down to the real reason why you think I'm bad for her? Go on, let me hear all your requirements. Let's see if I can satisfy them and have you call me 'son-in-law' before the night is over."
With a cocky smirk on his face, he leaned slightly forward from his seat, his entire demeanor radiating confidence as he clasped his hands above his slightly parted legs.
Witnessing his confident stance, Julia lightly bit her lip in slight irritation.
All this time, she was trying to be considerate to him without sounding too offensive, but this young man instead seemed to be taking it as an opportunity to act cocky in front of her.
'...Well, whatever. Since he's the one asking for it, there should be no complaint later.'
Julia internally shook her head with a tired sigh.
Truth to be told, she didn't want to do something like this in the first place. As a mother, she had long since wanted to support her daughter in loving whomever she wanted to, no matter what others said about it.
...After all, that's how she and Sierra's late father had also met back in the day and tied their knots together.
But unfortunately, now in the absence of Sierra's father, she had to be the one to take over all the unpleasant things he would've done as the father – including the vetting of this obviously shady-looking boyfriend of her daughter.
...That was why, even if she had to become a villain in Sierra's eyes instead of the intimate friend she had always wanted to be... For her naive daughter's sake, she had to do it!
"...Okay, then. My first question is – who exactly are you? Right now, other than your name, I don't know anything else about you. So maybe you can start from there...?"
"Hmm... Where should I start then? Oh, right..."
The smirk on Damien's face deepened as Julia silently stared back at him, waiting for him to inevitably embarrass himself and get out of the door himself.
"I've been a distinguished student of a reputed university in Texas, having graduated from the department of Business Administration. And until a few months ago, I was also a major shareholder of a certain business venture from New Mexico..."
He paused a little, taking out a white business card from his pocket and promptly handing it to the highly skeptical lady sitting in front of him.
"...Well, that's when I sold my shares in the company and bought a small house for myself further down in the south, so I'm no longer a shareholder there."
While fluently spewing out all of his lies, Damien had obviously noticed Julia's rising levels of suspicion against all the unrealistically tall claims he was making.
And her suspicions were justified too. The claims he was making weren't even realistically possible unless he was a genius beyond worldly standards, or had an immense windfall of godly fortune falling into his lap!
"But I still have many other investment plans in place, some of which, collectively, are projected to make me close to a million within a month's time..."
Damien paused, his intense pair of ruby-red eyes seemingly pressing down on the slack-jawed lady sitting before him.
Her previously skeptical eyes were now left wide open in disbelief, unable to match the delinquent-like face in front of her with the business-savvy individual he was describing himself to be.
"...So, does that sound like enough qualifications to call you my 'mother-in-law'? Or do you need more?"
"Uh..."
Julia was left slightly flabbergasted, repeatedly opening and closing her mouth without being able to make a sound for some time.
Her hand holding onto the business card handed over by Damien trembled unceasingly as she glanced at the name engraved on it in bold letters.
[Associate Director Damien Collins]
"T-This...."
"Perhaps you would like to see my name on the company website? You can look it up right now if you want. I won't mind, you know?"
Seeing her shell-shocked expression, Damien added even more fuel to the fire with his signature cocky grin on his face.
'...Good thing I prepared for this situation in advance.'
The entire deal with the shareholder thing was an elaborate ruse from his previous transaction with his money launderer.
It was originally meant to deceive the government and tax authorities from discovering his illegal source of wealth, if push ever came to shove.
That's why no matter how hard Julia looked into it, there was no chance of his ruse ever being exposed, and also why it was safe to use this as a perfect cover for his lies.
After Sierra pointed out just how lawless he looked because of all the tattoos and piercings he got when he entered the gangster business, his mind had been working overtime to find a way to conceal his link to his less-than-savory line of work.
...And now, even if he exposed all of his tattoos hidden under the full-sleeve hoodie he was wearing, he could easily make it seem like an exotic hobby of a rich youngster, instead of immediately getting linked to gangsters and such.
"Haa..."
After a few moments of confused thinking, Julia shook her head and sighed, seemingly having sorted out her thoughts as she offered him a bitter smile.
"...What else do you want me to say? It's your win. After what you already showed me, I don't think Sia will listen to me even if I said no."
Saying that, she returned the business card in her hand back to him.
Despite everything that he said and even showed her, her instinct was still continuing to scream at her, saying that Damien wasn't a good-natured person at all.
Rich guy or not, if her daughter couldn't be happy with him, then all of his money would be worthless to her anyway. It wasn't like her family was in a financial crisis or anything.
...But even then, she couldn't really stop this guy from seeing her daughter if he decided to do so, seeing how hopeless Sierra had looked a few minutes back.
All she could do was bide her time and slowly try to convince her daughter.
Damien also understood the hidden meaning behind her gesture. Since she couldn't do anything about it, she would just let things happen naturally without obstructing their path.
'Dammit, she's still not convinced! What else does she need me to do...?!'
...However, Damien wasn't satisfied with this conclusion at all.
Yes, she wouldn't obstruct him, sure. But she wasn't going to help him by any means either.
'...I need to completely win her over, no matter what. I need to make sure she always stays supportive of me and me only!'
Being the type of girl that Sierra was, the influence of her mother in her life was simply too great. Thanks to his knowledge from the original novel, he already knew how many problems it could create for him if she didn't fully trust and be supportive of him.
He didn't need a practical demo of it to understand the significance of her opinion.
That was why, just when Julia was about to bitterly shake her head and get up from her seat...
"Wait... Miss Julia, I haven't finished talking yet."
...Damien forcefully switched over to his plan-B, unwilling to let her damage the only meaningful relationship of his in any way.
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone