Myrtle accompanied them for the rest of the afternoon, but she left before five for work. Adrienne thanked her best friend for the umpteenth time that day, but Myrtle only waved her hand in response.
"It was nothing, Addie. I know you would have done the same if I was in the same situation," Myrtle replied. "As long as you promise not to get involved with my stupid brother, then we're good."
"You are still worrying about that?" Adrienne crossed her arms over her chest and chuckled. "Don't be ridiculous. We wouldn't be able to tolerate each other if the feelings were one-sided. Don't you know? I also want to get married to the man who loves me, but I'm not raising my hopes."
"Alright. I think that's enough for now. I'm just worried about you, Addie. I hope you understand." Myrtle touched Adrienne's arm lightly.
"I know, Myrtle. It should be me who should apologize for making you worry. Go now, I don't want to be blamed if you clocked in late again today." Adrienne replied, smiling at her best friend reassuringly.
Myrtle bid goodbye to Adrienne's mother before leaving the hospital. Adrienne chose to stay with her mother, knowing that neither her father nor her stepsiblings cared about her whereabouts. She watched the nurse administer a drug to her mother.
"What kind of drug is that?" She asked the nurse curiously. Now that she knew that Camilla was behind her mother's condition, she couldn't help but be wary of the drugs that were being given to her mother.
"This is the antibiotic for your mother. She recently caught pneumonia. Don't worry, it should clear up once she completes the seven-day treatment." The nurse politely replied. She then showed Adrienne the label on the vial she was holding.
Adrienne rubbed her temple. "I'm sorry. I have a lot of things in mind these days."
Right, it was around this time that her mother experienced some complications. It made her panic as she worried that this would dent her remaining funds. Perhaps she should try squeezing money from her father using devious means this time.
The nurse gave her a pitiful look, something Adrienne got used to receiving in her previous life. However, some people thought that she was cruel for keeping her mother on life support and she couldn't blame them for it.
Others might have given up quickly, but not Adrienne. She would never give up, especially now that she knew the truth. However, knowing the root of the problem didn't mean she also knew its solution. She must find a way to stop them from ruining her mother's health further.
She stayed until the last hour for visitation. The sun had already set, and visitors were leaving the hospital one after another. It wasn't until seven in the evening did Adrienne rise from her seat and step out when a loud crashing sound resounded from the room across them.
Adrienne frowned, remembering that there was a patient near her mother's room that always started a ruckus. She'd never dared to see who it was or find out the problem. They were on the ICU floor of the hospital, and only those in high standing in society were being catered to there, and she would rather not get involved with them previously.
However, after her rebirth, Adrienne's personality becomes one that takes no bullshit from others. She had stuck with a new belief that says, 'You deserve what you tolerate.' If this arrogant young master thinks he owned the place and had a right to cause a ruckus, he's sorely mistaken.
Adrienne strode towards the door with light steps and knocked twice on it. However, instead of answering, she heard cutlery clanging on the floor and things breaking. From the corner of her eye, she saw the nurses in the hallway fleeing away. It seemed they also didn't dare to offend whoever it was that was admitted to this room.
"Nox, you need to calm down." She heard a man speak disapprovingly. "You can't be like this! How can I help you when you don't even help yourself?!"
Those words resounded as Adrienne stood outside the door. She couldn't help but agree with that man. Change starts with oneself. She kept begging in her previous life, but how did it end for her? She kept begging everyone to help her, but she didn't dare to change how others treated her.
"It's easy for you to say those words because you aren't in my shoes, Gav!" Another man hissed in pain behind the closed door. "I'd rather die than suffer like this. Who cares if I lose our family's fortune to those Cheng vultures? Who cares if they kill the bastards my father spawned with his mistresses? Why did he have to die and leave his mess for me to deal with? I should have died with him in that accident than suffer like this for the rest of my life!"
Something inside Adrienne snapped upon hearing his words. Fury ran through her veins as she slid the door open harshly, startling the two men inside. One was dressed in a business suit, while the other man was dressed in a white hospital dress. His right eye was covered with a bandage, along with his arms and limbs. It looked like he suffered from severe burns.
However, this wasn't enough to quell the anger Adrienne had. She ignored the other man's surprised look and walked straight toward the patient, who was looking at her with confusion and irritation. He probably didn't expect someone to confront him like this.
Before the man could question Adrienne for entering his room without permission, a heavy slap landed on his face, stunning him in place. He lifted his gaze, meeting Adrienne's equally furious gaze.
"You were given a chance to live and yet you remain ungrateful? Shouldn't you use this chance to collect debts instead?"
Lennox Qin was the eldest child of the former Chairman of Qin Industries, a company that was established by Lennox's great-grandfather. Like any influential and large family, there was fierce competition. Greed and backstabbing were usual occurrences in the Qin family.
Of his grandfather's five children, his father, Richard Qin, the fourth child, came out victorious in the race for the company's succession. He was expected to continue the legacy of their hundred-year-old company.
However, despite his victory, Lennox's father was incapable of growing the company and keeping up with their competitors. He was also a known womanizer, fathering several children with his mistresses. Unlike Lennox, these children never got the same upbringing and were denied entry into the Qin family's estates. Though they bore the surname Qin, they were not considered part of the family.
Lennox's mother, Abigail Li, on the other hand was an art director and the only daughter of the Chairman of Starmedia. She was also a known socialite and media influencer. Still, when Lennox was five, she and her husband divorced and parted ways. Everyone was shocked to hear the news of their separation, but they didn't know that Lennox's mother was in love with his youngest uncle, Harvey Qin, his father's youngest brother.
Since the arranged marriage was already set between her and Lennox's father before she met the younger Qin brother, Abigail Li was forced to proceed with the wedding, feeling guilty that she wasn't able to resist her father's wishes and abandoning the man she loved the most.
After their wedding, Harvey Qin disappeared, and the Qin family had never heard from him again. This broke Abigail's heart. She blamed herself but couldn't do anything because she was now married. It was only after she gave birth to Lennox did she start getting better, but it was short-lived as her husband started chasing other women to spite her for loving another man.
Lennox couldn't understand why his mother endured living with the cheating man for years before divorcing his father for good. He witnessed how she discreetly cried at night while pretending everything was alright. He ached for her but could do nothing besides staying by her side. However, when the divorce was finalized, his custody ended with his father, forbidding his mother from seeing him.
This only made Lennox resent his father more, and he did everything to annoy him. For him, the concept of family meant looking out for his greedy relatives. As for his half-siblings, he never cared about them so long as none of them would obstruct his way. He didn't even bother to meet them in person.
However, despite their divorce, Richard Qin had never remarried, though he never lacked female company over the next few years. Seeing the sour relationship between his fourth son and Lennox, the Qin family's patriarch took Lennox under his care and groomed him as the next successor, much to his relatives' disappointment.
They were all smiles when talking to him, but Lennox knew better. It was one thing to be beaten by his father, but having to lower their heads to Lennox was already insulting to them. They looked down on him and refused to acknowledge him as the next heir. Perhaps they thought that Lennox would also lose his right to become the successor if they got rid of their brother.
Lennox Qin had just finished his master's degree overseas and recently returned to join the Qin Industries. He didn't want to meet his father, but his old man insisted they should meet and have a word after years of estrangement. The Qin Industries' main rival, the Cheng Group, had been catching up to them. Both companies were in the same industry, and their patriarchs had a long history of odd friendship and rivalry.
His father wanted his input to help the company release the first automatic self-driving car they'd been working on for over a year. As for his grandfather, the old man had been in the ICU because of a stroke he had suffered six months ago and couldn't help the company at all.
However, after his meeting over dinner with his father, who would have known that their car would be involved in a car accident. Their car was taking the right lane and was about to cross an intersection when a dump truck from the other lane of the intersection lost its control and hit the right side of their car. The impact was so strong that the car was pushed to the other side for several meters and was crumpled and bent like a thin can.
His father and their driver died on the spot while Lennox barely came out alive from the accident. The car caught fire, and their bodyguards had difficulty pulling him out. Not only did he suffer from burns, but his legs were also damaged, leaving him crippled.
Lennox suspected that someone had instigated the accident, but it would be hard for him to uncover who was behind it. None of his relatives bothered to check on him now as they were busy holding a funeral for his father. Thankfully, his best friend, Gavin, came to his rescue.
He knew he shouldn't take out his frustration on his best friend, but the pain he was in and his frustrations - knowing that he might never walk again, got the best of him. But who would have thought someone would dare hit him in the face like this?
He looked up and saw a young woman with cold obsidian eyes looking down at him. There was no doubt that this young woman was a cold beauty, but as he stared into this woman's eyes, he felt like he was staring into a cold, deep abyss that was hiding a violent nature at the bottom of its chasm.
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