CHAPTER 079
CHAPTER 079
«TRISTAN'S POINT OF VIEW»
“Are you hungry?”
I lifted my head at the sound of the voice and found the crazy woman holding a sandwich up to my face, and instantly, the smell drifted toward me, making my empty stomach twist painfully, but I quickly averted my gaze. Who knew if it was poisoned?
“You don’t want it? Suit yourself then.” She shrugged and took a large bite before returning to her seat on one of the fallen branches while my head tilted upward as the scorching sun burned against my skin. How long had it been since I had been tied up here?
Yeah...Two days.
I had been bound to this tree for two whole days, with this woman acting as my watch guard. The ropes dug mercilessly into my wrists and ankles, leaving my limbs sore and numb. With a weary sigh, my head dropped forward once more.
“How long am I going to stay like this? It’s better if you just kill me instead.” My voice came out hoarse and weak, barely sounding like my own.
“Not yet, dear.”
Slowly, I raised my head when I finally heard the crunching of branches and approaching footsteps. Through the trees, I watched Mrs. Benita saunter toward us with a small smile on her face, but something was wrong. Her eyes were no longer the warm brown I had known for a year. Instead, they were blue, eerily similar to the eyes of the crazy woman who had been watching over me, and her blonde hair was black. For a moment, it felt as though I was looking at an entirely different person.
“You can’t keep me here, Benita. I’m not your slave,” Stella whined as she moved to stand beside her. My eyes widened at the resemblance between them. No way.
Were they sisters?
“Hello, Tristan.” Benita beamed as she stopped in front of me, folding her hands before her. A few papers and a pen in her grip. “How have you been?”
I stared at her in silence for a moment, replaying everything that had happened over and over in my head, and then a shaky laugh escaped my throat. Before I could stop myself, I burst out laughing. What in the name of fuckery was this?
Was this some kind of twisted drama where the unsuspecting person turned out to be the villain? Because this woman certainly seemed to be the villain in my story, and honestly, who would have thought? Or was it that I had missed the signs in my lost memories?
“I always knew you were a bloody bitch,” I spat once my laughter died down, still forcing myself to remain standing. I could barely stand now, and my eyes kept fighting to shut on their own.
“I guess you were right. Everything you thought about me was right.” She smiled, but somehow, it sickened me even more than before. Maybe because I finally understood what had been hiding behind all those forged smiles. I let out a long sigh.
“This is getting stale. What do you want? Don’t tell me this is retaliation for accidentally pushing Dean down the stairs.”
The moment the words left my mouth, her smile vanished. Her blue eyes darkened, and despite the situation, I couldn’t help but smirk. “You recalled?”
Instead of answering her question, I nodded slowly in understanding. “So, this is about revenge.”
“No.” She shook her head and stepped closer to me. “This isn’t all about revenge. I’ve been planning this since the day I met your father through your mother.”
I scoffed. “Nothing could surprise me now.”
She smirked in return. “Trust me, I have a lot of surprising revelations. But first, I need you to sign these papers.” She held the documents up to my face, and I stared at them, my brows furrowing.
“What’s that?” I raised a questioning brow as I gestured a chin towards the papers she held up.
“These are transfer papers. Everything you own will be transferred under my name.”
I stared at her as though she had finally lost her mind. “Are you kidding? You spent years planning all of this just to get my signature on some stupid papers?”
She shrugged. “It’s the reason I married your father, after all. It was the wealth his late parents left behind and also the properties your mother placed under your name when you were still young.”
“You did all of this for money? You’ve got to be kidding me.” I let out a humorless chuckle at the sheer absurdity of it.
She shrugged again. “It’s money and the world revolves around it."
“If you wanted money, you could have simply asked Dad to transfer everything into your name. I’m pretty sure he would have done it.” I yelled, getting frustrated by the second.
She tsked and proceeded to say. “Your father was a hard nut to crack, but even at his weakest state, he refused, which only angered me more because he left nothing for my son and daughter in his will. He gave everything to you. Why would I allow that?”
“What?” I blinked. The last image I have of my so-called father was when he was trying to strangle me to my fucking death.
“Let me tell you a story of how all this began, Tristan. Listen carefully.” She studied my face for a moment before she began, and despite myself, I found myself listening.
“I met your father back in high school, but even then, he had an obsessive love disorder for someone named Sean, who was much younger than him. He became homophobic when Sean rejected his feelings, but then came your mother, Angeline. She was my best friend, but she wanted your father and believed that getting pregnant for him would tie him down to her. She was terribly wrong. She kept chasing a love she never truly had, convincing herself that one day he would return her feelings. Then she gave birth to you, and somehow, your father became happy. Having a child changed him for a while. He forgot about his illness and focused on your mother instead, and she was content with that, but I hated it.” Her voice hardened,d and her eyes turned murderous.
“She handed over her father’s business, a Mafia organization here in Canada, to your father and left the rest to her son. That was when I decided to take matters into my own hands. I started drugging your father with pills, and by the time he regained his senses, he had already killed her and was drowning in guilt. I convinced him to dispose of the body and lie about her death, and everyone believed us. He thought I was helping him when I encouraged him to pursue Sean again, but every attempt ended in rejection, and his condition worsened. It became the perfect opportunity for me to marry him, and I did. Eventually, I became the mother of his children.”