Chapter 69
She couldn't leave any concrete evidence linking her to Pacquiao.
Lynx took the card and nodded. "Understood."
The car started again, heading toward the Smith Manor.
Elizabeth watched the city lights blur past the window, her gaze turning profound.
Charles's lawsuit, the power struggle within the company, Lilith's hostility, the undercurrents within the Smith family, and now, the unpredictable wild card that was Pacquiao.
Her path to revenge was proving to be far more complicated than she had anticipated.
But so what?
She would deal with them one by one.
Now that Elizabeth was back, she would no longer be anyone's pawn.
Whoever dared to stand in her way had better be prepared to be crushed.
As the car pulled into the Smith Manor, Elizabeth immediately sensed that something was off.
The guards at the gate were tense, their expressions far more severe than usual.
In front of the main house, a few maids, who were normally composed, scurried about. Upon seeing her, they offered only a hasty greeting, their eyes darting away, filled with a poorly concealed panic.
The air was thick with an almost suffocating tension.
Elizabeth's heart tightened. Had Dave gotten into some trouble again? Or was it…
She quickened her pace into the main house. Tina immediately came to meet her, her face etched with a rare gravity.
"Ms. Windsor, you're back." Tina's voice was a low whisper. "Something happened to Jack."
Something happened to Jack?!
Elizabeth's breath hitched. "What's wrong with him? Where is he now?"
"In his room. Mr. Smith is with him," Tina explained rapidly as she led her upstairs. "He was fine this afternoon, but then he just broke down. He won't talk or respond to anyone. He's just curled up in a corner, trembling. He screams if anyone touches him and he's been throwing things, like he's been terrified by something. The doctor came, said it might be a past trauma that was triggered. He prescribed a sedative, but it didn't do much. Mr. Smith has been with him the whole time."
An invisible hand seemed to clench around Elizabeth's heart. She remembered Jack's unnervingly quiet eyes, the candle he had secretly snuffed out at the dinner party.
She broke into a near run, taking the stairs two at a time.
Jack's bedroom door was ajar. The main lights were off, with only a dim wall sconce casting long shadows.
A heavy, oppressive feeling washed over her as she stepped inside.
Jacob was sitting on the rug by the bed, his back to the door. His broad frame looked incredibly heavy in the dim light.
Cradled in his arms was a small figure, curled into a tight ball.
It was Jack.
He seemed to be asleep, but his small body was still wracked with uncontrollable shivers. His face was buried in Jacob's chest, revealing only a sliver of his pale forehead and hair damp with sweat.
Jacob was gently patting his back with one hand, his other holding Jack's cold little hand. The movements were clumsy yet incredibly careful, a side of him Elizabeth had never witnessed before.
Hearing her footsteps, Jacob didn't turn, but his body went imperceptibly rigid.
Elizabeth tiptoed closer, sinking to her knees beside the bed. Her gaze fell on the child in Jacob's arms, her voice unconsciously softening with a pained tenderness. "Jack? How could he..."
She reached out, wanting to touch Jack's forehead, to check his temperature.
Just as her fingers were about to make contact, her body leaning closer to Jacob in the process, he whipped his head around to face her.
His eyes were ice cold, filled with a displeasure she hadn't seen in a long time, and even a hint of suppressed irritation.
His gaze lingered on her face for a second. Then, his nose twitched almost invisibly, and his brows furrowed instantly.
Elizabeth froze, taken aback by his sudden reaction, her hand hovering in mid-air.
Jacob stared at her, his voice low, laced with a restrained anger and a dark mood she couldn't decipher.
"What is that scent on you?"
Scent?
Elizabeth instinctively lowered her head to smell her clothes.
She had just come from outside. What smell could there be? Surely not sweat?
Then it hit her. When Pacquiao's man had handed her the card, he had leaned close to the car window, bringing with him a faint, strange fragrance—a mix of something cold and cloyingly sweet.
She hadn't paid it much mind then. Could it be...
Was Jacob's sense of smell that sharp?
Or was he just particularly familiar with this specific scent?
Before she could answer, Jacob's gaze shifted back to Jack, his tone reverting to its usual icy chill, now tinged with an even greater distance.
"This has nothing to do with you. You haven't married into this family yet. Taking care of Jack isn't your responsibility."
The words hit her like a bucket of ice water, dousing the frantic worry for Jack that had consumed her heart.
She stared, dumbfounded, at Jacob's cold profile, then at the trembling child in his arms. A ridiculous, bitter anger, mixed with a profound sense of being wronged, surged through her.
Responsibility? He thought she was only concerned about Jack out of a sense of duty?
He had no idea what Jack meant to her. No idea how the single word "Mommy" from Jack's lips had sent ripples through her frozen heart. And he certainly had no idea what kind of confrontation and threats she had just faced, only to rush back, sick with worry, and be met with this cold, dismissive line in the sand.
"Jacob," Elizabeth's voice trembled as she fought to control her emotions. She pushed herself to her feet, looking down at the man still sitting on the floor. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
Jacob didn't look up. He just held Jack tighter, as if his actions were a silent declaration of ownership and exclusion.
His refusal to communicate infuriated her. Done with words, she took a step forward and reached down to take Jack from him.
"I said, stay out of it!" Jacob growled, raising an arm to block her.
There, beside the bed, one sitting and one standing, they began a silent struggle over the child.
Elizabeth was no match for Jacob's strength, but she was quicker.
In the ensuing chaos, her sole focus was getting Jack into her arms. She shifted her weight, and the sharp heel of her stiletto came down, hard and precise, on the top of Jacob's slipper-clad foot.
Caught completely off guard, Jacob sucked in a sharp breath of pain. The arm he was using to block her faltered.
Seizing the opportunity, Elizabeth gave a sharp tug and wrenched the still-trembling Jack from his arms, pulling the boy into her own tight embrace.
Jacob's face instantly darkened to a thunderous black. He looked up, his eyes locking onto Elizabeth, the searing pain from his foot and the fury of having his son snatched away swirling into a terrifying glare.
But Elizabeth wasn't even looking at him.
She clutched Jack, turned, and sat on the other side of the bed, her back to Jacob, completely shielding the child in her arms.
She lowered her head, pressing her cheek against Jack's cool, damp forehead. In a voice of unprecedented gentleness, imbued with a strange, calming power, she began to hum a soft, wordless melody.
Her hand patted Jack's back, over and over, with the lightest touch.
It was a lullaby from the deepest recesses of her memory, a hazy, fragmented tune of a mother soothing her child to sleep.