Chapter42 She Just Left Him
“What?!”
The blood rushed to her head. Linnea had to set down her knife and fork. “Vivienne... how dare she! That’s not even hers. She’s just a dung beetle that took over someone else’s home! A parasite!”
“I also heard Vivienne plans to flatten the manor. She’s going to sell the land to a lumber company. They’re notorious for depleting wood resources, and the public has been criticizing them.”
Linnea’s breathing stopped for a moment.
When her mother was alive, she was dedicated to environmental protection. Trees she funded grew all over the world. She used to say that even if Linnea left home to live far away, she would still find traces of her mother in a foreign country.
What Vivienne was doing was the ultimate insult to her mother, and to her!
This news plunged Linnea into a night of pain.
Vivienne selling the manor surely had the tacit approval of Brock Knight, her father. And the manor’s ownership belonged to Brock. There was no way Linnea could raise enough money to buy it, and even less of a chance she could convince Brock.
So, when Caius finished his work and lay down in bed, just as he was about to lift the hem of her silk nightgown, a cold tear landed on his palm.
“Linnea, are you crying? What’s wrong?”
Linnea was startled by Caius’s sudden presence and quickly said, “I’m fine.”
Caius pinched her cheek. “Linnea, I can see the color draining from your face. It’s darker than the neighbor’s dog that’s always rolling in the mud.”
Linnea was momentarily speechless. “That dog is pure black to begin with!”
“So, what did you run into?” Caius paused, then added, “I don’t like screwing my bedmate when she’s wearing a sour face.”
Linnea knew that if it were about anything else—preferably some unimportant minor issue—she could definitely confide in him. It would create a sense of dependence on him in Caius’s mind, thereby deepening their relationship.
But this was about Vivienne and the Knight family. She absolutely could not tell him, at least not yet.
She wrapped her arms around Caius’s arm. “I’m really okay.”
“I never knew you were so good at keeping secrets.”
Caius sighed helplessly, gently caressing her slightly moist entrance, hardly believing she could still be wet at a time like this.
“You usually don’t hold back when you’re mad at me. You go off on me like I’m not some guy you’ve got a crush on.”
Linnea remained silent.
“Alright, alright. So what do you want to do now? Cry it out?” Caius sighed helplessly. He lightly stroked the slightly moist opening down below. He couldn’t believe she was wet right now. “Or sex? Use the oxytocin rush to wash away the pain?”
Linnea automatically ignored the second half of his question.
Cry?
Caius wouldn’t want her tears, would he? Caius was as hard-hearted as a robot. How could he feel sympathy or pity for her?
Right now, he was probably just finding it amusing that his “kitten” was crying and was just teasing her casually.
“Can you just hold me?” Linnea thought about the attitude she should display toward Caius, temporarily pushing aside the pain that had been building up in her heart. She nestled into Caius’s embrace and let him hold her. “I’ll be happy as long as you hold me.”
It was a clumsy attempt to change the subject. Caius frowned but still held her tight.
“Fine, you tormenting little temptress. You just lost your chance to open up to me and seek protection.”
“Maybe next time?”
“That depends on my mood.”
Linnea felt a little down. She had annoyed Caius again. What now?
In the end, she slid under the covers and took his hot, thick thing into her mouth…
The next day was the weekend again.
Linnea woke up to an empty space beside her in the bed.
She went down to the dining room. Only the housekeeper was waiting to serve her meal; Caius wasn’t there. “Mr. Caius still has work this morning.”
“Oh.”
Linnea didn’t ask anything else. She sat down quietly to eat her healthy meal, wondering to herself: Caius didn’t even have breakfast with her this time. Was he really that busy? Was this a hint that he was angry with her and intended to clear her out of his private space?
She felt a little disheartened as she thought about it.
Last night, maybe she should have just casually made up some small thing that made her sad and exposed a bit of harmless vulnerability to satisfy Caius’s desire for control. But she hadn’t.
She wasn’t good at lying, and she had already told Caius the biggest lie of her life. She didn’t want any more deceit in this relationship.
Honestly, lying made her feel a little tired.
Well, since she had already annoyed Caius, she figured she shouldn’t stay here and continue to get in his way.
Noon.
Caius returned from the company specifically.
He entered the dining room. The table was full of rich dishes, all suitable for someone with a stomach condition. But the one person who should have been sitting at the table waiting for him, Linnea, was nowhere to be seen.
He asked the butler, “Where did she go?”
“Ah, Ms. Linnea went out.” The butler was momentarily stunned, then said sheepishly, “I thought she was just taking a walk in the garden, but I didn’t realize… she must have left this morning.”
The maids exchanged glances. No one expected Linnea to sneak away from the beach apartment. Most women who had a chance to enter Caius’s private space would shamelessly stay in the apartment until Caius personally kicked them out.
How could someone like Ms. Linnea just ditch Caius, who had kindly come back to eat with her, and run off?
Caius curled his lip and gave a sarcastic laugh.
Seeing that his kitten was in a bad state last night, he had intentionally left early this morning to finish his work ahead of time, clearing his lunch break to come back and keep her company, worried her low mood would last.
And she had the nerve to just take off?
A subordinate tentatively asked, “Should we call Ms. Linnea back tonight?”
“Call her back for what?” Caius sneered, gritting his teeth. “Just let her play around out there. I’m curious to see what she’s in such a hurry to go out for on her day off.”
Linnea’s mood was indeed terrible.
But since she couldn’t think of a solution right now, she had to occupy her mind with something else first.
The payment for the yacht party was already in her account. Caius had generously added a zero to the end of that number. This money would be enough if she only needed to purchase her mother’s remaining scattered works.
She didn't need to worry about money for the time being, and she also had time to look for a personal trainer.
She checked out a few gyms near her own apartment. She wanted a female personal trainer, but after visiting several, she couldn’t find anyone suitable.
Just as she was hesitating about hiring a male trainer, a clear, young voice sounded behind her:
“Hey, is that you, Linnea?”
Instinctively, it felt familiar. Linnea suppressed her surprise and turned around. It was a handsome, charismatic man, somewhere between a youth and a man.
He had just finished his workout, a sweat towel draped around his neck, and he smiled brightly at her.
“Linnea, long time no see.”
It was Soren, the top student in the PhD program under the medical professor who had shown a clear preference for her when she was studying medicine at Laurentian University.
She looked at Soren, and saw intense interest in his eyes.
The same intense interest Soren had when he pursued her five years ago.