Chapter 217 Love! Loving Me Is a Guaranteed Win
The villa where Thalia lived before marriage was in a famous wealthy neighborhood in Emerald City. The property management was run like the military - super strict. And yet, a thief had gotten in.
Good thing she had installed plenty of security cameras, otherwise if something actually got stolen, the loss would be huge.
Amara parked her motorcycle far away from the villa.
Thalia checked the surveillance footage on her phone. After confirming the person in her walk-in closet couldn't hear sounds from the yard, she carefully pushed open the door and went in.
"Shouldn't we call the police?" Amara watched as Thalia pulled out a stick from behind a flower pot in the yard. Startled, she asked while pulling out her phone to call William, deliberately keeping her voice low to avoid alerting the thief.
"By the time the police get here, the thief will be long gone."
"But it's dangerous for us to go in like this."
Thalia glanced at Amara, who obediently shut up. Thalia waited for the right moment. When she saw a car driving through the neighborhood, she used the distraction of its headlights to unlock the door with her fingerprint.
She tiptoed inside. After all, it was her own home - she knew it like the back of her hand.
The man was bent over in her study, searching for something.
Thalia hid Amara in the corner of the stairwell and gripped the stick tightly.
This person had clearly figured out she hadn't been living here lately, otherwise he wouldn't have stayed inside for so long without any intention of leaving.
She walked to the study door. Using the light from the yard, she could make out the man's figure. She messed up her long hair, and in her white chiffon dress, looking like a ghost, she asked in a hoarse voice: "Did you find it?"
The man in the study looked up and saw a woman with disheveled hair in a white dress standing at the door, her face unclear. His legs went weak with fright and he sat down on the floor.
A ghost?
"Who... who are you? Stop playing ghost tricks."
"What are you looking for? Tell me, I'll help you find it."
The man panicked and wanted to run, but realized he couldn't go through the window - if he went that way, the neighborhood security would definitely catch him. The only way out was through the door.
He steeled himself and rushed out. Just as he passed Thalia, she grabbed his arm and slammed him against the door frame.
"You're human, you're pretending to be a ghost?"
The man had been scared, but now he started fighting back. Thalia wasn't backing down either. She pulled out the stick and landed four or five heavy blows on the man in quick succession, so fast he couldn't even see her movements. He only realized what happened when he smelled blood.
"You're asking for it..."
In an instant, the two were wrestling in the hallway. Thalia was ruthless, and the man was clearly trained too, pressing his attack relentlessly.
As they fought their way to the stairwell, Amara gathered her courage and, timing it right, brought down a heavy blow with the stick.
It hit the man so hard his head spun and he tumbled down the stairs.
Realizing he was at a disadvantage, the man didn't dare stay. He scrambled to pull open the front door and ran out.
Thalia chased after him.
The man took a shortcut and jumped into the neighborhood's bushes, rolling down the slope. Just as Thalia was about to chase him down the main road, a black Maybach came speeding around the bend.
The man fell into the neighborhood's river...
"Why did you come here?"
William walked toward Thalia with a cold expression, gripping her arm and checking for injuries through her nightgown. After looking for a while, perhaps finding the dress inconvenient, he crouched down to lift her skirt.
"Don't lift my skirt, there are cameras. The blood on me isn't mine, it's all someone else's."
"You're proud of that?"
Thalia was stunned by William's yelling. After a moment, she shot back: "I won the fight, why can't I be proud?"
William was taken aback by her fierce retort, and his anger instantly subsided.
"Let's go back inside first."
"No, apologize."
William tried to take Thalia's hand, but she shook him off.
"I was wrong, I apologize. Be good, let's go inside first."
Thalia had expected William to keep arguing with her. Suddenly hearing his sincere apology, her heart softened. Compared to those reluctant apologies from others that end with "are you happy now?", William's straightforward apology really got to her.
"Sir, I asked the property management. They said the river in the neighborhood connects to the Jing River with flowing water. If he jumped in, he's probably out of the neighborhood by now," Finn rushed in to tell William.
"Call the police. Tell them to search along the river. We must find him. He's injured, he can't have gone far."
"Got it."
In the living room, William pulled Thalia over, took the knife from her hand and tossed it casually on the coffee table. He lifted Thalia's skirt to check her body.
"Really not injured."
"I'm fine!"
William sighed and sat on the coffee table, staring at Thalia for a long moment before speaking, his tone suppressed: "Why didn't you call me?"
"Didn't you say that once you enter your study and close the door, I can't disturb you?"
William choked, remembering he had indeed said that. He rubbed his face, somewhat helpless.
He ground his teeth and said: "Since when have you been so obedient?"
"I was disobedient when I was young! Now I'm getting old..."
"You can be disobedient."
"What?" Thalia didn't hear clearly.
"With me, you can be disobedient."
Thalia fell silent, looking into William's serious eyes. As their eyes met, feelings seemed to flow between them. She couldn't deny that William was a man with real responsibility in certain ways. If she wanted water in the middle of the night, one kick and he'd get up. When she bothered him at night, he never lost his temper - more obedient than the dog she had as a kid.
But these things... weren't enough to make someone like her, who grew up in the shadow of terrible men, fall in love with him.
Yet somehow, this one sentence made her heart flutter.
"Mr. Brown, if you're this romantic, I might fall in love with you."
William took the towel Amara brought over and wiped the blood from her neck and arms: "Go ahead and love me! Loving me is a sure win for you."
"Mr. Brown is so confident?"
William's hand paused. His slightly reddened eyes fell on Thalia's face, looking directly at her, leaving her nowhere to hide: "You wouldn't understand."
She wouldn't understand what he had sacrificed to have her, wouldn't understand that feeling of regaining something lost.
She would never know how long he had plotted to get her back.
"Wouldn't understand what?" Thalia pressed.
William crouched in front of her, one hand holding her arm, the other pressing the towel against the crook of her elbow, his eyes full of tenderness and devotion.
"Responsibility. Whether I love you or not, whether you love me or not, as long as you're my wife, I will protect you. Thalia, I'm not like your father."