Chapter 117 Her Past
That man was Kevin.
As Harold's secretary, he kept a low profile. If you weren't paying attention, he was easy to overlook.
Quinley immediately pulled out her phone and snapped a photo.
She'd caught him with Susan before—the two had been intimate, their relationship clearly more than professional. But now here he was, tangled up with Lucy.
Quinley felt like her brain was full of knotted thread she couldn't untangle. Why did these two completely unrelated women both have connections to Kevin?
She couldn't make sense of it.
Right now, the urgent matter was stopping Dennis from being with Lucy.
A conspiracy. All of it was a conspiracy.
Susan lurked in the shadows, appearing and disappearing like a ghost. She never revealed herself but had impersonated Quinley multiple times. What was she trying to accomplish? No one knew. But Quinley was certain of one thing—Susan wanted to destroy her.
So what about Lucy? Why was Dennis so dead-set on marrying a woman who hung around entertainment venues? Quinley had asked him repeatedly, but he always stayed silent. So what was the truth? What the hell was really going on?
Question after question flooded Quinley from all directions. She felt like there was a pool of black water ahead, ready to swallow her whole.
Halfway through her ride, she switched buses and headed straight for Dennis's dorm.
It was already late. The dorm had locked its doors. Quinley found the dorm supervisor and lied about a family emergency. The kind old man helped her call Dennis down from his room.
But the moment Dennis saw Quinley again, he turned to leave in annoyance.
Quinley rushed forward and grabbed his arm. "Denny, tell me—is someone threatening you? Or did they trap you into taking out another loan?"
Quinley spoke rapidly, her clear eyes flashing with urgency. She desperately wanted the truth from Dennis.
This was a battle where she was outnumbered from the start. Those people hid in the shadows, working together to drag Quinley down into the mud forever.
She'd almost resigned herself to fate. But in the end, she refused to bow to it.
"What the hell do you want from me?" Dennis exploded. He shoved Quinley away forcefully. His youthful face was twisted with pain and frustration.
"Denny, didn't you always want to study abroad? I'll find a way for you. Just leave the country as soon as possible, okay?"
Running away—that was the only solution Quinley could think of at the moment.
But Dennis just laughed coldly.
"Study abroad? Why would I do that? When I wanted to go, none of you helped me. Now that I don't want to go anymore, you're pushing me to leave. Am I some kind of clay you can mold however you want? Quinley, I'm telling you—I'm done listening to you. Tomorrow I'm dropping out of school. I'm marrying Lucy, giving her a grand wedding, having a bunch of kids with her. I'm going to live a normal person's life."
He vented like that, saying a lot, but to Quinley, his words sounded incredibly childish and ridiculous.
She genuinely wanted to help Dennis, but he kept pushing her away again and again.
Quinley took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down.
"Denny, I'm asking you one more time—do you really want to marry that woman?"
"Absolutely." Dennis's answer was firm.
"She has other men on the side. Did you know that?"
Quinley hadn't wanted to bring that up. Dennis was a man—she wanted to leave him some dignity. But apparently, she was overthinking it.
Dennis didn't seem surprised at all by what Quinley said. He already knew.
"Lucy's line of work is special. She can't help interacting with all kinds of men. So what? No matter what she does, I respect her choice. Even if she becomes a whore, I'm still marrying her."
With things said to that extent, Quinley had nothing left to say.
"If there's nothing else, I'm heading back." Dennis didn't even look at Quinley again. He walked straight toward the dorm building.
"Denny, about that concert ticket..."
It was in the past, but it sat between Quinley and Dennis like a thorn. Neither had brought it up, but both knew it was there.
Quinley had barely started when Dennis cut her off sharply. "I don't want to hear any explanations from you."
His voice was loud. After yelling, he ran off at full speed.
People always say family can't be torn apart. But a single concert ticket had made Dennis forget everything Quinley had done for him. Resentment had taken root in his heart, and resentment had blinded him.
By the time Quinley got home, Marlee had already packed up everything she could.
"Quinny, tomorrow help me find a moving truck. I'll move the stuff back to the countryside first and get that old house cleaned up. Once you and Denny are both married, your father and I will leave."
This apartment was something Quinley had bought for them not long after joining Apex Global Group—a retirement home. She'd thought that from then on, their family would finally have shelter in this city.
Three years. It felt like the blink of an eye, and all her efforts had turned to nothing.
"Okay." Quinley only managed that single word.
She respected Dennis's choices, just as she respected Colin and Marlee's decisions.
In this family, only she was the outsider. Even though she shared the Elikin surname, she didn't share their blood.
That night, for the first time, Quinley desperately missed her biological parents. Where were they? Why had they abandoned her all those years ago? After all this time, had they ever thought about her? Had they looked for her?
She had so many questions but didn't know who to ask.
Early the next morning, Marlee urged Quinley to arrange for movers.
"Mom, you really don't have to rush to move back so quickly." Quinley helped load things onto the truck as she spoke.
Marlee was quick and efficient. "Better to move early. I need to get that old house cleaned up anyway."
Two hours later, they were on the road to their hometown.
The entire ride, neither mother nor daughter spoke. Quinley was lost in thought, while Marlee was consumed by the urgency of moving.
The old house in the countryside was on the outskirts of a small town—a staff dormitory that Colin's former school had assigned him.
The building was ancient, only three stories tall, with over twenty units per floor. Each unit was just a single room. Bathrooms and showers were communal, and cooking had to be done in the hallway.
The conditions were terrible—freezing in winter, sweltering in summer. It really wasn't fit for living.
Close to noon, the truck stopped in front of the tube building. Marlee grabbed a bundle of things and immediately started hauling them upstairs.
The Elikin family's small room was on the third floor. By the time Quinley got there, Marlee had already opened the door.
Spider webs covered the ceiling beams. The furnishings were exactly as they'd been three years ago when they'd moved out—broken table, broken chairs, a cheap fabric sofa. Everywhere she looked, dust.
Marlee was already cleaning. The dust she stirred up made her cough constantly.
"Mom, why don't I rent you guys a different place?" Quinley suggested.
Marlee quickly refused. "This place is fine once it's cleaned up. Back in the day, all four of us lived here and never complained about the space. Now you and Denny are starting your own families, so it's just me and your dad. This place is good enough."
Marlee had a resilient nature. She quickly got the room into decent shape.
Quinley helped her put things away—covering the sofa, laying out the bedding. Memories slowly resurfaced. The family had been poor back then, but Quinley had never thought of it as hardship. When the family's hearts were together, that was the warmest place in the world.
And now...
"Mom, where's our old photo album?" Quinley remembered there used to be an album at home with lots of childhood photos of her and Dennis.
Maybe because she'd been thinking about her biological parents last night, Quinley suddenly wanted to look at those photos.
"Under the bed, in the wooden box." Marlee was busy, but her memory was sharp. No matter how much time passed, she could remember where things were.
Quinley bent down and dragged out the wooden box from under the bed. She wiped away the dust on the outside with a damp towel.
The box wasn't locked. Quinley opened it easily. But after searching through the entire box, she couldn't find the album Marlee had mentioned.
"That's weird. How could it not be there? I remember it so clearly—that album was in this box." When Marlee saw Quinley hadn't found it, she dropped what she was doing and came over to look herself.
But after searching again and again, the album had vanished.
"Forget it. If we can't find it, we can't find it. I'm hungry, Mom. Let's go get something to eat." Quinley suggested. Marlee was hungry too, so they locked the door and headed out.
Just as they reached the bottom of the stairs, Marlee spotted the album in the trash can by the stairwell.
"Isn't this our family album? How did it end up here?" Marlee picked it up and dusted it off. She opened the album and flipped through it page by page.
All the photos with Quinley in them were gone.
"Mom, where are my photos?" Quinley also noticed something was wrong. Her expression immediately grew tense. She took the album from Marlee and flipped through it from start to finish.
Nothing. They were all gone.
Solo shots, graduation photos, family portraits... any photo with her in it was missing.
"Yeah, why are all your photos gone?" Marlee looked equally confused.
Just then, someone walked out of the communal washing area, carrying clothes.
"Kelly! You're still living here? You didn't move?" Marlee recognized her immediately.
Kelly was a long-time resident. Before the Elikins had moved away, the two families had been quite close.
"Marlee, you're moving back in?" Kelly greeted Marlee cheerfully. But quickly, her gaze shifted to Quinley with surprise.
"Quinny, isn't this what you threw away last night? I tried to talk you out of it, saying your parents treasured that album. But you wouldn't listen. See? I was right!"