Chapter 21 The True Confession

Chapter 21 The True Confession
Watching the system notification pop up on his screen, Matthew couldn't help but laugh, pinching the bridge of his nose as his brother violently altered the group chat name.
William Lynes had an incredibly explosive temper. He was basically a walking barrel of gunpowder. Honestly, Matthew sometimes thought Arthur Finlan was actually William's long-lost biological son; the two of them had the exact same volatile, easily-triggered personality.
In contrast, neither Matthew nor Wayne had inherited their father's temper.
When Matthew was young, he rarely spoke. But when he did, he never wasted a single word. Especially when he was insulting someone—he didn't even need to use his fists; his mouth was toxic enough to verbally decimate anyone in the room.
By middle school, his core personality had fully set. He had a venomous tongue, but because he was flawlessly athletic, incredibly smart, and aggressively dominant, the guys who hated him just had to swallow it. That was exactly how his inner circle had given him the title "Master Lynes."
But the Eldest Son of the Lynes family, Wayne, was the complete opposite.
Wayne had been an absolute chatterbox since birth. The second he learned how to speak, he never shut up, driving the entire household insane. According to family legend, the day Matthew was born, Wayne finally spared his parents and the nannies. He spent all day aggressively talking at his infant brother. Since baby Matthew rarely cried and was naturally quiet, he made the perfect captive audience.
Because of this, Mrs. Lynes firmly believed that the only reason Matthew hated talking was because Wayne had permanently exhausted his social battery as a child.
The two brothers were only two years apart. One was a golden retriever idiot, and the other was a cold, calculating sociopath.
The outside world fiercely envied the Lynes family, but as parents, William and his wife knew the dark truth: both of their sons had grown up completely twisted.
The public thought Wayne Lynes was a mature, reliable corporate heir. In reality, he was a hopelessly addicted gamer who survived on three hours of sleep.
The public thought Matthew Lynes was a flawless, untouchable genius. In reality, he had spent his entire adolescence acting as the tyrannical boss of the local delinquents, only deciding to act like a normal human being once he got to college.
Back in the group chat, William Lynes had been rendered completely speechless by the photo. It was Mrs. Lynes who replied first.
[Mrs. Lynes]: Why aren't you showing us her face? You finally got your very first girlfriend, the least you could do is let your mother see her!
Before Matthew could figure out how to reply to that, his father fired back.
[William Lynes]: Are you actually believing this?! Have you forgotten how many times this brat and his idiot brother have teamed up to scam us over the years?! Your son is a computer genius, you don't think he could just photoshop a girl into the picture?!
[Mrs. Lynes]: ...Are you seriously trying to act tough while sitting alone in the living room?
[Mrs. Lynes]: I'm upstairs in the bedroom. If you have the guts, come up here and yell at me to my face.
System: Member [Internet Addict Wayne Lynes] has changed the group name from [HOLY FUCK MR. LYNES IS GOING TO YELL AT MATTHEW TODAY!] to [HOLY FUCK MR. LYNES IS ABOUT TO GET BEATEN BY HIS WIFE!]
Matthew: "..."
To be this blatantly suicidal... Wayne must definitely not be at the house right now.
[William Lynes]: .........
[William Lynes]: Wayne Lynes, which internet cafe are you rotting in right now?! Huh?! Have you literally visited every single gaming cafe in the state?! Get your ass home! Immediately! RIGHT NOW!
Seeing his father entirely redirect his fury, Matthew genuinely laughed out loud.
Since the crossfire had officially shifted, he exited WhatsApp. Glancing at the time at the top of his screen, he was just about to lock his phone and tell Ruth it was time to queue for their movie.
Before he could move, a soft voice drifted over. "Matthew, what are you laughing at?"
Matthew turned his head.
Ruth had evidently finished messaging her own family. She was staring at him, her large, beautiful eyes completely unblinking. The soft mall lighting illuminated her porcelain skin, highlighting the delicate, fine curve of her eyelashes.
Matthew's breath hitched in his throat.
I already knew the back of her head was gorgeous.
But the front of her face is so incredibly, dangerously cute.
Matthew smoothly locked his phone and adopted a perfectly casual tone. "Oh. The parents of the kid I tutor just texted me." He didn't even blink as he effortlessly spun the lie. "They said the kid's test scores improved a lot, so they're giving me a raise."
When it came to lying, Matthew was in a league of his own. Back when he was a high school tyrant, he had used his flawless grades and perfect face to talk his way out of everything. He could literally beat someone up behind the gym, look a teacher dead in the eye, and say, "I was just helping them study anatomy," and the teacher would actually believe him. He could successfully sell ice to an Eskimo.
Naturally, Ruth fell for it instantly.
She had noticed that his laugh just now had been incredibly genuine. He rarely smiled that brightly, so she had genuinely thought something monumental had happened.
Oh, it's a salary raise!
Ever since Ruth started her degree at Harvard, she spent every winter and summer break grinding away as an unpaid intern at The Buckley's overseas branches, purely to gain corporate experience. Even though she wasn't technically getting a salary, her grandfather had given her a Black Card with a limit so high she couldn't max it out if she tried...
So Ruth had literally never experienced the joy of earning a standard paycheck, let alone getting a raise.
But hearing that Matthew had gotten one made her exponentially happier than if she had gotten one herself. She instantly beamed at him. "That's amazing! Congratulations, Teacher Lynes!"
Matthew watched her for a second. The girl's eyes were practically sparkling with pure joy for him, and the way her sweet voice called him "Teacher Lynes" sent a very distinct thrill down his spine.
Classmate Lynes, Coach Lynes, Teacher Lynes...
She had so many nicknames for him.
When exactly am I going to get her to call me something else?
Matthew smiled, standing up from the sofa. "Since I got a raise, I should treat you to something."
Ruth didn't decline. She thought about it for a second. "Let's get popcorn then... We just ate lunch, I don't think I can fit anything else."
The atmosphere between them was incredibly light and happy. As they walked toward the concession stand, Ruth couldn't contain her curiosity. "Can I ask... how much of a raise did you get?"
"It went from..."
Matthew had absolutely no idea what the market rate for a college tutor was. Afraid of overshooting it, he gave a highly conservative estimate. "...from two thousand a month... up to three thousand."
Ruth gasped.
...Two thousand to three thousand!
That's a whole extra thousand dollars a month!
That's twelve thousand dollars a year!
You could buy several really nice bicycles with that!
So what if he's a broke college student?! So what if he can't afford to fix his cracked phone screen?!
He is completely self-reliant! Our Mat is so incredibly hardworking and excellent!
"That is so impressive!" Ruth aggressively hyped him up, even giving him a tiny, enthusiastic round of applause as they walked. "You are amazing, Teacher Lynes!"
Matthew completely ignored her dramatic, exaggerated praise. He just pulled the corner of his lips up, turned to the counter, and scanned his phone to pay. He grabbed the massive bucket of popcorn from the cashier and shoved it directly into Ruth's arms. "Come on. Let's go print the tickets."
The kiosks were right next to the counter. As Ruth stared at the machine printing their tickets, she suddenly heard Matthew let out a sharp "Ah."
It was an incredibly staged, highly deliberate "Ah." It sounded exactly like a student who had stayed up until 3:00 AM playing video games telling their professor, "Ah, I was studying so hard last night I completely overslept."
Ruth slowly turned around.
Matthew raised an eyebrow. "I suddenly remembered... I forgot to tell you. Because this movie is so popular right now, all the normal seats were completely sold out."
Ruth: "So..."
"So." Matthew blinked, looking down at her with the most innocent, pure expression imaginable. "When I bought the tickets, the only thing left was a loveseat in the very back row."
...Sunday afternoon. A massive downtown cinema. The highest-grossing romance movie of the year.
When you combine those three elements, shouldn't the back-row loveseats be the absolute FIRST thing to sell out?!
Only an absolute idiot would believe a lie like that.
Men are such liars.
While Ruth violently roasted his terrible acting internally, she couldn't suppress the massive wave of butterflies in her stomach. She happily followed him into the theater, walking all the way up to the back row and sliding into the dead-center loveseat.
A loveseat was exactly what it sounded like. There was no armrest dividing the two of them, and once the theater lights went down, the enclosed, intimate space was incredibly convenient for couples to do... whatever couples did in the dark.
The pre-show commercials were blasting, and people were constantly walking past them to find their seats, so neither of them spoke.
Matthew honestly hadn't expected his father to be so stubbornly persistent.
Having apparently finished his domestic war with his wife, William Lynes realized the group chat was compromised and decided to DM Matthew directly.
[William Lynes]: Listen to me seriously. Your grandfather called me yesterday. He said there's a girl from the Buckley family who is exactly your age, and he wants you to meet her... I have no idea where this girl suddenly popped out from, but over the next year, if we want to expand our domestic market, building a relationship with Sylvan Enterprises would be incredibly beneficial.
[William Lynes]: I know your grandfather and old man Buckley act like they hate each other, but they're basically just old rivals. From what your grandfather said, this Buckley girl is highly capable. What do you think?
Great. This bullshit again.
Matthew scoffed quietly and typed his reply: What do I think?
Immediately after, he re-sent the exact same picture of the back of Ruth's head.
A two-second pause.
[William Lynes]: You brat! I am talking to you about serious corporate matters! Stop trying to fool me with your photoshopped pictures!
Matthew didn't bother typing another word. He immediately swiped open his camera and hit record. Over the loud, chaotic noise of the theater commercials, he filmed a short video. The camera panned from his own dark jeans over to the edge of Ruth's long, elegant skirt.
The massive popcorn bucket was resting half on his leg, half on hers. As he filmed, Ruth's pale, slender hand reached into the bucket, perfectly captured on video.
Matthew stopped recording and hit send.
[Matthew]: Dad, if you don't believe me now, there is nothing I can do to help you. I'll be honest: my attendance at the company this month has been practically zero. And it's entirely because I've been spending all my time trying to chase her.
[Matthew]: I am watching a movie with your daughter-in-law right now. Do not text me again. Muting you.
After sending those two messages, he ruthlessly muted William's chat and comfortably locked his phone.
Right on cue, Ruth shifted the popcorn bucket slightly closer to him and leaned in. "Hey, Teacher Lynes. Do you want some?"
Matthew turned his head. In the dim light, he saw her grinning at him. "I mean, this was bought with your literal blood, sweat, and tears... aren't you going to eat any?"
Her eyes were completely curved into two beautiful, glowing crescents. He had no idea what she found so incredibly funny, but her happiness was infectious.
"Because it's my hard-earned money..." Matthew leaned closer, his voice dropping into a slow, deliberate drawl, "...that's exactly why I used it to buy something for you to eat."
Alright. Fine. I cannot out-flirt him.
Ruth violently pulled her head back and obediently ate her popcorn in silence.
Ten minutes later, the movie officially began.
Overall, the film absolutely justified its massive box office numbers. The cinematography was gorgeous, the details were flawless, and both the male and female leads were A-list celebrities with god-tier visuals. Putting the two of them in the same movie was basically an automatic recipe for mass hysteria.
The plot was a perfect mix of heartwarming and hilarious. The minor misunderstandings were resolved quickly, and the theater constantly erupted into genuine laughter, or let out collective, swooning "wooo's" whenever the leads shared an intimate moment.
Ruth, however, wasn't having much of a reaction.
Honestly, she had never been a big fan of fluffy, romantic comedies.
Ruth liked high-stakes thrillers. Whether it was a murder mystery or a supernatural horror, she only felt satisfied if the movie made her scalp tingle and sent violent chills down her spine.
But since she was out on a date with Matthew, dropping her bizarre, slightly psychotic movie preferences didn't seem appropriate. She figured it was safer to just watch whatever a "normal" girl would want to watch.
Back in high school, because Anne Clark's parents were rarely home, she constantly invited Ruth and Olivia over to watch movies in their massive private home theater.
Ruth never got to pick the movies.
If she had picked the movies she actually liked, Anne and Olivia's combined courage wouldn't have lasted fifteen minutes before they both started sobbing in terror.
They always teased her for having "zero romantic sensibility," and Ruth never bothered to argue.
To her, the perfectly scripted romances in movies and TV shows—where love somehow magically conquered all obstacles—felt entirely fake.
Because the real-life "romance" she had witnessed growing up had played out exactly the opposite.
In her real life, the female lead had been ruthlessly written out of the script and killed off. And to this day, the ultimate ending of the story was the male lead and the toxic secondary female character living happily ever after with their new daughter.
On the screen, the male and female leads were currently having a massive argument. Unable to win the verbal fight, the male lead aggressively grabbed the female lead and shut her up with a heavy, passionate kiss. The entire theater squealed and laughed. Ruth laughed along with them, mechanically tossing popcorn into her mouth at a perfectly consistent rhythm.
After the fight resolved, the female lead asked the male lead the exact question that every single girl in a relationship desperately wanted to know.
Before you met me... what was your ideal type?
The brilliant thing about a loveseat was that there was no armrest between the couple, but the physical dividers separating them from the adjacent seats were incredibly high. It provided a massive sense of privacy and security.
But while the dividers blocked sightlines, they absolutely did not block sound.
The exact second the question was asked on screen, Ruth leaned slightly to her left and heard the couple in the loveseat next to them talking.
The girl whispered, "Hey babe... before we started dating, what was your ideal type?"
Since Ruth was incredibly bored by the movie, she immediately perked her ears up to eavesdrop.
The guy answered casually, clearly completely oblivious to the trap he was walking into. "Oh. Back then, I really liked the pure, innocent type. You know, long straight hair, absolutely no dye jobs. Big eyes, small mouth... and definitely no taller than 5'3". Yeah, that was basically it."
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the adjacent seats.
A long moment passed. When the girl finally spoke, her tone was so terrifying it actually sent a chill down Ruth's spine.
"Oh... So you managed to settle for a girl who's 5'7", with dyed, curly short hair, and small eyes." The girl paused, literally grinding her teeth together. "I. Must. Have. Really. Forced. You. To. Compromise."
Ruth: "..."
I cannot watch this car crash happen.
She could already perfectly envision the absolute inferno that guy was about to burn in.
She hadn't expected to witness a live execution, but the conversation gave her a brilliant idea. She swallowed her popcorn, shifted her body slightly closer to the center of the seat, and closed the distance between her and Matthew.
She reached out and poked his arm. She whispered, "Teacher Lynes?"
Matthew had noticed her slowly creeping closer to him, but he hadn't reacted. When she poked him, he immediately turned his head, leaning in to whisper back, "What is it?"
Now that she was actually about to ask, Ruth suddenly felt a little shy. "Do you have an ideal type?"
Worried he might try to dodge the question, she rephrased it to be incredibly direct. "Like... what kind of girls do you usually like?"
Honestly, Ruth was absolutely certain Matthew wouldn't crash and burn like the idiot sitting next to them.
He was way too smart, and his emotional intelligence was terrifyingly high. There was no way he wouldn't perfectly navigate the trap.
Matthew didn't even hesitate. He lifted his chin toward the massive cinema screen. "I think the female lead in this movie is pretty great."
Ruth froze.
The female lead currently on screen was a notoriously mature, aggressively sexy, deeply glamorous actress with an incredibly dominant aura. She was the exact, literal opposite of Ruth.
"Long hair, incredible body, gorgeous, sexy..." Matthew casually listed off four traits, then paused. "Yeah. Pretty much exactly like that."
Ruth: ...
Didn't you literally just tell your dad you were chasing me?!
And a second later your 'ideal type' is a glamorous supermodel?!
Do you have early-onset dementia, or do you just fall in love with a new face every five seconds?!
Holy shit! Literally the ONLY word in that list that applies to me is 'gorgeous'!
Ruth was so profoundly caught off guard that her brain essentially short-circuited. She completely forgot to consider the highly probable reality that Matthew was just fucking with her. In her momentary panic, she actually started genuinely debating whether she needed to ruin twenty years of pristine, straight black hair to get a voluminous, sexy blowout.
Of course, the thought only lasted a fraction of a second.
The moment the words left his mouth, Matthew noticed the girl next to him go completely silent.
It was too dark in the theater for even his 20/20 vision to catch every detail, but thanks to the flashing light from the massive screen, he clearly saw the shift in her expression.
She was staring straight ahead at the movie, but she obviously wasn't watching it. Her eyes were slightly glazed over, and the corners of her lips were pulled down into a very faint, incredibly subtle pout.
She looked genuinely, deeply hurt.
Matthew froze. An intense, overwhelming wave of softness crashed violently into his chest, followed immediately by a sharp sting of guilt.
He was so used to casually bantering and dropping sarcastic lies to tease her, he had completely forgotten that she might actually take him seriously.
Ruth was currently mentally kicking herself for asking such a stupid question. She felt incredibly embarrassed and entirely depressed. She had just decided she was going to completely ignore Matthew until the movie ended, when she suddenly felt something cool touch her cheek.
It was... the touch of his fingers.
She turned her head, slightly startled, and looked at the man leaning into her space.
Matthew's fingers rested gently against the side of her face. He didn't make any sudden moves to pull her closer; his touch was light, cool, and incredibly comforting.
He looked at her with absolute, unwavering intensity. His voice was a soft, rough whisper. "Don't be mad. The curvy body, the sexy aura... I was talking complete bullshit. It was all a lie."
Ruth was just opening her mouth to angrily scoff at him.
"I like you."
In the very next second, Matthew dropped the words cleanly and abruptly into the space between them.
Ruth's eyes went completely wide. Her heart violently stalled in her chest.
Illuminated by the shifting, flickering light of the movie screen, the amber color of Matthew's eyes looked completely hypnotic. He smiled softly.
"...That part is true."