Chapter 401
Chapter 401
CHAPTER 401 YOU IDIOT!
Amelie took a few steps closer to Jodie. Jodie was too afraid even to bat an eyelid, and she glared at Amelie's hand with a look of caution in her eyes. Jodie flinched a little as Amelie got closer, and Melissa flinched along with her. Melissa didn't have the guts to mess with Amelie right then, but Jodie was still Melissa's daughter, after all. Melissa couldn't help but wonder what she should do if Amelie were to hit her daughter.
Fortunately, Amelie didn't do what Jodie and Melissa had expected her to do. Instead, Amelie tucked her hair behind her ear before staring directly at Jodie. "You could've just expressed all your dissatisfaction at home, and everyone would be fine with that, Miss Jodie. Why did you have to tell the shareholders about this? Are you trying to dig your own grave? You're already paralyzed—are you trying to ruin the rest of the Alston Family as well?"
Jodie's face turned pale after hearing Amelie's words. She looked all over the house frantically—she felt too ashamed to look into anyone's eyes right then. "What… What do you mean?" Melissa felt her heart pounding after hearing Amelie's words. She turned to stare at Amelie.
However, Amelie didn't respond to Melissa. She simply kept her lips sealed. Melissa had no choice but to turn and look at Jodie. "What have you done, Jodie?"
"What… What could I have done?" Jodie had been eager to get revenge when she first did the deed. She was even excited to do it. However, Jodie no longer had the guts to admit to her faults after she heard what Amelie said. Melissa knew that Amelie wasn't the sort of person who would randomly accuse someone of something they hadn't done, so she smacked her hand on her own thigh as she shouted at her daughter. "I want you to explain yourself now. I'll kick you out of the house if I have to find out about your acts on my own!"
"How could you trust an outsider, Mom? I'm your daughter!" Jodie put on a pitiful look as she gazed at her mother with bloodshot eyes. Tears threatened to trickle down her cheeks.
"That's beside the point!" Melissa wasn't the brightest woman, but she knew her daughter well enough to tell what she was trying to do. "If you're not going to explain yourself, then I'll tell the housekeeper to send you out now. Mr. Cooper!" Melissa cried. Material © NôvelDrama.Org.
"No! No! Don't send me away!" Jodie shook her head frantically. "I'll tell you. I'll tell you what I've done, okay?" Jodie shot Amelie an angry glare before she finally explained herself. "It's no big deal, you know. I was angry because this woman here took over the role as the president of our company, so I told the shareholders to drag her down," Jodie explained.
"That's not all. She also told all the shareholders about Leo's coma," Amelie added. Melissa's eyes were so wide, her eyeballs looked like they were about to pop out of their sockets at any moment. Smack! Melissa gave Jodie a slap. "What a betrayer you are! How dare you tell outsiders about such things? Don't you know that those shareholders are a bunch of greedy pigs? They'd probably swallow Genesis alive if Amelie weren't here to hold the fort! Amelie and I have been trying our best to keep everything a secret, yet you told the public all about what happened to Leo! Are you trying to ruin us all?" Melissa cried. Even though Melissa wasn't in charge of the company, she still knew a lot about company matters.
Jodie's face turned pale after Melissa slapped her. "I know. I'm paralyzed now, so you no longer care about me. You probably wish I was dead, right? Are… Are you even my mother?" Jodie cried while pressing her hand against her cheek. Melissa felt like she was about to burst into flames after hearing Jodie's words.
"How dumb can you be, Jodie? Didn't you hear what Amelie just said? Once you tell the shareholders about such matters, you will have given them the power to snatch our company away from us. You might be paralyzed now, but you still have tons of people to care for you. You have tons of money and a big house! However, if the shareholders ended up scheming against us, we would have no choice but to sleep on the streets!" Melissa cried.
Jodie couldn't picture herself sleeping on the streets—just the thought of it left her too shocked to speak for a while. Jodie simply started sobbing silently after that. "There are a lot of times when I chose not to argue with you, not because I was guilty of your accusations, but simply because I didn't have the time. Let me clear things up this time around, Jodie—you're responsible for your own broken legs. I have nothing to do with it. I'll bring you to court if you ever bring this up again!" Amelie cried.
"As for Leo… It's true that he was trying to save me. But have you ever considered why Chandler ended up taking me away? Don't you think you're partially responsible for it as well?" Amelie added.
"I obviously didn't… You were the one…" Jodie mumbled.
"Are you sure?" Amelie widened her eyes. Jodie was too terrified by Amelie's strong aura—she had to swallow her words even though they were at the tip of her tongue. Jodie knew what she did, of course —she was the one who told Chandler about Amelie's whereabouts, and it was Jodie's intention for Amelie's life to be ruined.
However, Jodie had no idea that Chandler was a madman who had been using her the entire time. What Chandler really wanted was to see the Alston Family being torn apart, and for the Alstons to suffer. Most of his dreams had been achieved at that point!
"I'll let you go just this once. If this ever happens again, you'll no longer be under my protection!" Amelie announced before she strode out of the door. Melissa shot Jodie an exasperated and disappointed glare. "Jodie, you idiot!" Jodie couldn't handle all the criticism that she just received, and all she could do was cover her face and bawl her eyes out.
…
There was no need to hide the truth about Leo's condition after that, so Amelie figured that she might as well bring Bria and Steven back into the country. Steven was aware of how much Leo had sacrificed for his own daughter, so he no longer felt the same intense hatred toward the Alstons. Even though Steven still didn't want to meet the Alstons, he often brought Bria over to visit Leo at the hospital.
Bria was braver than everyone had expected her to be. When she saw Leo lying still in bed, she wasn't afraid of him—she even reached out and held his hand before talking to him. Amelie went over to visit Leo whenever she ended work a little earlier, and she would sit by his bed to tell him about things that happened in the office. This eventually became a routine.
Everyone now and then, Amelie would fall asleep while talking to Leo. One day, she woke up to find a jacket draped over her. She often fell asleep resting on the bed, so she figured that a nurse must have put a jacket over her. However, after she tugged on the jacket, she froze in shock.
Her gaze was fixed upon her own hand. My hand is warm. This isn't the sort of warmth that comes from the heater in the room! Amelie turned to look at the man's palms. I pulled my hand out of his earlier. Does that mean that he… held my hand? Amelie couldn't believe what was going on, so she gently poked his arm before calling his name.
The man didn't respond to her at all. Could I have been the one who pulled his hand out of the sheets
before putting my hand in his? Amelie thought about this matter for a while more, but she couldn't seem to come up with any other possible answers.
"What would you like for breakfast, Miss Dillon?" The nurse walked in right then. They were in a VIP room, so the nurse was in charge of both caring for the patients as well as the patient's visitors.
"Anything's fine," Amelie replied as she regained her senses. The nurse ended up handing Amelie a bowl of porridge after that, and Amelie took it before devouring the food while scrolling through her phone. Amelie had an application that allowed her to manage her schedule, and she was focused on arranging her time when the man on the bed seemed to have moved a little.
The man's eyes moved under his eyelids, but they eventually stopped after a while. There were other things that Amelie missed out too—she didn't notice how the man's fingers were moving as if they were in search of something. His hand moved around for a long while, and he only stopped when he finally ran out of strength.