“You can’t sell my things! I won’t ever allow that…” my mother countered as her face transformed into a mask of shock.
“We don’t have any other choice. Stop acting so selfish!” my father screamed back.
“Me? Selfish? How can you blame this on me when you’re the one at fault!” she shouted back while pointing her index finger at her husband accusingly.
“Contact your brother or someone from your family. I’m sure they have some money to lend us,” my father suggested.
“Stop! I won’t let you embarrass me any further. This is already bad enough for me…” my mother said through gritted teeth.
I had never seen her so openly angry before and she never spoke this way to my father. Normally, she was obedient toward him, and it seemed like the only person in our family whom she would direct harsh words toward was me. I felt my sister’s arms around my waist as she hugged me close. That was when I realized that I was scared of what was happening and also about what was going to happen to us in the future.
My mother suddenly walked past us toward the large wooden worktable located at one end of the room. She was soon rummaging through some papers inside a drawer until she found the pile of papers that she had been looking for. Mother stomped back toward Father and basically threw the papers into his face.
“What on earth is wrong with you?!” he yelled as he swatted the papers away from his face.
“Do you truly think that I know nothing at all about all your debt and your gambling addiction? Look at all these papers demanding for payment and look at all this interest! No wonder people have been giving me looks and whispering behind my back every single time I go out to events. You know, just the other day Lady Hammoth just asked me when you will repay the debt that you owe to her husband. Can you even begin to imagine how embarrassed I was? I didn’t even know what kind of face I was supposed to make!” My mother spoke so fast before she ended up shrieking.
After that episode, my mother started sobbing and then she began wailing loudly. Instead of comforting his wife, my father grabbed the lamp from the nearby table and threw it hard onto the floor. Dina let out a scream and hugged me even tighter than before. By then she had started crying while I was too scared to tear my eyes away from the scene unfolding in front of me and my feet felt glued to the spot.
“Please follow me this way…”
I turned to see a very distressed-looking Lauren, one of our housekeepers, approaching us. Without saying any more, she ushered us out of the room. When I glanced back at our parents, they were still too focused on arguing with each other to pay attention to either my sister or me.
Although my parents never got a divorce that day and remained married up until this day, it was like their marriage came to an end from that moment on. Phillip, the leader of the Alnault family could no longer keep the family afloat, and blaming Catherine, his wife was the only thing that he could do. Funny enough, I could tell that my mother also blamed my father and never felt an ounce of regret for her actions. To her, she was just playing the role that she was supposed to play.
Around a week after that, my parents announced to us that the Vulkan family had expressed interest in engaging their only son to my sister. Less than two weeks later, a contract was drawn up and signed by the head of both families that finalized the engagement between Dina and Anthony. After that, money was no longer an issue for our family and the Vulkan family got full access to our aristocratic connections and all that came with it.
…
“Do you know why we called you back here?” my father asked curtly.
“To find Diana…” I replied in short.
“Do you honestly have no idea where she is? Is this happening because she is stressed about her upcoming wedding? Is that it?” my mother asked and for the first time in a long while, I could sense genuine worry in her tone.
“I honestly have no idea where she is. I mean, I wasn’t even here in the same country as her so how am I supposed to know?” I replied with a careless shrug of my shoulders.
“Always talking back with that disrespectful attitude. I guess after all this time, you still haven’t learned any manners…” my mother hissed through clenched teeth.
“I don’t know where Diana is,” I stated factually while deciding to ignore her words of disapproval.
“All your life, you’ve been a failure and a bad influence on your sister. You always get her in trouble and convince her to do the most outrageous things. Just how many times have you put your sister at risk? What about this time? Did you convince her to run away from her wedding as well?” my father asked with narrowed eyes.
“I have no idea what you’re going on about,” I replied emotionlessly.
I had no idea how many times I’d been through a conversation like this with them. They both had a habit of putting the blame on me instead of their poor parenting whenever my sister misbehaved or when something unfortunate happened to her. When I was younger, I felt so unloved, and that the world was so cruel and unfair to me. As the years passed, my skin naturally got thicker and my mind and heart more resilient. Every word felt like a slap to my numb face because it didn’t hurt, not anymore.
“You will have to take responsibility for this! If you can’t find your sister and make sure that she turns up to the wedding, I’m going to make sure that you take responsibility for it!” my father yelled at me at the top of his lungs.
--To be continued…
“There’s no need to threaten me. I’ll do my best to find her even if it’s not for your sake,” I replied in a flat voice.Back then, I had no idea what he had in mind when he told me that I would have to take responsibility if I couldn’t find my sister.…**The next day**Despite telling my parents that I would try my best to find my sister, I still didn’t have any solid idea where I would find Diana or why she had suddenly decided to disappear. The timing was just too perfect because it was so close to her upcoming wedding. The only source of comfort for me was my gut feeling that told me that she was doing fine wherever she was. If she was truly distressed or if she needed help, I was sure that she would have tried to get in contact with me by now.After making my escape from my parents and out into the long hallway of the mansion, I ran into one of our oldest housekeepers. The way her eyes lit up told me that she was pleasantly surprised to see that I had returned. Lauren must have
After thanking Lauren again and giving her a brief hug, I quickly made my way out of the mansion. The sun would be setting soon, and I wanted to take a stroll in the city for a while to take some photos for what I needed to do next. Although I wasn’t absolutely sure what Dina was up to, I had a very good guess.The city center felt even busier that early evening when I arrived than I remembered the last time that I was there. It seemed like a few more shopping malls had popped up and some new skyscrapers that were under construction the last time that I was there had opened up as well. As usual, the crowd was a good mix of people ranging from couples, university and high school students and regular working adults. I used to come here with my sister all the time to hang out after high school or whenever we were allowed or had the time.After finding a good spot in front of one of the shopping malls that my sister and I liked to frequent, I took out my mobile phone and snapped a few sel
“Come back home. This is just another fling of yours and it will be over in less than a month or two based on your historical track record,” I snapped as I clutched my mobile phone tightly in my hand.“You’re wrong, Leya. This time it’s definitely different. I don’t blame you since you’re no longer living with us. You see, I’ve been secretly dating him for almost a year now and we are truly in love with each other,” my sister announced while sounding very proud.A year...“You’ve been engaged to Anthony for over ten years! Also, please don’t make your success in staying in a relationship for longer than a few months sound like a lifetime achievement because it is not!” I barked through the phone.After shouting for so long, my throat had started to hurt. I was panting as my anger started to boil over. It wasn’t that Dina never matured from the days that we were kids but she had matured in a way that was uniquely and completely her own. Her view of the world wasn’t normal but I couldn’
**Back to the present**‘I can’t wait for tonight to arrive…’I had no idea why Anthony decided to say something like that to me. The playful and extremely flirtatious smile that he showed me made my heart skip a dangerous beat and for a moment I didn’t quite know how to react. I wasn’t sure if the Anthony that I knew would say something like that. Then again, it wasn’t like he was in a position to say something so playful and suggestive to me while he was my sister’s fiancé. Just like me, he probably never thought that he would end up marrying me instead of my sister.“Diana dear! Congratulations on your wedding. You have no idea just how long we’ve been waiting for this day to come. You look stunning! This dress looks perfect on you. You couldn’t have chosen a better dress,” a middle-aged woman with light blonde hair said while smilingly widely at me.“Thank you very much for your kind words. I hope you enjoy the party at the reception later on,” I replied smoothly.It felt like a s
His kiss felt gentle and loving yet demanding at the same time. It felt sweet yet slightly aggressive and unlike any kiss that I had ever experienced before. It left me curious and also eager for more. His lips worked to seduce mine until I felt like my body would melt in his arms. My lips slowly parted to grant his seeking tongue entry into the wet depths of my mouth. Anthony let out a satisfied moan as he thrusted his tongue firmly between my parted lips and into my mouth.“Mhmm…” I heard myself moaning even louder this time as my eyes drifted closed.The way his tongue seduced mine in a fervent dance of passion told me just how experienced and skilled he was. I had thought so since the first time that we kissed that he was such a good kisser, and he was probably the best that I have ever had. Although I knew that countless pairs of eyes were watching us, I couldn’t stop myself from kissing him back hungrily. My mind felt intoxicated with the pleasure of his kiss and thoughts of him
Since we are now married, it was only natural that I would be moving in to live with Anthony at his family estate. I recalled the large white mansion with a large French-style garden out front from my numerous visits there during childhood after the engagement between Anthony and my sister had been decided. Although the mansion that belonged to my family was already overly large, the Vulkan family estate where Anthony lived was much larger. I smiled a little to myself when I thought of the many encounters that we shared when we were younger whenever I had the chance to visit his home.After waiting for too long, Anthony and I were finally on our way back to what would be my new home. After leaving my mother and making my way back to Anthony’s side, he welcomed me back warmly before leading me to a large black limousine that would take us back to his place.“I still can’t believe that father invited that many people to our wedding,” Anthony commented with a hint of complaint before he
I automatically looped an arm around his neck as I pressed my body against his. Our tongues ground against each other as we both desired to feel closer and more connected. His hand moved to cup my shoulders before sliding down to caress my upper arm. I moaned softly into our kiss before he began sucking on my tongue teasingly. The jolts of pleasure that flooded my body and made my core clench with desire also made my body feel weak. Therefore, I was thankful when Anthony’s hand caressed its way all the way down my arm to my wrist before he took the champagne glass that I was still holding from me. It was a small miracle that I hadn’t spilled any champagne by that time given how busy we were with each other. I heard a small clinking sound when Anthony placed my glass down on the table.“Ahh…” I moaned before letting out a long sigh of pleasure when Anthony finally broke our kiss.I was panting hard as I stared back at him with almost teary eyes. He was such a good kisser, not that I di
“Anthony…Ahhh…” I called his name.Before I could protest against anything, his face was between my breasts. I felt the hot heat of his breath against my sensitive skin for a brief moment before the hot wet heat of his mouth engulfed one of my nipples and made me cry out. It felt like his heat was being transferred to my body as he flicked his tongue skillfully against my erect nipple. His hand moved to massage my other breasts to feed me even more pleasure. I felt like I was about to lose my mind completely as I ran my fingers through his blond hair. His hair felt like fine silk against my fingers but it didn’t take long for me to be clutching at his hair as my passion took over me.“Just as I thought, you love this as well. Your body is amazingly sensitive,” he commented when he released my nipple from his mouth.“Anthony…please…” I begged although I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to stop or to give me more.Anthony made the decision for me when his tongue lapped at my other nipple be