Mark could not stand to watch their exchange anymore. He stood and tugged Arianne’s arm, suggesting, “All right, that’s enough. I recall Smore having some assignments from school today, and maybe you can check and see if he’s doing them. Let me handle this.”Arianne responded with a wordless, sullen sulk before turning her back from them and walking away.Her bravado took her as far as a corner, where no one else was present, before it crumbled and revealed her reddened eyes. The fact that Helen was borrowing a hefty sum from her was never what dismayed her—it was the revelation that after abandoning Arianne, Helen’s life did not improve at all. Seeing her going around, essentially begging for charity, was a sting to her heart, and she hated how that distress felt.Downstairs, Mark tried his best to comfort Helen. “It’s all right, I can assure you. I sincerely believe she doesn’t mean abuse when she said what she said. She concurred when I told her you needed monetary help. The most

At six in the morning, a string of frenzied ringing startled Arianne out of her sleep. This was not her usual time to wake up, and she did not intend to start now. She jostled Mark, signaling him to help her get it. The man groggily obeyed and stood up from his bed, grabbing her phone and taking a glance on the caller’s name before passing it to Arianne. “Your phone; it’s Melanie. You pick it up.” Arianne placed the phone by her ear blearily. “Mmm, helloww? Melanie? Why the early call?” All the way from the other side of the phone, Melanie’s voice was dangerously light and evidently shaking, “A-Arianne… T-Teo… He… He’s been abducted… The m-media’s already on it… D-Don’t you know yet?” The fog of sleep around Arianne was immediately dispelled. “What did you just say?! W-What happened?!?!” Mark was so shocked, his plan to return to his slumber was instantly thwarted, and in response, he rolled on his back to express protest. Arianne willed herself to recover her composure bef

Mark heard the pandemonium from outside and frowned slightly, but he showed no inclination to care. Arianne, however, caught Mateo’s name among the hubbub and sprang out of the elevator unthinkingly before heading to the entrance. “What’s going on?! Who’s responsible for this hoo-ha?!”Seeing her leaving the elevator, Mark hesitated for a beat before trailing behind.By the time the two of them got closer, the troublemaker—an upper-class woman whose dress reflected her standing—dropped to her knees and let out a bloodcurdling keen. “Mr. Tremont, please! Teo knows he’s messed up, please! Please, he’s my only son! Please, please, please have mercy, please let him go!”Arianne felt her heart shudder. Was this Mateo’s family? But… who told them that Mark might be connected to his abduction? How else could they be so quick to show up here, in his turf?!A storm had clouded Mark’s darkening expression. “What’s that supposed to mean? What does Mateo Rodriguez’s welfare have anything to do

Mark yanked his tie loose as a fit of anxious frenzy seized him, and he strode to the couch for a seat.“So? You think I’m the one behind it too, don’t you?! A stupid requital against that Mateo Rodriguez? —You really believe that I would be behind any of this?!”Arianne said nothing. She suspected him, but she doubted that suspicion just as much as she doubted him. When pressed, she had no idea what to say.All her deafening silence succeeded in doing was to pour fuel into Mark’s fire. In the blink of an eye, he rose to his feet and grabbed Arianne by the chin, hard. “What are you implying? Melanie suspects me, and now, in her footsteps, so do you? If this were my doing, mark my words, I would not keep my lips shut on the matter nor bend over backward trying to hide it from you; rather, I would confess—plainly—to you that I want Rodriguez dead! So why am I being accused of a crime that I have not a single connection to, let alone pulled strings behind?!”Pain flared in response to

One look at Mark’s stormy expression prompted Jackson to quickly cup his hand over Tiffany’s mouth. “—I mean, people say the sh*ttiest things everywhere on the internet, riiiiight? Who needs you to remind us all about it? So how about we zip our lips on this one, honey, and move on to discussing the solution,” he quickly chimed in. “We didn’t wanna intervene at first, but Mark’s gotten dragged into it. It’s in all of our best interest to solve this as soon as possible, because as it stands, this is seriously staining Tremont Enterprise too much.”Mark let out a steely sneer. “And the world never changes. Who cares about evidence or proof? All it takes to damn anyone to death is a someone’s piehole. But I’m not just any weakling who can be taken down by some unfounded rumor, and good luck on getting me to care about Rodriguez’s abduction,” he bristled. “Why should I squander my effort in saving him—what, just to prove that I’m innocent? I’m already innocent, for God’s sake, whether I h