Laura’s POV 127
Rafael also looks at me with a probing gaze, smiling softly, “Walk together?”
I was a little flustered and refused in a low voice, “No need. I’ve got a few things I want to do and I want to go out … Willow, your dad is in your hands for now.”
“But Ms. Laura …,” Willow pouted, and tried to say something when Rafael stopped her.
“If you have something to do, go ahead and do it.” He said softly.
“I’ll be back soon.”
“Don’t worry about me.” He had a look in his eyes that could melt a person, “There are doctors and nurses at the hospital, it won’t be a big deal. Laura, I think it’s best if you go back and get some rest and a good night’s sleep, you’ve been working too hard this last while.”
I feel a little hard in my heart.
Why did fate have to arrange things this way? When I made up my mind to be with Rafael, it let me know such a cruel truth.
I walked out of the hospital.
It was a sunny day, the air was a bit cool but there was no wind and it was very comfortable. I could smell the early winter.
How long had it been since I’d been out for some air?
In fact, I didn’t have anything to do, I just wanted to escape from Rafael for a while. I needed a space to be alone for a while, to adjust myself so that I could face the next road.
However ghostly, I actually went to the nursing home. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Stella, my foster mom and my aunt. I suddenly wanted to see her, and subconsciously I had another idea that I might learn more about Cameron’s life from her.
I met Stella in the hospital room.
But she wasn’t doing well, and the paramedics told me that she wouldn’t last much longer.
“You’re Ms. Laura, aren’t you?” The dean recognizes me with a slightly complicated look, “Don’t just be busy filming and being a star, you should come and care for your mother too.”
I nodded silently.
“How is she … really doing?”
“Long-term depression torture, causing her body functions to be damaged.” Dean told me, “She has almost no immunity left, a common cold or flu could kill her.”
My heart tightened, “So, she’s really dying?”
“Be prepared.”
Coming out of the dean’s, I was at a loss for words.
She’s dying … She’s actually dying.
I should have let Cameron know.
That’s when Stella saw me standing in the doorway, she raised her eyes and smiled at me.
The sunlight shines into the ward, her body seems to be gilded with a layer of golden light, even her smile becomes sacred.
“Mom …” just called out to her, I immediately choked up.
I put the medical staff are expelled, the room is left with me and her. This suite is very luxurious, her monthly medical expenses up to seven figures, but now she is hunched over, her description is withered, a handful of bones … have more, what is the use?
She’s also lost an equal amount.
I helped her take a bath, changed into clean clothes, let her sit in the wheelchair, I helped her comb her hair. Her hair is thinning, has long lost its luster, and there are a lot of white hair … I can not help but feel a sour nose, this is all fate.
If she had known that it would end this way, would she have destroyed her sister’s marriage back then?
Without her sabotage, I might have grown up in a very normal family, with mom and dad loving, with my brother as a companion, following the trajectory of life to find the other half, and settle down for life.
But if that had been the case, I would never have met Cameron …
Cameron.
At the thought of that name, my heart can’t help but throb a little.
“Mom, okay.” I gathered her hair behind her head in a bun.
However, just as I straightened up, I saw a man walk in the doorway … I stared at him in awe, a few days of light, but it seemed like centuries apart. “Cameron?” my heart pounded, “You’re here too.”
“Uh-huh.” He nodded, his expression still light.
“Thank you.” He said, “Thank you for doing this for my mom. I saw it all earlier.”
“It’s what I should have done.” I smiled, “She’s my mom too.”
The caregiver walks in to give Stella her nutritional shots.
Cameron gently walks over to me, “Can I talk to you alone for a second?”
…
We walked side by side on the grass in front of the nursing home.
The early winter sun beat down on us like a warm, soft blanket. The two of us didn’t say a word, it seemed like a protracted silence, the two of us were two warriors seeing who couldn’t hold the last line of defense and speak first.
I snickered.
Then I secretly raised my eyes to look at him.
He is still rigid and cold, very manly, handsome and intoxicating.
I couldn’t help but wonder what his real parents would have been like. How good should they have been to give birth to such an excellent him?
And why didn’t they want him?
My head was full of questions and when I wasn’t paying attention, I was yanked into my arms by a strong force. I snapped back to my senses, the embrace familiar and warm with the faint smell of tobacco.
Tears drilled out of my eyes all at once.
Cameron was holding me so tightly, he was so strong that I had trouble even breathing.
“Cameron …” I wrapped my arms around his shoulders.
Only to hear him whisper in my ear, “Laura, don’t go.”
“What?”
“Don’t go.” His low, husky voice was so pleading, “Don’t go, don’t leave me.”
My body shook.
“I know all that.” He said, “We are not brother and sister … at all No!”
“I’m not the son of this family, and I don’t know who I am.” He smiled bitterly, “But I want to be with you.”
“Cameron …,” tears welled up in my eyes and I wrenched myself away from him viciously.
“Do you resent the fact that I don’t have the birthright that would make me worthy of you?” His eyes blazed with intensity. “You’re The Lynch Family Missy and I’m nothing.”
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“The Lynch Group is in my hands now, and everything I am is yours!” He tightened his grip on my shoulders, “Laura, I can give you anything, The Lynch Group was supposed to belong to you too.”
“But you belong to me! I’m not going to give you up to anyone… you owe Rafael, I’ll help you figure it out, make him whatever terms he wants, but I can’t give you up!”
I pushed him away, my heart in turmoil.
“Laura…”
He was about to say something else when suddenly an escort came running from the distance.
“Miss Laura, Mr. Cameron.” She said hurriedly, “Mrs. Stella has come to her senses for a moment and says she has something she wants to say to you, please hurry and follow me!”
Cameron and I looked at each other and hurried upstairs.
In the hospital room, Stella was lying on the bed, mentally stable, but breathless.
She slowly opened her eyes, looked at Cameron and then at me, and extended her withered hand.
I hurriedly took it, “Mom, I’m here.”
She stared at me intently, her cloudy eyes showing a rare tenderness. Her lips moved a few times, and she sucked in a cool breath.
A machine next to me made a dripping sound.
I was startled and wanted to run out and call for a doctor, however, she held my hand tightly and finally let out a weak, raspy voice.
“Anne…”
Anne…
My entire body froze.
Although Stella was looking at me, it seemed as if her gaze was no longer focused, and she mumbled, “Anne, Anne…”
I crouched down beside her and gently stroked her hair. “Yes, I’m Anne. Mom, just say what’s wrong!”
“There you are.” She smiles.
She lifted her hand with difficulty, as if that arm weighed a thousand pounds. Finally she lifted it to touch my face, and her fingers were cold, as if her soul was slowly being drawn out of her.
I knew she was running out of time.
“Anne, it’s so nice of you to come …” she was almost speaking with her breath, “You know, mommy has missed you … so much for so long …”
“I’m sorry mom.” My voice choked.
The apology came from the bottom of my heart, no matter whose daughter I was, Jacob or Mellisa, Anne’s death was inextricably linked to me.
“Silly child, do you need to say sorry to your mommy?” She laughed, then looked to Cameron beside me. she reached out shakily and took Cameron’s hand in hers.
Then she puts my hand and Cameron’s together.
“Anne…” she gasped, but still barely spoke, “Cameron…”
“Take care of her… help me take care of her…”
“Mom, stop talking for a second.” I wiped the tears from my eyes, “I’m going to call the doctor!”
“It’s no use, don’t call.” She smiles at me, her emotions calm, “Mom will be gone soon.”
“No, it won’t!” I bite my lip.
Stella’s eyes look straight at me.
Eyes that are no longer clear and written with worry.
“Anne, you’re mommy’s only child… Mommy will protect you and won’t let anything happen to you…”
“Cameron…” she looked at Cameron, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”
Cameron’s brow furrowed and he responded in a low voice, “Don’t say that.”
“Back then, when I carried you back, mom had selfish intentions … because mom only had Anne as a daughter, and mom wanted to find a lifelong support for her …”
Although I already knew Cameron’s birth, I was still shocked to hear first hand from Stella that he wasn’t biological.
I look at Cameron, he looks solemn, as if he has already withdrawn from the joys and sorrows of the human world.
“Take care of her … must take good care of her …”
Stella suddenly coughed and wheezed so hard that the machine next to her kept sending out a dripping alarm. I wanted to go out and call for someone, but I don’t know what happened, but the strength in her hand was surprisingly strong, as if she had concentrated her last strength in this hand.
She clutched me tightly.
“Cameron …” She started rolling her eyes and shaking, “Cameron, I’m sorry … your real parents. They’ve been looking for you, they’re …”
Before this mystery could be unraveled, however, her body shook violently a few times, her legs suddenly stomped straight, and the light from her pupils gradually dissipated.
Eventually she closed her eyes.
The machine next to her showed a straight line, and the dripping alarm sound, turned into a continuous drip.
The doctor and nurse came in, did a final check, and came up to us and whispered, “My condolences.”
I watched this woodenly.
My heart was aching, but the pain wasn’t as intense.
They covered her with a white cloth and pushed her out.
My heart was empty in that moment. I tried to remember what I remembered of The Lynch Family since I was eight years old, the Stella I remembered, the Stella who always thought of me as Anne, and I realized how she could have become so mentally disturbed, sure, it’s sad for a mother to lose her daughter, but she lost her only daughter.
I looked at Cameron, who stood in a daze, equally expressionless.
Cameron and I organized Stella’s funeral together, and it was a very sad one, with no one there but Cameron and me.
It was drizzling rain that day, and the sky was covered with dark clouds, heavy and depressing.
We both stood in front of her grave, her tombstone is also very simple, only wrote the name, birth year and date of death, not even the names of her husband and children.
In life, she got a lot of scenery, but in death, there is not even a send-off person.
My heart suddenly surged with sadness, gently put the white gardenias in front of her tombstone.
Cameron stood beside it, dressed in black. From the time of Stella’s death until now, I have not seen him smile, his face has been cold, deep eyes, as if in thought.
In the middle of the day, he squatted down and gently cupped a billet of soil and sprinkled it in front of her grave.
“Go.” My hand rested on his shoulder, his coat soaked and cold from the rain.
He stood up and turned his gaze toward me. The moment I met his eyes, my heart pounded.
“Mom’s finally in the ground.” He whispered, “And our mission is complete.”
“Yes.” I nodded, “Luckily I wasn’t wrong to go over and see her one last time …”
“Laura …” He raised his hand, and as he was about to touch my face he hesitated, his hand stopped in mid-air for a long time, but gently fell on it.
Like before, his rough thumb, caressing my cheek.
“Remember what Mom said before she died?” He looked at me.
I thought he was talking about his birth, the secret that Stella took to her grave.
I sighed, “She breathed her last halfway through the sentence…. What do you do? Are you going to track it down? And where do you start?”
“That’s not what I’m talking about.”
“Then what is it?” I froze.
“I’m talking … about you!”
I felt his gaze turn fiery.
The slight coolness of the drizzle was washed away by his passionate eyes.
“She said for me to take care of you.” Cameron embraced my shoulders, “She said the whole point of adopting me back then was to give you something to fall back on for life!”
“No …” my heart ached, “Mom meant Anne …”
“Don’t you think it was all God’s will?” He looked at me quietly, “Anne is dead and you came into the family to replace Anne. In mom’s mind, you are Anne and I am the one who guards you …”
“Cameron!”
I pushed him away violently.
If he says anything else, I won’t be able to hold back my tears.
“Laura!” he locks his gaze on me, “I told you, there’s no way I’m giving you up!”
“Drop the guilt about Rafael.” He whispered, “He took a bullet for you, but he can’t use that as blackmail to put you on the hook for a lifetime of happiness!”
“Come with me, Laura ….”
His low, husky voice swayed me for a moment.
“I’m taking you and Sunny out of here … We’re not brother and sister, we’re not bound by anything anymore! I’m taking you to a place where no one knows us for the rest of our lives and I’ll spend my life taking care of you and protecting you!”
I looked up at him.
There was a strange, determined gleam in his eyes.
I hesitated in that moment; after all, I didn’t feel that deeply for Rafael, and had agreed to be with him because I felt guilty for him, and because I was in the way of my relationship with Cameron.
But now, as Cameron said, we’re not brother and sister, there are no more bonds.
Maybe … Rafael’s favor, I can repay in another way?