Chris Walker“What if Lisa finds out?” Mom asked. Her face looked panicked and worried.“Don’t worry. Just avoid her as much as possible. Besides, Mom lives in a separate building from us. The important thing for me is not Lisa but Alice. What if she finds out about her mother’s affair, or one of her friends finds out about Lisa’s affair and spreads it around the school? Alice will be heartbroken and devastated. She’s no longer a little girl; she’s a teenager trying to find her identity. That’s what I’m most afraid of.” Mom gripped my hand tightly and looked into my eyes with a look of fear unlike anything I had seen before.“You’re right. I didn’t think that far ahead. Then what should we do?”“I will divorce Lisa as soon as possible before the world finds out about her dark side. As a father, I must protect Alice at all costs.”“Please do it quickly. Take Alice abroad. We can send her to any school she likes, even the best school. We have many connections,” Mom begged.“I know. Calm
Chris Walker“Thank you. So, what are your plans?” I asked Sarah. With her forehead and eyebrows furrowed, her eyes staring at an empty spot on the back porch, I didn’t know what she was seeing or thinking. However, seeing her expression made me sad, even though we were both victims.She was silent for quite a while, sitting frozen, staring at an empty spot with a blank expression on her face.Mark and I also remained silent and waited for her to speak. A moment later, after she snapped out of her thoughts and reverie, she looked at us and said, “Maybe I’ll file for divorce and sell this house. Then, I’ll rent a small apartment and live happily on my own there without having to think about Greg and this house. This house has its memories, but it’s too big for one person to live in. And if I stay here even after divorcing Greg, it’s the same as letting myself drown in old memories. That’s just my initial plan.”“That’s a good plan. Besides, you don’t have children, so you don’t have an
Chris Walker“Can you explain the trick to us?” I asked. Sarah smiled proudly. Her eyes sparkled with pride, and I became even more convinced that she was a smart woman hiding behind her simple appearance.“The group leader offered the list of hotels at one point. He said that anyone who wanted the list could send him a private message. I did that and pretended to be a man. He didn’t give me the list right away; he wanted to verify my identity via video call. Finally, to ensure the mission’s success, I asked a coworker to pretend to be me. I explained my situation briefly to him. Luckily, I could give him the reason that I was still working and couldn’t do a video call. In the next hour, he could make a video call. But before agreeing to my excuse, he asked for a picture of me. Finally, I took a picture of my coworker,” she replied.Sarah’s story was getting more interesting.Sarah picked up the coffee cup in front of her and drank it all. Then she looked at us and said. “Wait a minut
Chris WalkerA moment later, the door opened, and a middle-aged woman with dark brown hair, short and slightly overweight, wearing a loose-fitting T-shirt, stood before us. The bags under her eyes were visible on her unmade-up face. To me, she looked like someone who had just woken up. And what was even crazier was that I could smell something unpleasant. I couldn’t tell if it was coming from her body or from inside the house.Ah, one more thing. The inside of the house wasn’t much different from the front yard. It was messy, though there was no scattered food, but things weren’t where they should be, like piles of clothes—clean or dirty—in the sofa's corner, books scattered on the table, dusty plastic flowers on the nightstand, and dirty shoes scattered on the floor.“Who are you? Have you had enough of looking inside my house?” she asked unfriendly. There was no smile on her face, and her voice sounded heavy.“Sorry, this is Chris Walker, President Director of the Walkers Company. A
Chris Walker“So, he is a jerk.”“Yes, sir. What’s your next move?” Mark asked curiously.“Follow Lisa for two more days. We’ll do the same thing as before. You pick me up, then we switch cars at your friend’s cafe. After that, we follow Lisa around all day.”“Okay, sir. Does Miss Alice know about this?” Mark’s voice sounded sad.I was sad and confused. Alice had grown into a teenage girl, and it must have been difficult for her to accept the reality that one day her father and mother would divorce. It’s not that I didn’t want to maintain a marriage that had lasted thirteen years, but as a man and a husband, I couldn’t tolerate infidelity. Lisa had become an idol for men who worshipped infidelity, and who knows how many men had slept with her. Just imagining it made me sick and angry.“Not yet.”“If she finds out one day, what will you do?”I took a deep breath and exhaled, thinking hard about what to say and do to my only daughter.I was afraid she would be devastated and feel differ
Jensen“Grandma, please don’t cry,” I pleaded as I hugged her. One of her hands wiped away her tears, while the other held me close. Her palm was warm, but trembling.Dad was still standing there, frozen, unable to speak. I thought he had changed in an instant, or at least that my grandmother’s words had touched his heart and opened his mind. No. Not at all.“I’m thinking about Jensen, and I only want the best for him. I don’t want him to go to the best school and then, because we’re getting divorced, he has to transfer to a school that isn’t as good. I just don’t want that to happen to Jensen,” he argued.It turned out that he hadn’t changed and couldn’t change.I thought he at least had some compassion for mom, but it turned out to be just a false hope. He didn’t think about mom at all, and Aunt Bella had completely replaced mom.How cruel you are, Dad. I won’t let anyone hurt my beloved mom.“You mean Hannah won’t be able to send her to this school? How narrow-minded of you. If she