MasukCassandraSeeing her, I was truly shocked. Then the woman pulled Nia’s hair even harder, forcing her backward until she lost her balance and fell.“OUCH!”“Who are you?!”I looked at Nia, who was stunned by the woman who had helped me. It wasn’t only Nia who was shocked, I was too.Nia knew that my relationship with Julie had never been good. There was even a time when Nia saw Julie scolding me relentlessly. At that time, I couldn’t protect myself at all and could only accept everything she said.Remembering it still felt painful and humiliating. I had done nothing wrong, yet I allowed myself to be blamed by others. But I could blame my past self—loving a man too much really could make a woman foolish.“She already told you to get out of here!”She defended me. It was incredibly surprising.“…Mrs. Monclaire, I didn’t expect to see you here,” Nia said as she tried to stand up. “Ma’am, it’s because this woman trapped Sebas—”“Enough!”Nia’s eyes trembled, perhaps filled with disbelief,
Cassandra“Are you really going to sell your house?”A few days later, Erica contacted me. I knew she was dealing with something very important. As a single mother, there must be many things she has to take care of.Even so, I didn’t expect her to ask about this after several days.The question about selling the house made me look outside, at this quiet and beautiful place. I was lucky to have it.I shook my head with a faint smile. “No. I’ve only just moved in, Erica.”I took a breath before continuing. “I don’t like their arguments. They’re too noisy.”I’m not sure whether she heard my small click of the tongue or not, but I didn’t regret saying it. That day, all I wanted was peace. And in reality, that day truly was peaceful.An image of Sebastian joining me for dinner surfaced in my mind. Don’t misunderstand, I mean that the pleasant things that happened had nothing to do with him at all.If he didn’t cause trouble, then I felt much calmer.“Yeah… you’re right. I also didn’t know
CassandraMy head felt unbearably hot listening to their argument again.Sitting between them always put me on edge, afraid they would start another unpleasant fight. And as I was enjoying my coffee, the argument surfaced once more.For heaven’s sake, in this relaxed moment, I didn’t want to hear any arguing at all. That was why I decided to go home right after—to finally get some rest, but Sebastian followed me.“Sandra, are you going to move?”I knew he intended to keep following me. After briefly meeting his gaze, I ignored him again.I like this house. I really like the neighborhood, and my life is much more stable now. Miles has friends and goes to school here. With all of that considered, moving would be a difficult decision.In truth, I only said that to pressure them into keeping quiet and not making a scene around us.After making sure Miles went inside the house, I quickly turned to him, spreading my arms to stop him from entering. I didn’t want to deny myself the chance to
SebastianAnd so, I immediately walked toward them with an uneasy feeling. That man always seemed to be trying to interfere with my time, an intruder who followed Cassandra wherever she went.They noticed my arrival. Still trying to ignore that man, I didn’t want to start a fight that Cassandra wouldn’t like.“Why did you come here? Do you want to go ice skating too?” Cassandra asked, trying to avoid making eye contact with me.At that moment, I wanted to talk about Nakka first, but seeing the situation—and that man trying to steal the opportunity, I quickly changed my answer.“Ah, yeah.”“Why did you bring Nakka, Uncle?”More than anything, when that question came from Miles, I was shocked and left speechless for a few seconds.I didn’t want the man trying to steal a head start to smile, thinking I was embarrassing myself and losing to him.Regaining control of myself, I answered his question right away. “Nakka was outside. I was walking around looking for you.”More than anything, I
SebastianI had already spent my time working since last night, even though earlier I had enjoyed a wonderful Christmas Eve with Cassandra and Miles, taking photos together, photos I kept staring at over and over.Before the day even changed, Alden called me with a voice full of chaos. Those business people really were bastards. They tried to mess everything up on a pleasant Christmas day.My anger was overwhelming, I wanted to go there myself and tear their mouths apart. There were traitors within my family’s business.I was certain that some of them were still hiding, and no matter what, I would find them and give them a very severe punishment. Not only that, they deserved to be hurt again and again.Dragging me into trouble and keeping me from enjoying this time, absolute scum.The burden I carried on this peaceful day wasn’t over yet. Grandpa called me, so I didn’t have time to go home and ended up having breakfast with him and Mother instead.“Merry Christmas, Sebastian,” her voi
CassandraI couldn’t help the heavy feeling weighing on my heart slowly fading away. A nice day like Christmas made me feel more at ease, and being near Miles, listening to him talk with Dylan, made me even more relaxed.He had just finished a case there, and I knew he had taken on many cases. All I hoped was that he was doing well.When the phone call ended, Miles got up from the sofa, stretching his body.“Mom, let’s go.”I knew that after talking with Dylan, he had become more excited to do other activities. Today he promised to meet Tucker, they wanted to play at Lake Asborn, which wasn’t far from here.We only needed to walk for about ten minutes to get there. Before we opened the door, the bell rang, startling me. Maybe they had actually come here to pick us up.As I opened the door, a large man in a black fur-lined coat stood there, holding a big gift box.“Sandra Astor?”I nodded.As the man handed me a slip of paper as proof of delivery, I realized someone had sent me a packa







