Without wasting another second, Dahlia's mother turned around and walked straight into her room with the kind of purpose that comes from someone who has finally decided to take action. Her footsteps were quick and determined as she made her way to her wooden wardrobe where she kept her handbag tucked away behind some folded clothes.She pulled out the small black leather bag and began searching through it with fingers that moved like someone looking for buried treasure. Papers, old receipts, some loose change, and then finally, her fingers touched the smooth surface of what she was looking for.“Aha!” she whispered to herself as she pulled out the crisp white business card that Madame Veronica had given to them during their first meeting.She walked back outside to where Rebecca was still sitting, holding the card up between her fingers like it was made of pure gold.“You see,” she said, her voice filled with satisfaction as she waved the card in the air, “thank goodness I still have

At that moment, upon hearing what Madame Veronica just said and knowing fully well that this woman was clearly the type of person who could smell deception from a thousand miles away, someone who gets easily irritated when people try to play games with her intelligence, Dahlia's mother realized that she didn't have any other choice left but to tell her the complete truth.She could see Rebecca from the corner of her eye, frantically blinking at her and shaking her head slightly, using every signal she could think of to tell her mother that she shouldn't admit anything, that she shouldn't agree to what Madame Veronica was saying, that there had to be another way around this without confessing the real situation.But Dahlia's mother knew better than Rebecca did about how dangerous it could be to continue lying to someone like Madame Veronica, someone who clearly had the power to either help them completely or destroy them without thinking twice about it.She understood that if she conti

Immediately upon hearing Madam Veronica's direct question about whether she had been cooperating fully with their previous discussion, that was when Dahlia's mother quickly nodded her head with obvious eagerness, saying with a voice that tried to sound completely compliant, “No problem at all, absolutely no problem whatsoever. I am completely willing to give you any information that you want from me, whatever details you need to make this arrangement work perfectly.”At that moment, Madam Veronica's voice came through the phone with a slight edge of impatience as she then said, “But you still have not properly answered my earlier question, the one I asked you before we got sidetracked by other matters.” Her tone became more pointed as she continued, “I specifically asked you whether you have told Dahlia about my interest in her, about my son's desire to meet her and potentially pursue a relationship. This is one of the most important questions that I asked you earlier in our conversa

Immediately, Jefferson's father nodded his head up and down slowly as his eyes scanned through the papers in his hands, reading every single detail that had been gathered about this mysterious woman who had suddenly appeared in their investigation.“Yes, yes, her name is Melissa,”he said out loud, his finger tracing along the lines of text as he spoke. “And from what I can see here, everything about her is written down in these documents, all of the information we could possibly need is right here in front of us.”He looked up from the papers with a thoughtful expression on his face, his mind clearly working through something that troubled him deeply.“So this is the lady that Jefferson saw with that good-for-nothing Raymond the other day at the restaurant.”At that moment, without wasting another second thinking about it, Jefferson's grandfather nodded his head again, this time more firmly, like someone who had just decided that action needed to be taken immediately.“Well, I strongl

At that moment, upon hearing the harsh words that his father had just delivered like daggers straight to his heart, and seeing the cold, determined look written clearly across his father's weathered face, Jefferson's father knew deep down in his soul that one way or another, he absolutely needed to make serious amends for what had just happened in this room.He could feel the weight of years of disappointment and frustration that his father had been carrying about him, all the times he had failed to live up to the old man's expectations, all the moments when he had shown hesitation instead of the ruthless decisiveness that his father valued above everything else.This wasn't just about the Malisa situation anymore; this was about his entire future, his place in the family hierarchy, his right to call himself a worthy son of such a powerful and feared man.He knew that his father had never been completely pleased with him over the years, had always seen him as somewhat soft compared to