Armand had been dispirited and dejected for some time due to Phoebe Lewis. He could not recover
from his break-up with her for quite a long while. Mrs. Leslie did not like women that would make her
grandson sad and sorrowful. In order to avoid things change when Armand saw Phoebe when he
returned, she decided to make them get married there before they returned.
Boyce’s expression changed at once. Now he finally understood why Mrs. Leslie was so stubborn in
inquiring about Armand’s whereabouts, and would come all the way here amidst such a blizzard. It
turned out Phoebe had returned and she was afraid that her grandson would be nice to her again.
Afraid that Boyce would inform Armand, Mrs. Leslie grasped his arm and threatened him, “Don’t tell
Armand, or I’ll be angry.”
Boyce had pondered whether to tell Armand at first, after all, the woman whom he once adored had
come back now. Yet he did not dare to say it now. If that old lady gets mad and does something, he
would be in huge trouble. Now he regretted having asked her that. He wished he did not know that
earlier. He would be guilty whether he said it or not.
“What are you guys chitchatting?” Armand came close to them. Boyce pushed him away. “Well, urm…
yeah, I’m thinking how much money should I give you as a wedding gift.” Boyce told a lie that he
considered flawless after muttering for a long while.
Armand did not notice any aberrancy of his grandma being that anxious to ask him to get married at all.
He only felt that his grandma was being a little bit more anxious and she had used to urge him to get
married sooner. “The more the merrier of course,” Armand said excitedly. He was certainly delighted to
get money. “Sure.” Boyce was not stingy and he said, “I’ll give you lots.”
“Since your best friends are all here, and I think this hotel looks good, let’s settle then, your wedding
would be held on the 18th.”
“Well, I…”
“It’s okay, it doesn’t matter whether it’s day or night.” Theresa wanted to say that she had not agreed to
it and they should not settle the marriage that soon, but Armand snatched her hand. Afraid that
Theresa would change her mind, Armand said, “Sure, 18th then, we could get the marriage certificate
later.” The wedding of Armand and Theresa was then settled.
After lunch, Mrs. Leslie dragged Boyce along to look for the person in charge of the hotel to discuss
about the venue for wedding. Dolores had been uneasy because of Matthew keeping a distance away
from her on purpose. She did not express any personal opinion regarding Armand and Theresa’s
marriage. Plus, since Armand had dragged Theresa away, she did not have time and chance to speak
to Theresa too.
“Mommy, I can see you’re having a bad mood.” Samuel held her hands and asked, “Did you have a
fight with him?” Matthew used to love clinging to Dolores. Yet not only he did not do so today, he did not
even sit with her when they were having meals.
Dolores caressed her son’s head. She had thoughts in mind, and she was reluctant to confess to her
son. Samuel was a very attentive child, if he had found out anything, he might begin to worry for her.
Yet it was obvious Matthew was behaving abnormally. Dolores then said, “It’s nothing, married couples
always have fight.”
“Is that so? Please reconcile as soon as possible then,” Samuel said with care. Dolores smiled and
agreed.
Samuel released her hand and went back to his own room when he reached his room. He was
addicted to video games recently and he would play games on his bed whenever he was free. Matthew
was with Simona and they were not in the room. Dolores went to look for them in another room but they
were still not there. The room was empty and no one was seen.
As she took out her phone and was going to call Matthew, someone tugged at her sleeve. She looked
down and saw Simona standing behind her with a smile. She put her phone back into her pocket,
squatted and hugged her. Upon looking up, she saw Matthew standing somewhere not far from her.
Her arms which were holding her daughter slightly tightened.
Simona caressed her face and asked, “Mommy, who are you going to call just now?” Dolores thought
for a while and said, “I wasn’t going to call someone, I was only taking my phone out to see the time.”
“Oh, where’s Samuel?” Simona blinked. “He’s in the room.”
“I want to play with him.” Simona skipped into the room to look for Samuel. She seemed to have found
him and her excited voice was heard afterwards. “Samuel!” Dolores stood to her feet and seeing each
other, they did not utter a word. Dolores only spoke after making considerations at length, “I…”
Matthew did not listen to her and he straightaway entered the room.
Dolores fell into silence. He carried his laptop and sat on the couch, dealing with the documents Abbott
sent him. All those documents were actually not urgent, he was just waiting for Dolores’ explanation. It
was not because of him lacking trust in her. He only enjoyed seeing her taking the initiative to talk and
explain to him. If she was willing to take the initiative to explain to him, that meant she cared about him.
“I received Charles White’s call when I went out with Theresa. He asked me to go out with him. Since
we’re friends, I agree. He told me about Lacey Ward’s stuff, and then Lacey’s brother came looking for
him. They had some arguments and the time was delayed. He wanted to treat me lunch, but I rejected.
My coat was stuck in the gap between the seats when we came back and he helped me to take it out.
And that’s what you saw.”
Matthew did not show any fluctuation in emotion and he seemed to not hear her. Yet he was actually
listening attentively to her. The reason he did not speak and pretended to be angry was to wait for
Dolores coaxing him. Not knowing whether it was because of his thought influencing his action, he had
actually typed “coax me” at the signature space.
Abbott was not able to respond at length when he saw that and he sent him a message with caution
and fear. “How?” Matthew was startled when he saw his message. He initially wanted to criticize him
for not being serious, yet when he noticed what he had done, he shuddered and quickly unsent the
message.
Seeing him looking kind of busy, Dolores no longer bothered him and she said, “I have my own
principle, I hope you could believe me. I’ll not bother you for now.” After finished, she turned around
and walked away. “…” That’s it? Isn’t she gonna explain to him? Shouldn’t she kiss him, hug him, make
him happy, ask him to believe her, ask him not to be mad and so on?
He still had not spoken anything, and he did not say he was not angry. How could she walk away like
that? He put down his laptop and dashed out, yet Dolores had already gone downstairs through the lift
and he missed her. Not knowing why, the lift next to it did not rise from downstairs after a long while
and it did not respond after he pressed the button several times. He hurriedly used the stairs and ran
downstairs. Yes, in order to catch up with Dolores, he ran without caring for his image. Dolores had
already asked the chauffeur to drive the car away and she left the hotel when he reached the bottom.
Theresa was going to get married and Dolores wanted to specially design a wedding gown for her.
Time was running out and she needed to purchase equipment and accessories to make the gown. She
had a whole piece of tea silk given by Kevin Forbis and coincidentally it was white. She wanted to
make that silk as the main fabric and used other laces to adorn it.
She heard that there was a commodity city from the hotel staff and the city had everything. She wanted
to have a look to see whether she could find the things she wanted. She already had a basic thought of
how the wedding gown is going to look like in her mind, what she lacked now was the material. One
could not make bricks without straw though.
The car stopped at the commodity city after a while and she got out of the car. The chauffeur also got
out and he followed her inside. A lot of cars were parked at the entrance and the huge parking lot was
packed with cars. The visitors all came to purchase goods and the passerby walking to and fro were
carrying lots of things.
The chauffeur sighed. “The place doesn’t look big, but there’re still a lot of people.” Dolores nodded.
She thought that if such a small place could attract that many visitors, there must be something special
about it. She sped up her walking. “Let’s go inside.”
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