Nelson was so angry that he no longer used his usual grandfatherly tone; instead his language was
peppered with all kinds of swear words that no one expected he actually knew as he continued to beat
his grandson. It seemed like he had gained herculean strength and despite having been at it for a while
now, he was showing no signs of fatigue or stopping anytime soon. At the sound of each crutch falling
on Jonas's body, Melinda felt a bust of pain as if she was the one receiving a beating.
She wanted to stop Nelson, but couldn't come up with a viable strategy since his beatings were very
arbitrary so there was no way she could step in without getting hurt.
Yulia's face was a clear reflection of Melinda's pain because she was also pale with fright. In the end, it
was Queena who mastered up enough courage to stop Nelson.
Otherwise, Melinda had no doubt that Nelson would have sent Jonas to the hospital with the excessive
beating if his mother had not come to his rescue.
Despite having stopped hitting Jonas, Nelson was still angry and he was gasping for air like a bull
ready to attack its opponent. He threw a disgusted look at Jonas who was looking contrite and
embarrassed, and then looked away in disappointment.
'What have I done to deserve such a scoundrel for a grandson?'
He was too ashamed to see Leonard in the future.
Melinda took the medicine from Gavin and gave some to Nelson. After a few minutes of taking the
medicine, Nelson calmed down significantly and went back to breathing normally. Queena hurriedly
went to find an ointment for pain relief and open wounds and applied some of the medicine all over
Jonas's body.
Everyone's temper in the family was all over the place. Melinda rubbed her temples as she felt a distant
persistent throbbing headache. As soon as Jonas's wounds were treated, he left the mansion despite
Queena's loud protests and drove off.
Jonas drove around for a while without a specific destination in mind and finally decided to park his car
outside a bar near his former university.
The bar had changed a lot compared to when he had last visited. Jonas took a seat at the counter
since he didn't feel like interacting with the other revelers. The bartender that he knew had left a long
time ago and was replaced by a young university student doing part-time work.
Jonas checked the menu and ordered two kinds of random wine and drank them within a short while,
he didn't really care what he was ingesting as long as it was alcohol. One glass after another he
downed the throat burning drinks before slowing down after a while. He recalled that he had decided to
reduce his alcohol intake for Melinda's sake some time back. He felt ridiculous.
Yes, ridiculous was the right word. Their relationship had always been ridiculous from the beginning to
the end. It was always like a roller coaster ride—one time they were okay but the next they were not.
"Why are you here getting drunk again?"
Jonas was so engrossed in drowning his sorrows that he didn't realize someone was talking to him. He
continued drinking, until the man took one of the glasses full of alcohol that he had subconsciously
lined up on the counter.
"Oh great! It's you again. What do you want?"
Jonas spat as he downed another glass of potent wine. The man clicked his tongue and said
something to the bartender. Then he put his hand on Jonas's shoulder and nudged him to move before
guiding him upstairs to the private room he had just booked.
"You seem to be in a bad mood?" Compared to the open space downstairs, the private rooms on the
second floor were relatively quiet and more private, hidden from the prying eyes of curious bystanders.
Although it was daytime, the place was still packed with enthusiastic university students trying to have
a good time.
"Yes I am. How about you, what's your excuse for being here? Why are you always here?"
There was no wine on the table, so Jonas lit a cigarette to keep his hands and mind busy. The ball of
smoke particles covered his face reflecting his dark and depressed mood. From his words it could be
deduced that he was unhappy.
"I'm a shareholder of this place so I have to keep a regular eye on my business," the man answered.
Jonas smiled. It was no wonder that he had met the man twice at the same venue.
"Tell me. What's bothering you this time? Let me guess. It must be something about love. So what
happened? Did you quarrel with your wife again?"
the man teased him mercilessly, deriving immense enjoyment from Jonas's discomfort. While they were
still talking, the door to the private room was pushed open. The bartender pushed the cart full of wine
towards where the two were sitting and also set up two sets of dice. The two gentlemen walked
towards the cart and picked the dice without calling out any specific number.
Since there was someone accompanying him, although Jonas had promised himself that he wouldn't
drink too much, with his friend keeping him company, he drank a lot. After a while his tongue became
loose and he started talking, telling his friend everything that had happened.
When he narrated how Melinda decided to give him the divorce papers, his demeanor became even
more gloomy like death.
"That's a complicated situation. There is nothing much I can say to make you feel better."
The man frowned in deep thought while rolling his dice although not concentrating much on what he
was doing. He had ordered a few light drinks and was about to take one of them. But Jonas didn't even
pay attention to what was happening around him, and he simply picked the beer that was in front of him
and blew on the foam ready to down it in one gulp.
"Well, I can't let you do that," the man stated. Jonas was obviously upset and prepared to get more
drinks in order to drown his sorrows.
"I think your wife must be totally disappointed in you for her to act the way she did. You'd better give up
now, so that everyone can move on with their lives and may be this action will leave a soft spot for you
in her heart."
The man drank a glass of wine while trying to keep his friend company and expressed his opinion after
he took another sip of his drink. Listening to his suggestion, Jonas glanced at him sharply.
Jonas blamed himself and thought that he was the one responsible for the broken relationship between
him and Melinda, and he was the one that had torn them apart. His sins were unforgivable.
"Don't look at me like that. It's creepy. I'm just telling the truth as it is." The man looked at him in an
exaggerated way. Then he flipped a cigarette towards Jonas and directed the lighter towards him,
lighting their cigarettes together at a go.
He looked like a playboy and a master of love.
"I can't do it."
Jonas took a big drag of his cigarette. He used the tobacco smell to numb himself. Once he was
convinced that he was right, it would be difficult to convince him otherwise and besides he was a
sucker for self-punishment.
Especially when it came to Melinda, he couldn't follow the false advice that everyone seemed so eager
to dish out. As long as he loved a woman, he wouldn't give up and would always keep her by his side.
The man looked at Jonas and shook his head. "If that's the case, you will lose both sides and both of
you will get hurt."
"So what?"
Jonas said arrogantly as it was common for him when he was challenged. Hearing Jonas's tone, the
man realized that Jonas had already made up his mind and was clear about what he needed to do, so
he just raised his glass and said, "Well, let's stop talking nonsense. Let's drink."
He was prepared to drink with Jonas, but he soon realized he could not keep up. Bottles of strong
drinks littered the table one after the other, but Jonas consumed most of it, the engrossing dice game
forgotten at that moment.
Jonas had a high tolerance for alcohol, which at that moment was not working to his advantage. It was
a painful affair because he had to drink so much to reach a point where he could drown his sorrows in
the drink, almost setting his liver in flames in the processes.
When his friend saw that Jonas almost drank everything on the table, he guessed that if Jonas
continued drinking anymore, he would get alcohol poisoning. So his friend decided to take the wine
away.
"That's it. You have had enough."
The man then motioned for a bartender to clear their table and bill. Once he had cleared the bill, he
tried to walk Jonas home, but he was too drunk to even hold his own weight. So the man and the
bartender carried Jonas to the hotel next door. Jonas had been drinking and not sleeping well, so as
soon as he hit the bed, he was gone to dreamland within the blink of an eye.
Then he slept the whole day.
Back at the Gu's mansion, Queena was also implicated in Jonas's crimes because Jonas was her son
and so Nelson was not happy with both of them. Queena felt unfairly aggrieved but when she thought
of how distraught Melinda also was, she felt a bit relieved.
"My silly girl, why didn't you tell us? You shouldn't bottle everything in."
Queena patted Melinda's hair gingerly, but because of Emily's involvement in the matter, she felt a bit
strange and uncomfortable.
"There is no need for me to say anything."
Melinda only talked out of respect for Nelson and because Nelson had asked her to say something, or
Melinda didn't know how to broach the subject and would have just kept it to herself. She was tired
because there had been several fights between her and Jonas over Emily's involvement in their
relationship.
She was annoyed, more than the others because this was something she had to go through day in, day
out.
"I know that it's Jonas's fault, but Mellie, I hope you can trust him. He would never do such a thing."
Queena felt that Jonas was in love with Melinda and she believed in her son. She still had a niggling
feeling that there was something sinister behind this whole fiasco.
It was useless for her to believe anything without tangible facts and besides she needed Melinda to
trust Jonas.
"Mom, I have trusted him so many times, yet the outcome is always the same." said Melinda lightly.
Although her tone was light, her miserable facial expression made everyone feel sorry for her and
embarrassed to be associated with Jonas. Queena sighed, feeling helpless. Her son's ignorance was
the reason why he was constantly linked with Emily.
Now his problems would be considered Karma paying him back. He was reaping the seeds he had
sowed.
"Anyway, you are Jonas's legitimate wife, and the only one officially recognized by the Gu family. Who
does Emily think she is? You don't need to back down from protecting your marriage."
Queena comforted Melinda again and again trying to convince her not to give up on Jonas. She wanted
Melinda to fight for her marriage with Jonas so she took a different direction instead of trying to protect
Jonas. She was also angry with Emily and couldn't understand why she was being such a pest.
The woman was really good at making trouble. She was certain that this matter must have something
to do with Emily, and it seemed that Yulia also had something to do with it. Queena was sure that there
was a link between Yulia and Emily.
As soon as she thought of the two women, she glanced at Yulia, who was twitching on her seat while
wringing her hands together. She couldn't look anyone in the eye and kept looking everywhere else
with guilt except at Queena or Nelson.
Queena comforted Melinda for a long while, and finally managed to persuade her to temporarily put
aside the idea of divorce.
"You have put up with him and his bad behavior for so many years, but now that he actually loves you,
now you want to give up? Have you ever thought of who is going to gain the most if you divorce Jonas?
May be this is a trap set up by Emily just waiting for you to take the bait."
Queena spoke while trying to persuade Melinda, but unbeknown to her, she had actually summarized
the crux of the matter. Melinda may be disappointed in Jonas, but she wasn't ready to let Emily get her
way.
It was already dark when Jonas finally woke up in the hotel. He had slept for twenty four hours straight,
and although he had finally paid his sleep debt, he still had a throbbing headache and his throat was
dry as if he had been walking through a desert for twenty four hours without water.
He felt better after drinking the ice water that had been thoughtfully placed beside his bed, but the
throbbing headache didn't seem to be going away anytime soon, despite taking some Tylenol for it.
The clock indicated that it was ten o'clock in the night. This was way past the time he was normally
back home, but when he thought of the situation that he had left at home, he didn't feel any inclination
to go back.
He didn't want to face anyone in the house.
At the thought of this, he subconsciously drove to Soaring Group. At ten o'clock, except for those who
were working overtime or taking the night shift like the security guards, the company was pretty quiet.
Jonas went directly to the CEO office through the special access elevator. The usually boisterous office
was now empty. He walked into his office without putting on any lights, he simply used the light from his
mobile phone.
He found that there still were a lot of documents which needed his attention and signature, and William
had piled them up on his desk. Jonas turned on the light in the office and felt very fresh and energized.
He tackled the heap systematically all night.
The next morning, William was the first to arrive at the CEO office as usual. When he heard the steady
click of the keyboard in the office, he was shocked. He opened the door and found that it was his boss,
who was carefully working.
The documents he had set for him on his desk yesterday were now worked and had been put aside on
the desk in order.
Having worked on so many documents, William wondered how early the boss had come to the
company?!
William made a guess based on the amount of work that had been done, but after a few days, he finally
realized that his boss was simply working and had not left to go home even for a few hours.
Jonas's evasive behavior completely eroded Melinda's trust in him and she didn't even bother to
communicate with him anymore. His evasive behavior made him look even more guilty instead of
vindicating him.
Queena didn't know how to persuade Jonas to come home and sort out his issues. She had made a lot
of phone calls to him, but Jonas didn't answer any of them. It was William who always answered giving
some lame excuses.
The excuses were limited to either Jonas in a meeting, or in an inspection. All in all, Jonas was a very
busy CEO.
Everyone knew that being busy was just a facade he had created to avoid dealing with his problems.
Jonas was operating like a zombie for days in a row operating only on auto-pilot. He finally decided to
go home, but his attitude had changed a lot. Before going home, he drank a lot, as if to embolden
himself.
As soon as Melinda entered her bedroom, she smelled a strong alcohol stench, and then she was
imprisoned from behind. She struggled although she could smell a familiar scent.
It was Jonas!
Sniffing greedily from Melinda's body, Jonas put his lips on her tempting collarbone.
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