Chapter 4

I swallowed it down. I was in a hurry to see Lester, so in the end I only said, flatly,

"Let's divorce first."

"Once the child is born and registered, we can talk about remarrying."

Benedict froze, and somehow the look in his eyes went even softer.

"Eudora, I knew you were still thinking of me."

I didn't answer him. I turned and walked out.

When I met Lester, the first thing he said was,

"The falsified accounts, the embezzlement—it wasn't me framing Benedict. Benedict is the one who told me to do all of it."

I went completely still.

Lester pushed the ledgers across the table to me.

For years, Benedict had been keeping Angela on the company's books.

Tuition, luxury cars, designer goods, even the houses for her parents and her brother—all of it paid out of company funds.

Lester gave a cold laugh. "When I realized something was wrong, I wanted to tell you."

"Benedict threatened me with my family. My mother was waiting for surgery, and he withheld my bonus and my time off."

"By the time I got back, she'd missed the window for treatment. She'll be bedridden for the rest of her life."

"So I pretended to go along with it, and quietly kept every piece of evidence."

"I want to make Benedict pay."

I looked at those receipts, one after another, and I won't pretend it didn't shake me, didn't hurt.

Everyone says Benedict built the company from nothing, but there were more than ten years of my own work in it too!

He'd taken what I'd poured myself into and used it to keep his young mistress.

And still I couldn't stand to watch the company I'd built collapse in a single night.

Even less could I stand to watch this junior colleague I'd trained with my own hands fall into the abyss.

"These accounts all passed through your hands. If they really dig into it, you won't get out either."

"I've already drained every bit of Benedict's usable capital. The moment I break the story of his affair, the stock takes the hit, he can't cover the gap, and the board throws him out anyway. That's your revenge too, isn't it?"

Lester fell silent, his eyes going faintly wet.

"I don't want this either... but if I really go inside, there'll be no one to take care of my mother."

The door to the private room was suddenly shoved open.

Angela burst in holding up her phone, a whole crowd livestreaming behind her.

"Everyone, look! The Delgado boss's wife, meeting a man in secret behind her husband's back!"

The camera swung straight onto me and Lester.

Angela saw the ledgers on the table, and her eyes lit up.

"He's the Delgado CFO?"

"So while you're sneaking around with the CFO behind Ben's back, don't tell me the two of you have been hollowing out the company this whole time?"

She shouted excitedly at the livestream,

"Guys, help me report her!"

My expression changed.

"Angela, turn that phone off!"

I reached out to grab the phone.

Angela used the motion to stumble backward, dropping to the floor, clutching her stomach and bursting into tears.

"Sis, I won't tell Ben you cheated on him."

"Just don't hurt the baby..."

Benedict rushed in at that exact moment, and the instant he saw it he kicked me aside.

Angela's eyes went red at once. "Ben, I only think you deserve better."

"That boyfriend she had in college was Lester. My fans already dug it up."

"And when I was tidying the master bedroom, I even found her old prenatal test records."

"She was pregnant once, and she kept it from you the whole time."

"If that child had been yours, why wouldn't she have told you?"

Benedict's face went completely dark. "Eudora, is what Angela's saying true or not?"

But I couldn't get out a single word,

because a piercing pain tore through my lower belly, and a warm stream kept running down.

Lester saw it and hurried to help me out, but Benedict charged over and knocked him to the floor with one punch.

Shaking all over from the pain, I forced the words out through my teeth, "It hurts so much. Take me to the hospital."

But Benedict only snapped, furious, "I'd like to see who dares save this bastard child!"

He flung Lester off and made a phone call.

"Yes, it's me. No hospital in Los Angeles is to admit a patient named Clara James. That's right—pull her tubes now and throw her out!"

Facing the despair and hatred on Lester's face, Benedict gave a contemptuous, cold laugh.

"You want to take my woman? You're not good enough."

"One life—your mother's—should be enough to wake you up to reality."

Benedict looked at my ashen face and threw the divorce certificate at it.

"The divorce—I agree to it."

"You threw me over and chose him. Eudora, I'll make you regret it."

Suddenly the assistant rushed in, his face white as paper.

"Mr. Delgado!"

"The regulators just showed up at the company!"

"They say someone filed a signed complaint of financial fraud, with a complete set of evidence!"

Benedict's head snapped toward me and Lester.

"Was it you two who reported it?"

But Angela immediately held up her phone, fishing for credit.

"Ben, it was me!"

"I saw them with those contracts, being all shifty, and I couldn't tell what they were up to, so I got my livestream fans to help me report it!"