Chapter 92 Tales of the Past
“Who is it?” Janice asked.
My grandmother. Rachel assumed that the whole picture would become clearer once she found out who her mother was, but things only seemed more complicated. Somehow, her mother was involved in the Hudson Family’s fight for their inheritance that happened all those years ago.
The sun was shining bright on top of her head when Rachel left the restaurant. She saw Hans jogging toward her from a distance away. “I’m sorry I’m late, Rachel. Are you and Janice done talking?”
Yeah. We’re done. Rachel wore a rather stiff look on her face.
“What is it? Why do you look so pale?” Hans asked.
It’s nothing. There are just some things that I need to clarify with my grandmother.
Hans held onto her arm. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Rachel gave him a nod, but it was clear that she wasn’t paying attention to his question.
“Hey, why don’t you let me send you back?” he offered.
I drove here.
“No. I’d be worried if you had to drive back now,” he replied. Rachel couldn’t reject his stubborn determination in the end. However, neither of them realized a moving figure that had been standing on the street just opposite the restaurant. There were a few cigarette butts lying right beside the man’s feet. “Hello? The person you told me to keep an eye on is going into a car with a man. Do you need me to continue following her? You’ll have to top up some cash for my car ride then,” the person said.
A woman’s voice came from the other end of the line. “Who did she go off with? Did you take any pictures?”
“How am I supposed to know? You didn’t tell me to take pictures,” he replied.
“Take them now.”
“I told you that she already got into the car with someone else. They’ve left.”
“Are you an idiot? I gave you a simple task, and this is what you managed to accomplish?” the woman cried.
The young man’s face darkened when he heard the woman shouting at him through the phone. “Are you scolding me right now? You watch out! I’m not going to entertain you anymore if you scold me again.” The young man ended the call right after finishing his words. He grumpily threw his cigarette butt onto the ground. “F*ck! What was that? How dare she shout at me!”
The young man turned to look at the car opposite the street. He studied the details for a while, even memorizing the car plate number.
…
Hans stopped his car in the alleyway and stayed there even after Rachel left. He glanced up to look at the light turning on in one of the units. Nancy was both surprised and glad to see Rachel showing up at her front door. “What brings you here today?” she asked.
I have a few questions for you, Grandma.
It was rare for Rachel to be so serious, and Nancy seemed rather taken aback by this. “What is it? Come in and have a seat before we talk.” There was a faint scent of lavender that lingered on the couch. No dilly-dallying was involved—Rachel got straight to her point once she sat down.
I’d like to ask you about my mother, Grandma.
The smile on Nancy’s face faded a little as she looked away to avoid Rachel’s gaze. “Why would you ask about your mother all of a sudden?”
Is she my mother? Rachel typed out Selena’s name and handed her phone over to her grandmother.
Nancy’s entire body jolted with shock when she first saw the name, and her expression changed within seconds. There was no more explanation needed. “How did you find out about this, Rachel? Did Jefferey tell you about this?”
No. I did some of my own research.
“Your research? What have you found so far?”
I’ve found quite a lot of things. I found out about my mother’s actual identity and her cause of death. Rachel told Nancy about everything that she saw at the Hudson Vineyard. Nancy was trembling with anger by the time she heard about what Jefferey had done in the darkroom. “Jefferey, that disgusting rat! He was already desperate for her when she was alive, and he’s still not letting go of her right now. He’s inhumane! He’s going to hell!”
What do you know about this, Grandma? What is the truth?
The anger remained on Nancy’s face, and she sighed and groaned a few more times before she spoke. “I never intended to tell you about this, Rachel. However, I guess I can’t hide it from you now that you’ve found out about this. I’m not actually your biological grandmother.” Rachel froze on her spot. She couldn’t believe Nancy’s words.
“Your birth mother is Miss Selena, whom Old Mr. Hudson adopted as his daughter all those years ago. When I was still with the Hudsons, Miss Selena helped me out a lot. That’s why I left along with her once she got into trouble and was chased out of the Hudsons,” Nancy explained. Rachel was starting to see how complicated things were back then.
Selena was an orphan adopted by Old Mr. Hudson, and she had grown up with two brothers—Jefferey and Lionel. Old Mr. Hudson was a kind and loving man, and he had always treated Selena as his own child. He sent her overseas for her studies and let her take over half of the pharmaceutical business after she returned to the country.
“After that, the Hudsons somehow provoked some other people, and they then found themselves being attacked. Lionel had been doing a lot to help, but he suffered a sudden death during then. All of the pharmacies were shut down for investigation after that, and Old Mr. Hudson’s health only deteriorated more every day. At the same time, the eldest son from Circa Pharmacy in Jacksonville showed up to propose to Selena,” Nancy continued.
Rachel froze. What happened after that?
Nancy shook her head. “I don’t know what Old Mr. Hudson was thinking. I recall how it was raining heavily that day. Miss Selena knelt outside the house for the whole night, but Old Mr. Hudson ordered the maids to pack her items before he kicked her out of the Hudson Family the next morning. The Hudsons no longer had a daughter after Selena was chased out, so Circa Pharmacy naturally couldn’t continue to ask for a marriage. After that, I left with Miss Selena, but we were kidnapped by some people and thrown into some sort of ferry.”
Was it someone from Circa Pharmacy who kidnapped you guys?
“No,” Nancy said with a stern expression. “You probably wouldn’t have guessed it if I don’t tell you now—it was Jefferey, that horrible, evil man. He made a deal with Circa Pharmacy just for the sake of inheriting the family business. He knew that Old Mr. Hudson had given all of the medicinal recipes to Miss Selena, which was why he chose to kidnap her.”
Rachel felt like her mind was spinning in circles. She was too confused by everything she had just heard. Technically, her mother and Jefferey were siblings based on their titles. Yet, Jefferey went against Selena for the sake of some medicinal recipes. But how could that explain Rachel’s existence? How was she brought into the world?
How did my mother give birth to me? Did Jefferey do something to her—
“Pfft. That b*stard doesn’t deserve a woman like her,” Nancy mumbled. “If Lionel hadn’t passed away so abruptly, the Hudsons had already planned to host a wedding. Miss Selena and Lionel had agreed to explain everything to Old Mr. Hudson once things were over, but they hadn’t expected a sudden accident to occur.”
Are you saying that my father is Lionel?
“That’s right. You are the only inheritor that descended from the eldest child of the family. Who does Jefferey think he is? He’s nothing more than a crazed psychopath and a b*stard who plots and schemes to benefit himself!” Nancy was tearing up as she got emotional. “After Miss Selena and I managed to escape from the boat, we stayed in my old house in the mountains. But a few years later, Jefferey managed to find us. There was a huge fire after that—the fire practically engulfed my whole village,” Nancy said.
Rachel had vague memories of such an incident. She couldn’t recall much from her past, but she often had a dream in which there was a large fire that wouldn’t end. She remembered how she couldn’t seem to run out of the fire no matter how much she tried. The dreams made sense to her now since it was actually what happened.
“Your guess was right, Rachel. Jefferey was the one who murdered your mother, and they thought that they could get all the details for the medicinal recipes after that. Unfortunately, there were no quantities or measurements in the recipes.”
Right then, Rachel jumped up in surprise once more. She thought about the prescription that Jefferey had shown her in the Hudson Vineyard. The tiny handwriting she saw then belonged to her mother.
