“Not necessarily, as it involves their reputation.” Lupine raised her gaze at Charlotte. “Ms. Lindberg, is Mr. Nacht doing this to bring you to your knees?”
“He really is something.” Charlotte gritted her teeth in exasperation.
Given the current situation, she was left with two choices. She either had to lower herself and marry Louis knowing his family would always hold the matter against her, or she could go back to Zachary. In the former, she would constantly be ridiculed and wouldn’t be able to see her children for the rest of her life.
She couldn’t understand why Zachary was doing all this when he insisted she had slept with Louis and hated her guts for it. Furthermore, he even had a woman by his side. Hence, she wondered if it was all just for the sake of revenge.
“She’s calling again,” Lupine reminded softly.
Setting her thoughts aside, Charlotte stared at her phone. Just a while ago, the call automatically cut off after ringing for a long time. But now that Sherlyn had called again, Charlotte knew she had no choice but to accept the call.
Charlotte answered, “Hello?”
“Charlotte, where are you?”
From Sherlyn’s tone, Charlotte could tell how the woman was desperately suppressing her anger. Evidently, the former was extremely emotional and couldn’t wait to question Charlotte about what happened.
“What is it?” Charlotte was a sea of calm.
“What’s wrong with you? Louis has been beaten unconscious, and you’re asking me what it is?”
Sherlyn blew her lid immediately. “Charlotte, the only reason I’m still speaking nicely to you is on the account of your brother. Therefore, you had better come home right now and explain to me what happened!”
“I’m sure you already have a rough idea,” Charlotte plainly replied. “Anyway, there’s something I need to do now, so I can’t go over. We’ll talk again once I’m done-”
“Charlotte!” Sherlyn was unable to hold back her rage any longer. She bellowed, “You are about to marry Louis, and yet, you are still involved with your ex-husband. In fact, you even threw yourself at him in the hotel and slept with him. Don’t you have any shame at all?”
Knitting her eyebrows, Charlotte didn’t respond.
“Furthermore, not only did you not protect Louis at the crucial moment, you even bullied him together with Zachary by knocking him out. You devious woman! I’m not letting you off easy…”
Sherlyn berated Charlotte, “I’ll give you one hour to come home and explain yourself. Or else, be prepared to suffer the consequences!”
Sherlyn ended the call the moment she finished.
Holding her phone, Charlotte frowned as she looked out the window with a heavy heart.
What had begun as a simple matter had escalated beyond her control. And now, she was left to clean up the entire mess.
Wait a minute.
A thought suddenly popped into Charlotte’s mind. Considering how careful Zachary has always been, how did he let Mr. Murphy leak his movements? Could it be that he did it on purpose? He got Mr. Murphy to reveal his itinerary to Louis so that I would be tempted to go and see him. After that, he arranged for the chaotic situation to happen so that he could use it to force me into canceling the wedding.
“By the way, when Jade and I were at the villa, it was silent everywhere. I didn’t see the children nor anything that belonged to the kids. It felt really strange.”
Morgan suddenly felt suspicious and informed Charlotte, “Ms. Lindberg, I believe the kids were never at the villa.”
“Could it be…” Lupine mumbled, realizing something, “that this is all part of Mr. Nacht’s scheme?”
“It’s entirely possible!” Morgan saw through the ruse. “They must have set this trap a long time ago and were waiting for us to fall into it. Marino wasn’t surprised to see me at all. Come to think of it now, they must have planned everything.”
“Zachary!” Charlotte seethed. “How can you!”
“Seems like we have underestimated Mr. Nacht.” Upon realizing it, Lupine felt a shiver down her spine. “It’s obvious that he has never gotten serious with us. If we had truly gotten into a conflict, we wouldn’t have stood a chance at all.”
