Mr. CEO, You Look Strangely Familiar

The woman sitting next to Herman Hawthorne recognized her at a glance—his ex-wife.

After glancing at his expression, she took the initiative to say, ”You two are divorced. You should go your separate ways, shouldn’t you?”

Zoe Ellsworth’s entire demeanor was aggressive. ”Was I talking to you?”

The woman frowned, then whined coquettishly to the man beside her, ”Young Master Hawthorne, look at her.”

Herman Hawthorne placed a finger on the woman’s lips. ”Baby, don’t pay her any mind.”

”Heh...” Zoe Ellsworth downed the alcohol in her glass in one go, the burn stinging her throat.

”Don’t pay me any mind? Herman Hawthorne, who was it that shamelessly insisted on sleeping with me just a few days ago?”

”AHEM, AHEM, AHEM...” Herman Hawthorne choked too. A hint of a smile appeared in his eyes. ’I can’t believe she actually dared to say that out loud...’

”You shameless bitch! Young Master Hawthorne doesn’t even want to look at you, you... AHHH!!!”

Before she could finish, Zoe Ellsworth’s high-heeled shoe smashed directly into her face. The impact of the heel broke the skin, and blood began to flow.

She narrowed her eyes at the woman beside Herman Hawthorne. ”Who’s the shameless one here, you or me? Let me show you something. Even he doesn’t dare to bully me like this. You think you can?”

”Young Master Hawthorne! *Sob, sob*, look at my face...”

Herman Hawthorne took out his wallet, pulled out a stack of bills, and handed it to her. ”Get out!”

The woman was stunned. ”Young Master Hawthorne... I... You...”

He waved the money in his hand. ”Want it or not?”

She hastily took it. ”I do.”

Then, clutching the money, she quickly left.

It seemed as if everything around them had gone quiet.

He and she stared at each other, Zoe Ellsworth’s gaze somewhat hazy.

”Herman, you’re getting on in years. You should stop playing these games for young people, okay? You really need to remember that.”

”I’m the same age as your brother, yet you always treat me like an old man.”

”That’s how I’ll always see you. Ugh, why didn’t I just smash that woman you hired to death? Her acting was so shoddy, it was pathetic...”

”I didn’t ask her to act. Though, in reality, I was the only one acting...”

She scoffed. ”That piece of trash was fake enough without acting. If she actually tried to act, it’d be so cringey it would make her ancestors crawl out of their graves.”

He watched her in silence.

Zoe Ellsworth leaned back on the sofa and said weakly, ”I’m so sleepy. I’m going to take a nap.”

He stood up, pulled her to her feet, and led her out of the club.

He put her in the car and reclined the seat. ”Go ahead and sleep. I’ll watch over you.”

”Mmm... You... No funny business...”

”What about with my mouth...”

”Not that either...”

He smiled, pulled out a cigarette and lit it, taking a long drag. He then noticed that she had already fallen asleep.

Looking at her face, his mind unexpectedly drifted back to when she was a child.

’She used to follow me around like a little shadow. You could say I watched her grow up.’

’I never thought that one day I would marry her, divorce her, and then try everything I could to get back together with her.’

’This version of her had completely seeped into my life, and I found myself unable to pull away, becoming more and more intoxicated by her.’

He leaned over gently and kissed her on the cheek before quickly pulling away, as if he had just stolen a bite of an immortal fruit.

「The Grant Residence.」

Mrs. Grant sat in the living room, gloomy and incredibly anxious. ”When will Catherine be able to come out? I wonder how the poor child has been these past few days.”

Mr. Grant put down his newspaper. ”Just stay out of it. Nothing good comes from meddling.”

”Do you have a conscience? How am I meddling? Isn’t this just because of all the guilt I’ve felt for so many years?”

”It’s been so many years. Why haven’t we been able to contact them?”

Mrs. Grant mused, ”I don’t know.”

Just as she finished speaking, the landline began to ring.

Mrs. Grant got up to answer it.

”Hello? Who is this?”

”...”

”You got in touch with them? Really?”

”...”

Mrs. Grant immediately asked, ”Give me the phone number. I’ll call them. Okay, go ahead, I’ll write it down.”

”...”

When she hung up the phone, Mrs. Grant was overjoyed. ”Quentin’s dad, I got in touch with them!”

Mr. Grant was a bit incredulous. ”How is it that we couldn’t reach them for years, but suddenly we can now?”

”Listen to you. The time was just right, what else could it be?”

”I think it’s strange. It’s as if someone was secretly blocking us before, and now the path has suddenly cleared.”

Mrs. Grant waved it off. ”You’re overthinking things. I’m going to call them right now.”

As she spoke, she dialed the number the detective had given her.

The call connected quickly.

A middle-aged woman’s voice came from the other end. ”Hello?”

Mrs. Grant couldn’t contain her excitement. ”Are you Faye Sinclair?” she asked.

The person on the other end paused for a moment, then quickly replied, ”Yes, I am. And you are?”

”I’m... Quentin’s Mom...”

”Oh, it’s you.” The other party’s tone was somewhat flat. ”What is it?”

”I wanted to tell you... the child you lost twenty-five years ago has been found. She’s been with our family all these years, and we’ve taken good care of her...”

An equally excited voice came from the other end. ”Is that true?”

”Yes, yes.”

After hearing Mrs. Grant’s affirmation, the voice on the other end quickly said, ”I’ll head over tomorrow.”

”Okay.”

After hanging up, Mrs. Grant said urgently, ”Tell Quentin to let Catherine out immediately.”

Considering that her biological parents were coming, Mr. Grant didn’t object. ”Just be nice when you talk to Quentin and Nora. Don’t be so harsh.”

Mrs. Grant hurried out the door, saying as she went, ”I know.”

On the other end of the line, the woman claiming to be Faye Sinclair, the mother who had lost her daughter twenty-five years ago, was not smiling at all.

She sat at her vanity, staring at the large framed photo on her bedside table. Her eyes seemed to want to bore a hole through the beautiful, flower-like smile of the woman in the wedding dress.

The woman who looked exactly like her.

Her identical sister, Faye Sinclair.

And she herself was the younger sister, Claire Sinclair.

She stood up and moved a picture hanging on the wall. Behind it, a locked box with a keypad appeared. She entered a string of numbers, and the box clicked open. Inside, she took out a photograph: a picture of a woman holding a small baby.

’This was her and her own daughter.’

After taking it out, she closed the box again.

Looking at the wedding photo again, she muttered to herself, ”Sister, you never would have guessed, would you? You stole my man, so my daughter and I stole your place and your daughter’s place. A fair trade, don’t you think? I’m going to make you feel this pain—a pain worse than death. And you... you are fated to never see your biological daughter again in this lifetime.”

***