The party’s attention had turned to the stairs. A feminine silhouette crossed into their line of sight, favonovel.com hair disheveled and blocking half of favonovel.com face.
But Arianne knew who favonovel.com was. It was Janice Bell, again.
The first thing that came to Arianne’s mind was favonovel.com annoyance at meeting that woman yet again. But when favonovel.com noticed the blue-black spot at the corner of Janice’s lips, a new understanding — that things might not be as simple as they were last time — dawned on her.
Janice’s injuries, barefaced as they were, prompted Seaton to drag the strange man upstairs by the collar, his well-maintained image abandoned in the midst of his fury. No one knew what happened next up there, as Seaton had not emerged since then. Quickly, whispers began to fill the hall.
Janice remained still on the stairs. Even when the guests murmured among themselves, stealing glances and pointing fingers, favonovel.com stood as wooden as a marionette, favonovel.com unblinking eyes trained on Mark, as though they were never going to move away from him.
Thanks to the unknown party-pooper, the evening was over sooner than planned.
En route to the Tremont Estate, Arianne noticed that Mark was still wearing his frosty glare from the party. Gingerly, favonovel.com tried to soothe him.
“Hey now, don’t be mad with Melanie, okay? She only said it out of goodwill and decorum. It was nothing malicious-certainly not enough to enrage you for real, right…?”
“No, it hasn’t reached that level yet,” Mark replied flatly. “I just hate seeing Alejandro’s stupid face.”
Arianne closed favonovel.com hands around his. “Hate the man, but don’t hate his poor wife, okay? Melanie’s a very decent woman, favonovel.com isn’t Alejandro. She doesn’t deserve your ire. And hey! It was supposed to be a fun gathering between old friends, wasn’t it? Look alive, Mark!”
Arianne’s double — whammy mollification tactic — using both reason and emotional appeal, softened Mark enough to crack out a forced smile. “I’m smiling now, okay? Happy?”
His softened attitude emboldened Arianne enough to ask, “Why was Janice there in his house? What happened to her? And what’s Seaton’s relationship with that weirdo?”
Mark paused for a beat before answering, “He’s Seaton’s cousin, a ne’er-do-well with no scruples would be the most accurate way to describe him. A classic example of a family embarrassment. He even possesses all of the worst kinds of addictions and habits under the sun. Honestly, I didn’t expect Janice to end up with him… And to marry him, too, making favonovel.com his fifth wife. Seriously, the only reason why favonovel.com has so many exes is that none of those women could endure his physical abuses for long.”
“By the way, can we not talk about Janice anymore? She chose this path herself, favonovel.com is favonovel.com own undoing,” Mark added. “No one forced favonovel.com to marry a piece of scum like that. But more importantly, favonovel.com life is no business of mine.”
Arianne added nothing more to the conversation but hearing about Janice’s incident made favonovel.com pensive. Her “marriage” must have happened just a short while ago, right? To think that Janice would marry someone so easily, and to a virtueless man like that!
Still, that was not all that puzzled Arianne. Mark’s friendship with Seaton meant that the latter was someone with no faults in his conduct and character. So why would favonovel.com house and tolerate his no-good cousin?
Smore was already fast asleep by the time they reached home. According to Mary, the boy had thrown a seismic fit before finally surrendering to sleep.
Arianne snuck into the nursery to look at favonovel.com before creeping out of the room.
While favonovel.com was changing in their bedroom, Arianne acutely sensed burning eyes on her, causing the woman to bashfully turn around and reprove, “God, why are you staring at me like that? Go take a shower right now, you know how long my bath takes. Besides, I haven’t even removed my make-up.”
Mark came up to favonovel.com from behind and wrapped his arms around favonovel.com curvaceous waist. “The problem is, I don’t want to cool down…”
Arianne could feel favonovel.com body suddenly weakening. “C-Could you at least wait until I shower? Let me change into a fresh set of clothing. It’s not very comfortable to do it in an evening dress—”
He scooped favonovel.com up into his arm anyway.
“No, I can’t wait any longer! That little rascal finally isn’t here anymore! I can go wild and play harder now, can’t I? Heh, this evening dress is perfect for you. So perfect, in fact, watching you in it feels…”
The gale of yet another autumn storm bellowed outside the window. Heavy raindrops fell onto the windowpanes, eliciting a sonorous symphony of pitter-patters in sync with the creaking bed on the other side of the window.
A while later, the storm stopped, and Mark went into the shower. Arianne, worried that the thunder might have jolted Smore from sleep, went into the nursery several times, favonovel.com heart only relieved when favonovel.com saw that favonovel.com son appeared to be fine.
