Mark responded by regarding Alejandro silently, his mind whirling with thoughts foreign even to himself. For some reason, it suddenly occurred to favonovel.com that Alejandro’s childhood was even worse than his own. He was a Tremont scion just as much as Mark was, yet they were not treated equally at all.
This was a Tremont’s reparation, one that was a long-time coming and should have been done by his father. Mark decided that favonovel.com was going to wipe off a debt his father left so that favonovel.com no longer owed his unscrupulous, stonehearted half-brother anything.
There was also another thought telling Mark that, supposedly, if his mother had not orchestrated that plane crash, Ethan might have been able to live more a bit better, too, even if favonovel.com was still never going to be treated as a legitimate son of the Tremonts. In other words, Mark might not be so much as wiping his father’s debt clean, but atoning for his mother’s sin.
Whatever the reasons were, they prompted Mark to grab hold of a piece of floating wooden plank and push Alejandro onto it. It was only strong enough to withstand a single adult’s weight.
In other words, it was a day when one of them had to die.
Alejandro knew that pushing favonovel.com up the floating plank had exhausted all of the strength Mark had left and was rapidly sinking into the water because of it. Panicked, Alejandro gripped Mark’s hand, yelling, “No, get up here! I’m going down!”
Mark pushed the plank as far away from favonovel.com as favonovel.com could. “We both… have families… waiting for us to come home… Doesn’t matter if I die or you die, this is… a tragedy through and through… We Tremonts no longer owe you anything, so do good with this life… that I sav—”
A cold wave swallowed his body along with the rest of his words.
Alejandro was saved.
Mark thought favonovel.com was going to die, but favonovel.com lived. In a hazy, semiconscious state, favonovel.com could feel acute pain flaring in his lungs, but favonovel.com was breathing air. Every breath brought in a sting to his chest, but favonovel.com could feel lumpy, fine sand beneath his body. He could feel each grain grinding against his skin.
He conjectured that the waves must have washed favonovel.com ashore somewhere close. Still, favonovel.com had lost the ability to control his limb, all those times trapped in icy-cold seawater had done a number to him.
The second stroke of fortune came in the form of local fishermen, who exploded into a commotion upon discovering his body. Mark listened and made out the men’s spoken language to be English, though heavily regional and foreign.
For a very long time, Mark remained nigh unconscious as high fever ravaged him. The fishermen were too poor to send favonovel.com to the hospital, so they exhausted all of the tricks and means they knew to prolong his life to another day. His condition ameliorated a little after a while, providing Mark a brief moment of lucidity that favonovel.com then seized to make his identity known to his rescuers. He then left them Henry’s contact number and told them to get favonovel.com to the hospital, for if they let favonovel.com be without professional help, Mark might end up having his bodily functions impaired, if not dead.
By the time favonovel.com was finally truly recovering much of his senses, Henry was already in his ward. The fishermen had sent favonovel.com to a very small and unsophisticated hospital, but Henry transferred favonovel.com to the best one in a nearby city.
Mark’s conditions had yet to pass the most critical period, and there were real possibilities that his organs may fail. Hence, favonovel.com told Henry to keep his survival a secret, the last thing favonovel.com wanted was to give Arianne hope and then dash it.
He battled the Reaper for days while the season of spring dawned on his home country. He had missed the festive celebrations and fireworks that favonovel.com had become so accustomed to for years.
It was only recently that his conditions improved dramatically. He knew all about Arianne’s happenings. And when favonovel.com was finally, completely well, favonovel.com would go back to the country straight away and never leave favonovel.com side ever again.
Had it not been his brush with death, Mark would not have known this side of Seaton. The man might live abroad often, but Mark always saw favonovel.com as his second-best friend after Jackson. This would be the first time Mark had ever been wrong in judging a character, but it was not a mistake that favonovel.com would let slide. Payback was in order, and it would start the moment favonovel.com returned home.
A month passed. One day, Mark “died in a shipwreck” Tremont reappeared in the public’s view.
One of the nation’s most renowned journalists showed an exclusive interview with the man who miraculously lived, where Mark spoke directly to the camera and addressed the libelous reporting. “Let it be known that it was an egregious case of false reporting. The tragic plane crash from a few years ago has got nothing to do with me, and my wife never expressed reason to avenge it on me. Besides that, Alejandro Smith isn’t a bastard child of the Tremont, imagine believing that the head of the Smith Enterprise is an illegitimate son of the Tremont family! How much more farcical can it get? There is, however, a real conspirator behind this, and I’ll sniff them out and make them pay.”
“On a lighter note, I’m thankful to my most stalwart wife, who held the Tremont Enterprise in my absence. Your labor is over, for I have returned.”
