Now You Want Me? Too Late

When he arrived home, Elias went straight to the bedroom. He needed answers.

’Why did she go there? What was she talking to Amber about? And why didn’t she tell me anything?’

His mind was filled with questions. ’She went there alone. Didn’t she know it could be dangerous? Has she forgotten she is carrying twins?’

He quickened his pace. As he entered the room, he saw her standing there by the floor-to-ceiling window. He walked over to her.

"Elena, I have to talk to you."

Elena slowly turned her head. The sight of her made his heart stop.

Her eyes were red and swollen. Tears streaked down her cheeks, and her face was pale from crying.

A chill ran through his entire body. All the questions he had prepared vanished from his mind.

His hands immediately settled on her shoulders.

"What—what happened? Why are you crying?"

Elena’s lips trembled. Then she broke down. Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks as she stepped closer and leaned against him.

Elias immediately wrapped his arms around her. His heart sank further.

"Elena, you are scaring me. Say something. Who made you cry?"

Elena tried to control her breathing. She wiped her tears slowly.

"I went to meet Amber Sterling."

Elias stiffened.

She was finally telling him.

"Why?" One word came out of his mouth.

"She called me," Elena replied, "and said she had something to talk to me about." She lowered her head. The memories of the meeting came rushing back, pressing heavily against her chest.

"I went to meet her."

Another sob escaped her.

Elias’s fists clenched at his sides. "You could have told me. Why did you go there alone?"

"She is..." She struggled to say the words. "She is my mother."

Elias’s expression changed instantly, completely stunned by what he had just heard.

"Your mother?" he uttered in a daze.

"Yes." She nodded. A tear rolled down her cheek.

Elias froze. He remembered Elena telling him about her mother—the woman who had abandoned her when she was only five.

But he had never imagined that woman would be Amber Sterling. His heart ached for Elena.

"I never wanted to see her again," Elena said. "She means nothing to me. But..."

She faltered. "When she called me and asked me to meet her, I couldn’t stop myself. The wounded child inside me still wanted answers."

Elias pulled her into his arms again. He didn’t interrupt. He simply held her.

"I foolishly thought she might have recognized me and wanted to see me." She clutched his shirt. "I thought she would apologize to me for leaving me all those years ago. I thought... maybe she regretted it. But I was wrong..."

A broken sob escaped her throat, followed by another.

Elias held her even tighter. He didn’t tell her to stop crying and didn’t try to force her to forget. He simply let her cry.

Some wounds couldn’t be healed with a few comforting words. Sometimes, all a person needed was someone willing to stay.

So he stayed.

He allowed Elena to release everything she had been holding inside.

"She only wanted me to help her," she continued through her tears. "She offered me money, telling me to withdraw the charges against Vivian."

At that, Elias’s eyes flickered with a dangerous light. "How dare she," he muttered. "Does she think my wife needs her money?"

His anger rose rapidly. "She made a grave mistake. I’ll destroy the whole Sterling family."

When he looked back at her, his expression softened. He caressed her hair.

"Don’t upset yourself by thinking about them. They don’t deserve your tears."

He cupped her face and looked into her eyes. "No one is going to take Vivian out of jail. Not because of money. Not because of influence. She will answer for her crimes."

Elena believed him. She nodded. "I know. It’s just..."

She looked down at her fingers. The agony was so intense that she almost wished she could stop feeling it altogether.

"All these years, I never stopped wondering why she chose another man over her family. Now I have the answer."

She lifted her eyes at him. This time, there was something different in them. The sadness was still there, but beneath it burned anger.

"She never loved my father," she recounted. "She used him to spite Cedric."

She then told him everything she had learned from Amber. She told him about Cedric refusing to marry Amber while she was pregnant, about their daughter being taken away immediately after birth, and about Amber marrying Thomas to get revenge on Cedric.

And finally, she revealed Cedric’s condition—that if Amber wanted to marry him, she had to cut all ties with Thomas and leave Elena behind.

With every word, Elias’s expression grew darker.

"Cedric was such a bastard. I was never wrong about him. He is selfish, manipulative, and an opportunist. He used his own daughter and wife to get what he wanted. How pathetic."

"But she still chose him, the man who once abandoned her while she was pregnant," Elena muttered. "She chose to abandon her family to be with the man who had snatched her daughter right after she was born. She never cared about my father or me."

Tears streamed down her cheeks, no matter how hard she tried to hold them back.

"Seven years of marriage... All those years, and all she did was use my father for revenge. When Cedric finally wanted to marry her, she forgot everything. She forgot the pain he had caused her. What a joke."

She let out a bitter laugh. "She said she wanted to be with the man she loved, that she missed the daughter that had been taken away from her."

Her smiling face twisted into sadness the next moment. "What about me?" She looked at him with questions in her eyes. "I am also her daughter." Her voice became smaller. "But she left me and chose her other daughter."

Seeing the pain in her eyes, Elias’s own heart ached. He had endured the pain of losing his parents for years. It still ached whenever he recalled them.

Yet, he felt that pain was nothing compared to what Elena had endured. She had grown up carrying questions no child should ever have had to ask.

"Back then, I kept asking," she continued. "Was I not good enough? Why didn’t she want me? Why did she leave?"

She snorted. "But I know now."

But somehow, knowing the truth seemed to hurt even more.

"She didn’t even bother checking on me. She cut ties with me." Her voice shook. "She said Cedric forced her to do that."

She laughed bitterly. "Such a pathetic excuse. She believed I would trust her."

More tears filled her eyes.

"She never cared about me since the beginning. That’s why she could abandon me without a second thought."