Chapter 55 Why Would I Cry?
Courtney’s words were food for thought.
However, Alexander wasn’t one to stand by. He continued to speak up for her and said, “Courtney is no stranger to the Hunter Family’s affairs. If you’re deliberately trying to cause trouble for her because of this, I won’t mind having a word with her father. I don’t think he knows that Anna has been throwing her weight around and picking on her innocent little sister.”
Now that Alexander was here, everyone began singing a different tune. Those who knew the truth but hadn’t dared to speak up earlier now began to whisper.
“I heard that Mr. Hunter’s current wife is actually his second one; he had a daughter with his previous wife. She’s that daughter, right?”
“I think so. Anna’s probably the illegitimate child.”
“There’s a high probability of that. His previous wife never made any public appearances, so no one knows who she was; we can see that Mr. Hunter protected that daughter well, though.”
Anna was so furious that she shook. The proper lady image that she had carefully sculpted over the years was now being destroyed right in front of her eyes. All of a sudden, her boyfriend, who had been standing by her, also turned and left. She stomped her foot and yelled as she chased after him. “Dean? Where are you going?”
With Anna gone, only Isaac and Vanessa were left.
Having heard the commotion, Isaac’s parents came running as well. When his father caught sight of Courtney, he stiffened for a moment as well. Nonetheless, he had experienced his fair number of surprises before. Once he returned to his senses, he quickly began to apologize to Alexander and Courtney. Mrs. Graham tugged on her son’s sleeve and shot him a glare.
“Why are you not apologizing to Mr. Duncan? Look at the fuss that you’ve caused.”
Isaac frowned as he looked at Alexander and unwillingly said, “Sorry.”
Vanessa was quick to respond. Having seen the tables turn on her, her expression changed faster than a flash of lightning. She was all smiles as she pulled on Courney’s hand in a friendly manner.
“That was just a misunderstanding. You and Mr. Duncan are both our esteemed guests. Please don’t take notice of that. Let’s open a bottle of champagne to wash all of that away, all right?”
“Yes, yes! Let’s get some champagne to get over that ruckus.” Mr. Graham nodded as well.
The guests who had been watching the show had all scattered, but no one knew what they were thinking on the inside. However, Courtney knew that news of her being Alexander’s fiancée was going to spread now that that commotion had occurred.
After drinking some champagne, Courtney and Alexander walked side by side in the banquet hall. She lowered her voice to ask him about the lie he made earlier. “I ended up causing trouble for you. Is it going to be easy for you to deal with the consequences?”
Alexander was calm, looking as though he wasn’t thinking of that earlier event at all.
“Never mind that.”
Courtney naturally thought he meant that she didn’t need to bother about it; someone would probably handle the matter, so she nodded. Suddenly, a thought occurred to her and she immediately asked him, “By the way, why are you here? Shouldn’t you be at the forestry center?”
“Your friend took the kids back home. I heard that you’re here today for your ex-boyfriend’s wedding, so I got curious.”
“Curious?” Courtney’s expression stiffened.
“Curious about what you’d look like when you cry.”
“Cry? Why would I cry?” Courtney pouted. “It’s all in the past. You don’t think that I came all the way here to drink myself silly and crash their wedding, right?”
“If you actually can pull that off, Tina and Jordan wouldn’t have threatened me.”
Courtney froze for a moment, unsure if she should laugh. “Ah, so Tina and Jordan got you to come.”
“Yes.”
Amid her exasperation, Courtney felt a little disappointed. She naturally knew that Jordan liked her, and Tina would wish for nothing more than to tie the two of them together. It was no wonder those two kids were able to cook up something like this.
She was disappointed that Alexander probably hadn’t come to see her because he wanted to act on his feelings.
As she stayed lost in her thoughts, Alexander’s voice suddenly rang by her ear. He sounded somewhat amused.
“On the other hand, I’m more interested as to what kind of mental preparations you made before coming here. It’s more interesting to see what a jilted ex-girlfriend would do at her cheating ex and two-faced best friend’s engagement party than it is to help Jordan to collect leaves for his art homework at the forestry center.”
“Hey.” Courtney angrily pushed at his arm, embarrassed. “Don’t poke at touchy subjects.”
If he hadn’t showed up and lent her some credibility, she would have treated him worse. “I didn’t know that Anna would be here too. I was caught off-guard.”
“You’re afraid of her?”
“Who said that I am?” Courtney glared, her eyes wide as saucers. She looked like she was displeased with the whole thing. After glaring at Alexander for a while, a thought suddenly hit her. “How did you know that Anna’s my sister?” she asked.
Alexander lowered his gaze a little. He looked like he was stating some facts as he answered, “Don’t you think that I should vet the background of someone who picks up my son from school and spends a lot of time with him?”
Courtney looked embarrassed as she let out a dry cough. She had no comebacks for that.
On the other hand, Alexander simply continued. “Did you think that I wouldn’t be suspicious as to why the second daughter of the Hunter Family would tamper with her resume and work as a manager at one of the hotels under my banner? Don’t you think that I would’ve suspected you for having some ulterior motive? Isn’t allowing you to have that job a sign that I trust you enough?”
“I absolutely have no ulterior motives.” Courtney immediately shook her head. “I simply wanted to feed myself and my daughter.”
Alexander studied her, as though something was on his mind. A beat later, he raised a hand and swept the messy strands of hair covering her forehead behind her ear. He then bent down slightly and whispered, “I know.”
Courtney immediately blushed a brilliant red.
In the distance, Isaac took in this romantic moment. As he watched Courtney’s lovely smile and their flirtatious movements, he balled his fists up in envy. If it hadn’t been for his momentary lapse in judgment, she would have been the woman he was going to be engaged to today.
Meanwhile, Vanessa was chatting with her friends next to Isaac. At the mention of his name, she looked back to see the unhappy look on his face. She followed his gaze and saw Courtney in the distance. Her smile slowly disappeared at that.
Despite all her efforts over the years, she still wasn’t able to make Isaac completely forget about Courtney.
“What are you thinking about, Vanessa?”
Her friends’ voices pulled her out of her thoughts. Vanessa stared at the glass in her hand for a moment before whipping her head up.
“Give me a hand, Leah,” she said breezily.
During the banquet, Alexander received a call from his butler. He went to the balcony by himself, leaving Courtney alone to eat in boredom.
“Courtney.”
When she looked up, she saw that two of her roommates back from her university days were standing before her. There were two young men that she didn’t know. One of her former roommates greeted her warmly.
“It’s been a long time since we last saw you, Courtney. You’ve gotten prettier.”
“Thank you.” Courtney smiled politely. She had only lived with them for a year, so they weren’t particularly close. They were barely on a first-name basis.
After some idle chatter, someone said, “Since it’s been a long time since our last meeting, we should drink to this.”
That wasn’t anything strange, so Courtney lifted her glass and drank. But before she could even put her glass down, the other former roommate lifted another glass of wine.
“Me too, me too. Courtney, do you remember that I used to sleep across from you? Come on, let’s have a toast.” With that, she clinked glasses with Courtney’s own. “You’ve got to accept this drink too.”
“I remember.” Courtney nodded. She had no choice but to drink another glass.
