Chapter 435 I Miss You
The car honk had drowned out Eric’s cries.
As soon as Courtney entered the car, she instinctively turned to look outside. All she saw was the vehicles that drove past and nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so she assumed that she had been mistaken earlier and didn’t take the matter to heart.
“Fasten your seatbelt.” Caleb attentively reminded her. She then came to her senses to hurriedly fasten her seatbelt before she revealed an unnatural smile.
It was quite likely that he’d sensed her awkwardness, so as soon as their car merged with the traffic, he mentioned, “Dr. Hass, you should relax. Just treat this as an outing with friends where you are catching a concert and having a meal. I’m a boring person, so I’m happy enough that you don’t mind this side of me. You should behave like yourself and disregard anything else.”
There was more guilt in Courtney’s heart as she smiled at him. How can I possibly relax? I’m about to collapse from the anxiety! If I don’t deal with him today, Linda will slaughter me tomorrow!
Then, from the side of her eyes, she studied Caleb as he drove. She suddenly shifted her gaze to rummage for her phone before she sent off a text.
‘I think your blind date, Mr. Menzie, is quite a nice man. He’s attractive and comes from a well-to-do family. Besides, he has a great temper with a stable job too. The main point is that he has a great personality, so I can’t even bear to continue being mean to him. Why don’t you consider getting together with him?’
Linda replied to the text shortly after that. ‘You can take care of that old man in the VIP room as soon as you return.’ The tone in Linda’s warning was quite obvious.
At that point, Courtney secretly cursed Linda in her heart before finally sending off another message. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to finish this task.’
In her mind, Courtney thought, I guess it’s easier to evoke dislike in someone rather than the opposite.
The concert hall was located not too far from the restaurant and it looked like Caleb had planned everything beforehand. There were many more people who attended the afternoon concert than she had expected, but perhaps the hall was filled to the brim because it was the weekend. Both Caleb and Courtney were in the middle where it was perfect since it wasn’t extremely close or far away from the stage.
However, she wasn’t too interested in the concert and she didn’t dabble too much in this aspect so, she started to nod off after a short while and soon fell into a deep sleep.
While she was serenaded by the background music of the orchestra, she had slept so well that she even had a long dream.
She dreamed that she was at her farm in France where she had fallen asleep among the pile of pharmacotherapy textbooks during her final exam revision. All of a sudden, she felt a rush of pain whereupon it hit her in waves. After the pain had woken her up, she stumbled over to Leon’s house nearby to wake him up to send her to the hospital.
As a result, Courtney was in pain for the entire night before she finally delivered a baby girl in the afternoon the next day. That had happened about a month after Cameron visited the farm and before Courtney’s baby was born a preemie.
At that point, Courtney was so exasperated from the labor that she fell asleep without even looking at her child. Next, she woke up to see Alicia by her side with a pained expression.
“You’ve gotten gutsier than ever! How dare you hide such a big thing from us! This isn’t the first time that you’ve done this and now you’ve done it again! Do you even respect me as one of your elders?”
As usual, Alicia had a reprimanding tone, but Courtney somehow found it quite endearing now that she lay on the hospital bed.
However, she burst into tears and burrowed herself in Alicia’s arms, as if she had finally found the maternal comfort that she was in search of.
In the end, the child was christened Josephine and registered as the grandchild of Alicia and William. Ever since Josephine was a baby, she had remained under both Alicia and William’s care. It was only during the special occasions that Courtney was able to reunite with Josephine abroad. The dream felt much more enjoyable now that she dreamed of the child.
The concert was about to end when Caleb slightly turned his head to take a look at the woman who had fallen asleep on his shoulders. As soon as his eyes fell on her slightly curved lips, his cold eyes suddenly became warmer and he couldn’t contain his smile either.
Since the start of the concert, he had maintained his position without even the slightest movement. In fact, compared to her previous nonsensical introduction of herself, he was much more inclined to believe that the girl currently sound asleep on his shoulders was actually the courageous and pure Linda that he had known from his childhood.
Once the concert had ended, Courtney trailed behind Caleb with her face that was as red as a lobster while they walked out of the hall.
“I’ll buy you a new suit.”
“No, you don’t need to.”
Then, Caleb smiled. “It’s just a piece of clothing and it’ll be fine after it’s been washed.”
However, Courtney glanced at the evident drool stain on the shoulders of his suit and she found herself in an extremely awkward position. At that point, she rambled on, “No, I have to buy you a new suit. I’ll replace this.” Gosh! What have I done?!
Due to this incident, she scrambled to leave after the concert and even vehemently refused his offer to send her home. Subsequently, she hailed a cab to take her home instead.
She had done everything that she could for the entire day, but from his final glance before she left, it seemed that Caleb was rather pleased with her instead. What sort of warped preferences do people nowadays have anyway?!
Meanwhile, Angie and Tina had stayed over at Alicia’s house for the night due to the rain and they rang home to notify Courtney that they wouldn’t be coming back. Since there was no one else at home, Courtney tidied the house before she went downstairs to throw the trash in her nightgown.
It was already dark outside by the time it rained cats and dogs before the continuous rumble of the thunder ensued.
After she had taken out the trash, she stood by the hallway and rummaged for her keys. The voice-controlled lights had been automatically switched off since the time had passed, so she coughed to trigger the lights to be switched on again. However, the lightbulb seemed to have been fused since it remained off.
A darkened shadow then gradually approached her in the pitch-black surrounding.
With the clank of her keys, Courtney managed to suddenly retrieve it from her pocket and was about to open the door during the dim flashlight from her cell phone when she caught the strong whiff of alcohol.
The sound of shoes squeaking on the ground sounded exceptionally audible to her ears.
“Who’s there?” Her whole body had tensed up while her voice trembled in fear. At this moment, she already had her hands on the emergency help button on her phone.
“It’s me.” The man’s reply came in a low, hoarse voice that sounded croaky. After she was momentarily stunned, she slowly turned to take a good look at the person standing underneath the dim sensor lights that both brightened as well as divided the steps leading upstairs and downstairs.
It was Alexander.
“How did you get—”
Before Courtney could finish with her sentence, her back slammed against the door behind her whereupon she felt a bone-shattering pain traveling down her spine. Her yelps were lodged in her throat and she couldn’t even utter a sound.
Meanwhile, he had pressed himself firmly against her and disregarded her struggles. He cupped her cheeks and moved his lips on her as he kissed her in a rather passionate manner where there was anger, resoluteness, resentment and endless longing.
“Umm…”
Courtney slammed the keys she was holding onto into his face.
As he gave a muffled yelp of pain, she took the chance to struggle out of his arms. Then, she gave him a tight slap across the face. “Are you insane? I’ll call the cops on you!”
There was a gash across half of Alexander’s face and his eyes were also bloodshot. He had a terribly frightening aura at that moment where the strong smell of alcohol was indicative of his drunken stupor. Perhaps he had been so drunk that he didn’t even realize what he had done.
“Did you go on a blind date?” Alexander’s mere question caused Courtney’s expression to stiffen.
After a short while, she took a deep breath. “Yeah, I recall mentioning it to you on the phone this morning. Don’t tell me that you were so slow to pick up on it! And don’t tell me that you drank yourself into such a state because of that!”
Alexander suddenly leaned on his side against the wall. He looked exhausted and seemed to have forgotten about her earlier slap as he muttered, “I drank because of work. It has nothing to do with you.”
“Then, what are you doing here?” Courtney was now slightly frustrated.
As for him, he was so wasted that his eyes were closed to the point where they became slits. Subsequently, he replied in a hoarse voice, “I miss you.”
