Chapter Five: He Is Someone Very Important to Me
Elara’s POV
My heels clicked against the hospital floor as I hurried down the corridor. The air reeked of antiseptic, sharp and unpleasant.
A nurse led me to a room. The moment she opened the door, I saw the man lying in the bed.
“Lucas!”
I rushed over.
There was a scrape on his face, gauze wrapped around his forehead, and a cast on his left hand. When he saw me, he actually smiled.
My voice trembled. “How are you feeling?”
Seeing how worried I was, the nurse reassured me. “Mr. Lucas isn’t in any danger. His injuries are mostly superficial, along with a mild concussion. He should be able to leave after a night of observation.”
I exhaled in relief. Only then did the crushing weight finally lift from my chest.
“Thank you.”
I turned back to Lucas with a frown. “Who hit you?”
Lucas lowered his head, pressing his lips tightly together.
After a moment’s hesitation, the nurse said, “The other driver is also in the hospital. She only suffered minor injuries.”
“Who is she?”
The nurse checked the medical chart.
“Silvia Thorn. She’s in a VIP room.”
I went rigid.
Silvia?
I suddenly remembered the look she had given me outside my office. The ominous feeling inside me grew stronger.
I turned and headed toward the rooms on the other side of the corridor.
When I pushed open the door to the VIP room, I saw exactly who I had expected.
So Austin hadn’t been following me. He had come to clean up Silvia’s mess.
Austin sat on the sofa, idly playing with a lighter. The moment he saw me, his brows drew together.
I ignored him and walked straight to the bed.
“Silvia.”
She looked up, her expression visibly stiffening. Her forehead was slightly red.
“Why did you run Lucas down?” I asked coldly.
She quickly averted her eyes. “I didn’t do it on purpose. I’ll just pay him a large settlement.”
Her answer infuriated me.
Wealthy young women like Silvia always thought they could throw money at people whenever they caused trouble. Besides, I didn’t believe her.
“Whether it was deliberate is for the police to decide.”
With that, I took out my phone.
Panic immediately crossed her face. “Elara, are you calling the police to have me arrested?”
“Relax. I only want the truth investigated.”
“That’s enough,” Austin said grimly.
I turned toward him. “What exactly is enough?”
He frowned. “She was hurt too. You came here to interrogate my sister over an outsider?”
An outsider.
Those words stopped me for two seconds.
I looked straight at him.
“Lucas isn’t an outsider.”
Austin’s expression darkened.
“He’s someone very important to me. At the very least—” I paused. “More important than you.”
The room fell silent.
Austin’s jaw tightened, and his gaze became frighteningly dark.
“Say that again.”
“I made myself perfectly clear.”
“You’re picking a fight with me over him?”
“This isn’t a fight.” I held his gaze. “Silvia owes him an explanation.”
“And what do you want?”
“An apology.”
“She’s already hurt.”
“That’s her problem.”
Austin gave a cold laugh. “Since when did you become so aggressive, Elara?”
“I’ve always been this way.”
We stood locked in a standoff.
Silvia pressed her lips together, not daring to say a word.
Just then, Austin’s phone rang. He glanced at the screen, and his expression shifted slightly.
“I need to take this.”
He headed for the door, but stopped before leaving and said in a low voice, “Keep an eye on Silvia. Don’t let her say anything she shouldn’t.”
He wasn’t talking to me.
Only then did I realize there was someone else in the room.
Miles was leaning against the wall. He gave me an awkward wave in greeting. I would normally have returned it with a polite smile, but I couldn’t manage one now.
After the door closed, silence lingered for several seconds.
Silvia suddenly snapped, “Just because my brother likes you doesn’t mean I’ll apologize to that lowlife Lucas!”
I froze.
Austin liked me?
That was the most ridiculous joke I had ever heard.
She bit her lip. “If it weren’t for you and him…”
“Silvia.” Miles abruptly raised his voice, cutting her off.
She glared at him resentfully. “If she hadn’t cheated, I never would’ve driven into Lucas! And my brother was stupid enough to suppress the evidence that could’ve destroyed her!”
Evidence…
My heart sank. “What do you mean?”
Silvia’s eyes were red. She was about to answer when Miles immediately stopped her.
“Shut up!”
He stepped forward and planted himself between us like a human wall.
But Silvia’s furious voice still came from behind him.
“Elara, why do you think my brother deliberately leaked those stories? Because someone took pictures of you cheating with Lucas!”
Her words struck me like a bolt of lightning. My head began to ring.
I frowned at Miles. He read the confusion in my eyes and let out a long sigh. Then he took out his phone and handed it to me.
The photographs on the screen caught me completely off guard.
They had been taken at the private restaurant I’d visited the previous week. The private dining room was dimly lit, yet the camera had clearly captured Lucas’s arm around my waist.
My pupils contracted. Cold sweat instantly dampened my back as I swiped across the screen with trembling fingers.
Every photograph had been taken from a compromising angle.
I couldn’t imagine what would have happened if these were the pictures shown at today’s press conference.
Once I was branded an adulteress, Hunter would seize the opportunity to come after me. Worse, I might lose any chance of becoming the Richter Group’s next CEO.
So Austin hadn’t leaked stories about his own affairs to sabotage my press conference. He had done it to draw attention away from evidence that could have destroyed me completely.
My mind was in turmoil.
Before I could process everything, Silvia spoke again.
“Elara, do you know why my brother sought out those women?”
She stared at me.
I said nothing.
“Lucy, and all the women before her…” Her voice dropped. “Nothing ever happened between him and any of them.”
My fingertips slowly turned cold.
It felt as though something had struck my brain. I couldn’t force a single sound from my throat.
“He sent you those intimate pictures of them on purpose.”
“He only wanted to make you angry.”
My pupils trembled.
He had sent those pictures?
Then I remembered what he had said that morning.
“You suddenly left the country two years ago. I thought you wouldn’t care which woman I was with.”
I had told him that I did care.
At the time, there had been an emotion in his eyes that I couldn’t understand. Now, I thought I finally did.
“Why would he do that?”
I heard myself ask, my voice trembling.
Silvia was silent for a moment.
“Because on the night before your wedding, he saw you enter a hotel with Lucas.”
My breath stopped.
Three years ago, the day before the wedding, I had indeed gone to a hotel with Lucas.
But that was because…
Before I could explain, Silvia continued.
“You didn’t marry my brother because our families had no choice but to arrange an alliance.”
“You married him because he chose you.”
It felt as though a hand had closed tightly around my heart.
My thoughts went back to three years earlier, when my father told me that the Thorn family had agreed to the marriage.
I had been ecstatic all night. I thought fate had finally shown me mercy.
It had never occurred to me that Austin himself had chosen me.
Could he really have feelings for me?
But then, what about the scene I had witnessed with my own eyes all those years ago?
