Chapter 217: Madwoman
Preston Chase had just stepped out of the CEO’s office when the door was pushed open, and a man Alaric Blackwood had no desire to see walked in.
"Busy?"
Quentin Blackwood’s tone was calm. He closed the door behind him and strode toward the large desk.
Seeing him approach, Alaric Blackwood rose with a cold expression, turned to face the floor-to-ceiling windows, and showed him his back. He lit a cigarette. "If you have something to say, say it."
"I’m planning to send Lydia Wynn abroad."
This was what Quentin Blackwood considered the best arrangement.
"Once she’s gone, she won’t be able to bother you anymore."
For the past few days, Quentin Blackwood had been having nightmares every night. He dreamed that Lydia Wynn, with nothing left to lose, would run to Mandy Halloway and expose his affair with his secretary from all those years ago, throwing his family into chaos.
"Lydia Wynn is already handing over her work. She’ll leave the company in a few days. Her paperwork to go abroad should be ready in about two weeks. I’ll see her off myself then and make sure she never appears again."
Alaric Blackwood took a hard drag from his cigarette, then turned back. "Fine," he said, his voice devoid of emotion.
"And your mother...?"
"Don’t worry. I won’t tell her."
Even if he wasn’t doing it for Quentin Blackwood, he would keep quiet for Mandy Halloway’s sake.
Hearing Alaric Blackwood’s firm reply, his father let out a sigh of complete relief.
"Thank you."
He raised his hand and clapped Alaric Blackwood heavily on the shoulder. "Really, thank you."
He couldn’t change what had already happened. He had wronged Mandy Halloway, but his love for her wasn’t fake. All he wanted now was to protect their marriage. He couldn’t lose Mandy Halloway and this family.
The father and son had reached an agreement, but little did they know that at this very moment, Lydia Wynn had arrived at the VIP room of the beauty salon where Mandy Halloway was.
She had spent a fortune on a VIP membership of the same tier as Mandy Halloway’s and had successfully managed to track her down.
Before Alaric Blackwood returned to the country, she had always been by Quentin Blackwood’s side as his personal assistant. Visiting the Blackwood family home was routine for her, and she knew Mrs. Blackwood’s habits like the back of her hand.
She knew Mandy Halloway came to the beauty salon three times a week for skincare and treatments.
"Mrs. Blackwood, what a coincidence."
She approached with a smile, striking up a conversation.
Mandy Halloway was lying on a treatment bed, a mask half-applied to her face. She looked at Lydia Wynn, somewhat surprised. "Assistant Wynn?"
"I’m not an assistant anymore."
"Transferred to a new position?"
Lydia Wynn shook her head and lay down on the treatment bed next to her.
As the professional aesthetician cleansed her face and mixed a mask, she turned her head to look at Mandy Halloway and said, "Not transferred. I was fired."
Mandy Halloway was taken aback. "Fired?"
"It was both Director Blackwood and Mr. Blackwood’s decision."
Mandy Halloway rarely meddled in company affairs anymore, so she didn’t pursue the topic with Lydia Wynn. She simply closed her eyes and let the aesthetician apply the mask to the other half of her face.
"Mrs. Blackwood, please rest for a while. I’ll be back in twenty minutes to remove the mask."
The aesthetician got up and left.
Lydia Wynn glanced at Mandy Halloway, who was resting with her eyes closed, then looked away and urged the aesthetician beside her to hurry up.
Pressed to hurry, the aesthetician quickly mixed the mask, applied it to Lydia’s face, and also got up and left.
In the blink of an eye, only she and Mandy Halloway were left in the VIP room.
Melodious piano music drifted through the air, soft and sleep-inducing.
Staring blankly at the ceiling, Lydia Wynn broke the silence. "Mrs. Blackwood, does Director Blackwood ever mention me to you?"
Hearing this, Mandy Halloway opened her eyes and turned to look at her. "Not really. Why?"
"Then do you know why he sponsored me in the first place, let me join the Blackwood Group, and personally mentored me?"
Lydia Wynn’s tone turned provocative, and the corners of her lips curved into a smirk.
This gave Mandy Halloway a bad feeling. ’That old fool Quentin,’ she thought, ’at his age, has he gotten himself another mistress? And one young enough to be his daughter?’
"Are you wondering if I’m Director Blackwood’s kept mistress?"
Lydia Wynn sneered. "It’s not surprising you’d think that. After all, he hasn’t been faithful in the past. He cheated on you during your marriage—and with his own female secretary."
Mandy Halloway’s blood ran cold.
’A female secretary?’
’So the one he had an affair with was that secretary?’
She knew he had someone on the side, but she had never been able to find out who it was. They used to fight about it constantly—small arguments every three days, big ones every five. And at that time, she was pregnant with Nina.
To ensure she could give birth to the child safely, she had fled abroad.
For a full six months before Nina Halloway was born, Quentin Blackwood didn’t call her even once. She had already made up her mind back then: after the baby was born and her postpartum confinement was over, she would go straight back to the country and file for divorce.
But just a few days before her due date, Quentin Blackwood showed up. In the end, he couldn’t stop himself from coming to win her back.
He dropped all his work to be with her through the birth and her postpartum confinement, showering her with sweet nothings until, after much internal struggle, she softened toward him.
In the end, after Quentin Blackwood repeatedly promised to cut off all his inappropriate relationships, she chose to forgive him and continue the marriage.
Lydia Wynn’s words struck a raw nerve.
She shot up from the treatment bed, her eyes filled with alarm and unease. "How do you know he cheated with his secretary?"
"Because that secretary... was my mother."
It was as if a bomb had gone off in Mandy Halloway’s head.
She sized up Lydia Wynn. "So you’re..."
"I’m Quentin Blackwood’s daughter."
"..."
Mandy Halloway was dumbfounded. If she remembered correctly, Lydia Wynn was about the same age as Alaric...
Quentin Blackwood’s affair happened when she was pregnant with Nina. He had promised her he would cut off all contact with his mistress. If what Lydia Wynn said was true, then Quentin had been lying to her all along.
Not only had he not broken up with his mistress, but even after he brought Mandy back to the country and she became pregnant with Alaric, he was still entangled with the other woman.
’Men!’
’The only time they’re faithful is when their portrait is hanging on a wall.’
"Your husband sponsored me and kept me by his side to groom me because he couldn’t bear to see me living in such a wretched state."
Before Mandy Halloway could even process the frenzy of it all, Lydia Wynn herself burst into crazed laughter. "To hide me from you, to keep you from ever knowing I exist, he’s planning to send me abroad. The paperwork is already in progress."
"But I don’t want to go abroad! My biological mother died a long time ago; I never even met her. Your husband was entrusted by her to take care of me, but he didn’t. He threw me in an orphanage! It was only later, when he saw me in a news interview, struggling so much I couldn’t even afford to go to school, that he reluctantly sponsored me."
"Your husband is a real piece of work, isn’t he? Ignoring his own flesh and blood for so many years, and now he wants to ship me off just to protect his marriage."
Lydia Wynn laughed as she spoke, tears streaming down her face.
She looked completely unhinged. She scrambled up, washed her face with water, and grabbed a towel, saying as she dried her face, "I can’t fight his arrangements, but before I go abroad, I can tell you the whole truth."
"Not only did he cheat on you, he had a daughter with the other woman."
"And... and... by some twist of fate, that illegitimate daughter—me—fell in love with your son, Mrs. Blackwood. Isn’t that hilarious? HAHAHA..."
With that, Lydia Wynn burst into wild laughter, like a madwoman.
She doubled over, clutching her stomach, laughing so hard that tears streamed from her eyes. The expression on her face could almost be described as grotesque.
Mandy Halloway thought the woman was mentally unstable, driven mad by everything. She hastily slipped on the slippers by the bed, wanting to get out of there.
Seeing this, Lydia Wynn reached out to stop her, grabbing her shoulders with a death grip and forcefully pushing her back onto the treatment bed.
"Where are you running, Mrs. Blackwood? Are you scared?"