Chapter 831: Suspicion
"Have you spoken to Caius in these past few days?"
Lily looked up from the noodles she was slowly twirling around her fork, her father’s unexpected question catching her off guard. They’d been sharing lunch together for the past few days, a somewhat new routine, but their conversations had barely gone beyond polite small talk and weather updates. And now he wanted to talk about Cai? She wasn’t entirely sure how much he knew of her current relationship with Caius, or what his opinions about it were, but she did know one thing—she wasn’t about to let his thoughts sway her one way or another.
"Not spoken to," she replied, keeping her tone neutral. She didn’t feel any need to clarify that she and Caius had actually been texting each other almost constantly. That was personal. If they wanted to know more, they’d have to ask directly. Just because she’d chosen to have a few meals with them didn’t mean she was ready to forgive, forget, or pretend the past didn’t exist.
Her mother snorted at her answer, but Lily let it slide, keeping her expression impassive. It amazed her how much she had internalized Caius’s own philosophy. He’d once told her that while things could certainly bother him, he tried not to let his emotions be dictated by others’ actions. He focused on his own peace of mind, rather than letting other people pull him off balance.
In the past, sitting down to a meal with her parents would have been unthinkable. The constant tension, her father’s tiptoeing around her mother’s icy stares, and her mother’s disapproving glances across the table would’ve grated on her nerves within minutes. In truth, those dynamics still got under her skin, but she found it easier now to remind herself that however they felt—that was their issue, not hers.
"
Like her, her father ignored her mother’s derisive snort, his gaze remaining steady on her, which made her wonder what exactly he was trying to understand. Did he think he needed to lecture her about dating a guy? If so, she would have to tell him he was about ten years too late for that. But for now, she answered carefully, her tone as neutral as she could keep it. "Close enough."
An uneasy silence settled over the table, lasting a few minutes as her father seemed to be weighing how to proceed. She could sense his hesitation, see it in the way his fingers fidgeted with the chopsticks on his plate.
"Have you... stayed in touch with him... since then?" he finally asked, his voice quieter now. She nearly snorted. It was tempting to pretend she didn’t understand the question at all, make him clarify but instead, she spared him the discomfort.
"If you mean since Jasmine’s death? No," she replied plainly. "He’d cut off all of us. And after I left you both, I wasn’t exactly going to go looking for him." She shrugged. "I ran into him a few months ago. It was a coincidence."
Her mother snorted again, louder this time, while her father only nodded, quietly digesting her words as he turned his attention back to his noodles, leaving them to eat in silence once more.