I Was His Wife, Then His Widow, Then No One's But My Own novel Chapter 19

She didn't want to go up.

It wasn't that she didn't want to see her mentor or Mrs. Vance; her mentor was still recovering, and she didn't want him to exert himself by worrying. Plus, she wanted to organize the contract before showing it to him properly tomorrow. Going up this late meant they wouldn't be able to talk for long anyway, and getting him riled up and excited right before bed would only ruin his rest.

Although she hadn't fully earned her mentor's forgiveness yet, she couldn't keep imposing on them indefinitely. It was simply too inconvenient.

She stood under the streetlamp, deep in thought, before pulling out her phone and scrolling through her contacts. She needed to find a place to stay.

If she were to rent an apartment, she still had enough savings to comfortably get by for a month or two.

Just as she was about to call a friend, her phone screen suddenly flashed, and her ringtone abruptly shattered the quiet night.

Nora glanced at the caller ID; it was Cassie.

Nora's fingers paused, the soft expression on her face fading into something far cooler.

Why would Cassie be calling her this late? Shouldn't she be waiting for Seraphina and Finnegan to bring her home?

Nora answered the call in complete silence, waiting for the other end to speak first.

"Mom, where are you?" Cassie's voice filtered through the speaker, laced with a hint of urgency.

Nora's tone was entirely flat, stripped of all its usual eager warmth. "What's wrong?"

"Come back home right now," Cassie demanded.

Nora frowned. Cassie had been incredibly resistant to her lately, so proactively calling to ask her to come home was completely out of character.

Thinking it over, she simply asked, "Is it an emergency?"

There was two seconds of silence on the line before Cassie replied, "It's pretty urgent, Mom."

Just two seconds later, Cassie's tone snapped back to that familiar, entitled impatience. "Ugh, Mom, just hurry up, there's not enough time!"

Gripping her phone, Nora's mind raced through a dozen worst-case scenarios. She was her own daughter after all, her own flesh and blood—how could she possibly not worry?

Was Cassie feeling sick? Had something happened at the house? Even though she had decided to step back and let go, Cassie was still legally her responsibility, and if it was a real emergency, she couldn't just turn a blind eye.

"Alright, I'm heading back." Nora hung up, briskly walked out of the complex, and hailed a cab.

Twenty minutes later, the cab pulled up outside the villa. Nora paid the fare and rushed inside.

Nora was pulled right up to the low table. Cassie let go of her hand, gesturing dismissively at the mess of materials with unbothered entitlement. "Look, Mom. I want to make a necklace for Seraphina! Her birthday is in a few days. But it's so hard, I can't string it."

As she spoke, she picked the wire back up, clumsily jabbing it at a bead, only to have the soft wire bend and slip right off the edge of the hole. Her little brow fiercely knit together again.

"You know how to do everything, Mom. Come help me. If Seraphina doesn't get a gift, she'll definitely be sad."

Nora stood perfectly still by the table, her breathing slowing down to a near stop.

She looked at the scattered beads, at Cassie's reddened hands, and at the earnest, desperate urgency on her daughter's face.

Nora couldn't even recall the last time she had seen such genuine desperation on her daughter's face. But this time, it was entirely for Seraphina.

Nora's face paled a fraction, her lips pressing tightly into a thin line.

Seeing Nora's silence, Cassie assumed she was about to start nagging again. She frowned, opening her mouth to complain, but Nora beat her to it.

"Sure."

She truly didn't care about any of it anymore.