Hunting for His EX-Wife

“Mr. Harper.” The assistant’s voice suddenly interrupted Elliot before he could finish his sentence. He choked and met Rose’s questioning gaze.

Rose didn’t hear what he was going to say, as a flash of light quickly appeared and disappeared in her mind. She couldn’t catch it in time, making her even more confused. “What?”

Madeleine walked in behind the assistant, interrupting their eye contact.

Upon seeing Rose here, Madeleine’s face changed instantly before forcing herself to calm down. “Elliot, I haven’t seen Shawn these past few days and I don’t know how he’s doing. Can I go see him and take him out for some fun?”

She asked with a hint of humility that was unlike her previous arrogance. Rose quietly scanned Madeleine’s face before looking away.

Elliot impatiently frowned at Madeleine while saying sternly, “He is doing just fine without you bothering him.”

Without even looking at Madeleine again after speaking those words, Elliot warned expressionlessly, “I’ve told you not to disturb him anymore. After all, he is my son.”

After hearing his last sentence, Madeleine turned pale instantly as she bit her lip while taking a step back unsteadily – knowing that Elliot knew everything now.

She had been hiding it for so long!

He knew! He had always known!

“Alright then, just go,” said Elliot who lowered his head to look back at the file that he hadn’t finished reading earlier on.

However, his words were interrupted by Madeleine who pleaded with him, “Elliot… I want to see my child! Please let me see Shawn? Just once? Please… I have cancer.”

As soon as she mentioned cancer, everyone in the office went silent including Rose who looked up surprised, wondering if it was true or not.

Did Madeleine really have cancer?Content protected by Nôv/el(D)rama.Org.

When she looked over at Elliot, she saw surprise written all over his face, which meant that he wasn’t aware of this either.

“What?” asked an unhappy-looking Elliot.

“I got my report from the hospital today; it’s lung cancer which has progressed into its later stages due to my poor lungs previously being unhealthy,” explained Madeleine sadly while pleading with tears running down her face, “So please, let me take Shawn out for some fun… I owe him so much.”

Madeleine spoke sorrowfully yet pitifully; her delicate makeup covered face full of disappointment mixed with hopefulness.

Rose squeezed her phone tightly before lowering her head once again – this time unable to focus on whatever video played on the screen no matter how hard she tried..

Madeleine’s sudden announcement left everyone feeling a bit dazed. Rose and Elliot were both taken aback.

“Is that okay?” Madeleine asked, looking at him with tearful eyes. “I’m begging you this one last time. After this, the child will need you to take good care of them.”

Elliot didn’t refuse; after all, Madeleine was the mother of the child, and he had no reason or right to deprive her of her rights.

Madeleine left happily, her back seeming to radiate joy.

Rose blinked in surprise and disbelief. The office was silent for a while before she spoke up, “What did you want to say just now?”

Elliot suddenly looked up at her and focused on her face. “Hmm? What did I say just now?”

Rose met his gaze. “You said Shawn wasn’t anything.” She felt an inexplicable nervousness when asking this question as if she were expecting something.

After a few seconds of silence, Elliot picked up the intercom phone and told his assistant not to let anyone into the office for now. Then he stood up and sat down next to Rose with a heavy posture.

Rose became even more nervous because she realized that what Elliot was about to tell her might be something she had been curious about but also confused by all along.

“Rose,” he asked again to let her answer the previous question, “Have you thought it through? You do not say yes to me because of things like Madeleine, Shawn or old Mr. Harper bothering you, do you?”

As they locked eyes with each other in that moment, Rose saw herself reflected in Elliot’s deep-set eyes.

“Hmm,” Rose softened inside as she admitted what she had been thinking. “So will you tell me what I want to know then?”

Elliot laughed – an extremely pleasant laugh.

His smile was rare; clean-cut yet exceptionally handsome compared with popular young idols who seemed more delicate than him.

They spent most of their time together torturing each other rather than laughing together like this.

This smile could easily stun someone.

“Rose,” Elliot called out softly while embracing her body against his chest.

He began telling everything that Rose wanted so badly to hear from him since long ago…

“Shawn is not mine and Madeleine’s child,” Elliot touched the woman’s hair in his arms, with a gentle expression mixed with a hint of reminiscence. “Shawn is Madeleine’s son, but he is not my biological son. Except you, I have not slept with any other women.”

Rose was stunned and looked up at him in disbelief, only seeing his jawline and high nose bridge.

“It’s true. Shawn is the child that Madeleine was forced to have after you left for half a year. The man responsible for it committed suicide in prison, and the accident that happened to Madeleine was actually related to me,” Elliot’s low voice was particularly magnetic, but also revealed things that Rose didn’t know about all these years.”

“That night at the charity gala, I couldn’t find my phone, and it was taken by someone. Then someone impersonated me and assaulted Madeleine. I buried this incident, and the person responsible paid a price, but Madeleine only discovered she was pregnant a month later,” Elliot revealed, his voice still low and filled with the weight of these hidden secrets.

“Madeleine dared not tell anyone about this matter, so she came to me and asked to marry me. After all, I am responsible for this.”

“So you agreed to marry her?” Rose blurted out, with a hint of sourness in her tone.

Elliot looked down at her with a smile and said, “No. I didn’t promise anything. At that time, I didn’t believe that you had already… so I sent people to look for you everywhere and couldn’t care about anyone else. Besides, she didn’t take any precautions herself. Even if it was my responsibility, I wouldn’t have married her. But the child in her belly couldn’t be hidden forever and grew bigger day by day. I don’t know what Madeleine said to her family, but her parents came knocking on my door asking me to marry her.”

Rose nodded.

If Elliot really marries Madeleine, he will become a scapegoat who was cuckolded by his wife. Although it’s not right to think like this, Rose can’t help but find it a bit funny.

“And then?”

“Madeleine tried to kill herself to marry me after I refused.” Elliot pursed his lips as his face began to look bad.