I had originally planned for a quiet Christmas for just the two of us, so I gave Margaret the day off.
I never expected Julian would bring his girlfriend home.
There were plenty of ingredients in the fridge. Isabella selected some she thought might suit their tastes and started cooking with Lena.
Lena didn't know how to cook, so she just assisted Isabella.
They chatted about how Lena and Julian met and got together. Lena said she met Julian at a party. Her father was one of the investors in a documentary he was preparing to film. Lena was the one who pursued him actively. After two months of her chasing him, he agreed to be with her.
Although Lena's Chinese wasn't great, she was quite knowledgeable about Chinese culture. She asked Isabella, "Are girls in this country generally more reserved? Isabella, tell me, is a girl like me too forward? Will Julian and I end up getting married?"
Isabella looked at her pretty, lovely face and said, "You're so beautiful, how can you lack confidence? You two are very well-suited. Julian must genuinely like you to be with you."
Lena was very happy. "Thank you for saying that."
Isabella pressed her lips together slightly and asked, trying to sound natural, "Did you just arrive today?"
"Yes, we came straight home from the airport," Lena replied.
Isabella's heart jolted. What was going on? Was that man not Julian that day? Then who was it? Was she really taken advantage of by a complete stranger?
Isabella cooked many dishes. She and Lena carried them out and called the Sullivan brothers to eat.
The two men were no longer in the living room. Alexander had gone to the study on the second floor. Julian had gone to the third floor to put away their luggage.
Isabella called for Alexander naturally, directly using his name to tell him to come down for dinner. But she couldn't bring herself to call for Julian. She said to Lena, "Lena, could you go upstairs and call Julian down for dinner?"
Lena went.
Isabella served the rice. Soon all three came down. She smiled gently at them. "Sit down and eat, please."
Lena tasted the food and praised generously, "This is delicious! Isabella, your cooking is wonderful!"
Isabella used the serving chopsticks to put food on Lena's plate. "Have some more," she said softly.
During the meal, Isabella spoke with both Alexander and Lena. But she didn't exchange a single word with Julian. He only spoke when Lena noticed he wasn't eating much and asked if something was wrong, if the food didn't taste good. He said, "Isabella's cooking has always been good. I'm just a bit tired and don't have much appetite."
Isabella said to Lena, "Such a long flight must be exhausting. You should rest early after dinner."
"Yes, okay."
After dinner, Julian and Lena went to the guest room on the third floor. Isabella and Alexander cleaned up the dishes and the kitchen together.
"Whose fault is this, yours or mine? If you hadn't lied to me back then, I wouldn't have treated him that way. But you did it so I would keep living."
If he had forced her to accept that her husband and son were dead, she would have sought death herself. Alexander did it so she would survive.
Yet she had done that to Julian. She had seduced him.
Now their meeting was so awkward.
"Don't dwell on the past," Alexander said, taking the washed dishes from her, drying them with a cloth, and putting them in the cupboard. "He has such a lovely girlfriend now. He won't hold onto what happened before."
Lena was indeed likable to anyone. Besides, Alexander, as the older brother, had raised him. He must have let go of the past by now, Isabella thought.
——
Julian let Lena sleep on the bed. He himself made a bed on the floor. Lena complained, "You're really being overly gentlemanly!" But she was used to him acting like this. She went to sleep on the bed.
Julian lay with his hands crossed behind his head, eyes open in the darkness, unable to sleep.
Forgetting what happened a year ago was for the best.
His brother didn't hold his betrayal against him anymore. Isabella had only seduced him because she was forced, desperate. There was no genuine feeling for him there. He could actually understand all the cause and effect. There was nothing left to feel resentful about.
Although it was Lena who, hearing that he and his brother had become distant over some incident—so much so that he never planned to return home—particularly hoped this Christmas holiday could help reconcile them, ultimately he was the one who decided to come back. He also wanted to resolve the rift with his brother.
But he had underestimated Isabella's effect on him. Seeing her again, that intense possessiveness shattered all his self-control once more...
He closed his eyes and began counting numbers in his mind, hoping to calm the turmoil inside.
He counted past five hundred, but still couldn't sleep. He felt irritable, and his mouth was dry. He got up and went downstairs.
Passing by the master bedroom on the second floor, his brother's room, he paused.
Last year when he came back, they were still sleeping separately, their relationship frozen. No matter how his brother tried to please her, Isabella remained cold and distant. Because of his interference, his brother's deception was exposed. His brother wasn't her enemy, but her benefactor. Now, Isabella had fully accepted his brother. Today, she had received them as the future lady of the house, cooked for them. Of course, she and his brother sleeping separately wouldn't happen anymore.
Come to think of it, he had played a crucial role in their relationship transforming to what it was now.
He looked at the closed door, the corner of his mouth lifting in a self-mocking twist. He continued downstairs.
He only realized once downstairs that he wasn't the only one thirsty for water in the middle of the night.
The kitchen light was on. Isabella was boiling fresh water. Her period had come, and she couldn't drink cold water. Margaret wasn't home today, and she had forgotten to boil water and keep it in the thermos. Woken in the middle of the night by her period, her lower abdomen cramping, she came down to make a cup of brown sugar water.
"Ahem." A dry cough from the kitchen doorway startled her. She turned and saw Julian, a flicker of panic clear in her eyes.
But she quickly composed herself. "You came down... are you hungry or thirsty?"
"Thirsty."
"I'm boiling water. It will be ready soon."
Julian initially thought to say he could just drink water from the fridge, but then changed his mind and nodded. "Okay."
The kitchen was large, about fifty square meters. He had been at the doorway, then took a few steps toward her, stopping at the counter about ten meters away from her. A perfectly safe distance, but Isabella felt inexplicably nervous.
The kitchen was quiet, only the faint hum of the electric kettle boiling water.
Neither spoke.
"Did—" "You—" They spoke at the same time.
Julian smiled slightly. "You first."
"Lena said you arrived today? Why didn't you tell your brother so he could send someone to pick you up?"
Just then, the kettle switched off. Julian strode over quickly. Before Isabella could reach for the kettle to pour the water, he grabbed the handle. "Let me. Don't burn yourself."
Isabella took two steps back.
He had his back to her, so she naturally couldn't see the expression on his face. The corner of his mouth was faintly curved, as if smiling, but there was no warmth in his eyes. He knew why she kept asking if they had arrived today. She asked Lena once, and now she was asking him again. He had deliberately told Lena to say that, using the excuse that "if we didn't come home first thing, my brother and sister-in-law would be upset."
To create an alibi for himself.
He poured hot water into her cup, already prepared with brown sugar and ginger slices. Then he turned and handed her the cup, a warm, harmless smile on his face. "My brother is so busy. Renting a car was quite convenient for us."