Chapter 573 Toby’s Confession
“And?”
“Then…” Sonia trembled a little as her expression implied that she was blaming herself. “Then, I asked him how he was, but he said he was fine, so I thought he was just bothered by the situation that Paradigm Co. was in. Had I insisted on taking him to a doctor, I would’ve known that he was drugged and he wouldn’t have taken his own life as a result. It’s all my fault; I could have saved him, but I missed my chance to do so because I was negligent. Am I a terrible daughter, Toby?”
“No, you aren’t.” Toby held her hand and looked at her in a serious manner. “After all, no one in the world can predict what will happen the next minute, and neither did it occur to anyone that your father was mentally ill because he was drugged. So, all of this isn’t your fault and you need to stop blaming yourself for that. Furthermore, I believe your dad wouldn’t want you to beat yourself up either. In fact, what you need to do now is to stop dwelling on what you think was your mistake and gather the evidence that can prove your father was drugged.”
Sonia’s eyes widened in response as he seemingly managed to talk some sense into her. She then pulled herself together and acted like a tough cookie. “You’re right. I need to pull myself together and avenge my father!”
“Now, that’s the spirit.” Toby gently caressed her hair and asked, “Are you hungry? You haven’t eaten anything since this morning, so I bet you’re probably starving, aren’t you?”
Sonia was about to say that she wasn’t hungry because she had lost her appetite after learning the shocking revelation. However, before she could speak her mind, her stomach started to growl, prompting her to cover it with her hands with an embarrassed look.
Toby chuckled and stood up before he held her hand and led her to the dining area. “Come on, let’s grab something to eat first. You need to keep your strength up so that you have the energy to go on with your day, and that includes avenging your father.”
She puckered her lips in silence and obediently followed the man. After breakfast, he went out to take care of his work, although he had a wedding ceremony to attend. Therefore, he didn’t stick around to accompany Sonia.
Meanwhile, Sonia stayed behind in the estate to wait for Nancy’s news. When the clock struck 3:00PM, Nancy’s call came through where she informed Sonia about Jessica’s location. Sonia learned that Jessica had been deported from Kosovo to the Republic of Mesania where she held citizenship rights. Therefore, she was currently on a plane back to the Republic of Mesania.
Upon learning about Jessica’s whereabouts, Sonia furrowed her eyebrows because she was already one step behind. After all, she had planned to make her way to Jessica’s current location and interrogate her, but was surprised that the Lazuli Family had beat her to it and sent her on a flight to the Republic of Mesania. Ugh! Great! How am I supposed to capture her now?
Sonia rubbed her temples in frustration, wondering how she could get to Jessica. Well, it appears that the only way for me to capture Jessica is to pay a visit to the Republic of Mesania by myself.
At the thought of that, Sonia quickly reached out for her phone and browsed through the calendar to find an empty slot in her schedule for a visit to the Republic of Mesania. Shortly after that, she decided to set it at the end of the month because that was when Paradigm Co. would hold their stock taking. Therefore, she reckoned she would be less busy by then and would have more time to locate Jessica. Thinking that Jessica could lead her to more discoveries about Titus’ wicked plan back then, Sonia believed she should start her investigation with her half-sister. Meanwhile, Sonia was absorbed in her train of thoughts as she stared blankly at the window in an absent-minded manner.
The next day, Sonia and Toby took a flight and flew back to their country. On their way home, she appeared to be spaced out most of the time, even nearly running into a few other people who were coming her way. Fortunately for her, he was by her side to prevent that from happening or she would’ve hurt herself by falling.
“Does that matter still bother you? Toby had a magazine in his hand while he gazed at the unhappy lady beside him in the first class cabin.
Sonia responded by rubbing her cheek. “How can I just let it go? It’ll probably take days at the very least.” Back then, when she first thought that her father committed suicide, she struggled to accept the truth; now that she realized her father’s death had been orchestrated, there was no way she could easily calm herself.
“Stop overthinking.” He gently lifted his arm over her head to place it on her shoulders.
“What are you doing?” Her body tensed up.
“You should get some sleep. Look at your dark circles and swollen eyes. I guess you had a rough night, didn’t you?” Toby told Sonia about her swollen eyes.
She felt her swollen eyes and was tongue-tied at that moment. After all, she had a sleepless night as she couldn’t stop picturing her father committing suicide the moment she closed her eyes. In fact, she had been haunted by nightmares for a long time after her father’s suicide, which took her a lot of time before she overcame it, only to fall apart once more now.
“Alright, it’s time for you to take a nap. Come on, use my shoulder as your pillow,” Toby repeated.
Sonia met his caring eyes and turned her attention to his shoulder while puckering her lips. “Thank you.” The moment she finished speaking, she closed her eyes and leaned on the man’s shoulder. Strangely enough, her exhaustion and insecurities simply dissipated when her head rested on his shoulder. I don’t feel sleepy anymore. Is this all because he is by my side?
“Toby.” She cast a serious look on the man’s flank.
“Yeah?” The man shifted his gaze away from the magazine to her face, only to meet her wide gaze with a chuckle. “You’re still awake, aren’t you?”
Sonia blinked and asked, “Can I ask you something?”
“What is it?”
She responded, “Can I trust you?”
“Why would it even occur to you to ask such a question? What kind of trust are you referring to?” Toby raised his eyebrows.
Then, Sonia lowered her head before she continued, “You said you love me, but can I trust you that you will continue to love me? We both used to correspond with each other through letters, but you fell in love with me even before you met me. Yet, why weren’t you able to tell that Tina wasn’t me? Were you ever in love with me?”
A pang of guilt greeted him after hearing Sonia’s words as he gently caressed her head and replied remorsefully, “I’m so sorry, Sonia. I didn’t fail to recognize you, but instead, something happened whereby I ended up with no memory of you.”
“What do you mean?” A confused Sonia looked up. “Did you have amnesia back then?”
“No, it wasn’t amnesia.” Toby shook his head.
Back then, he had already noticed Tina’s disguise when she posed as Sonia to meet him. At the same time, he also instructed Tom to investigate who Maple was and why Tina had posed as her, but before Tom could even reveal the results, Miles had hypnotized both men and those around him into thinking that Tina was indeed Maple. Because of that, Toby’s brain omitted the fact that he was already aware that Tina was an imposter and firmly believed her to be Maple.
“It wasn’t amnesia?” Sonia asked in puzzlement, “This is confusing. If you didn’t suffer from amnesia, why is it that you had no memory of me?” She couldn’t understand what he said because she found it hardly logical.
Toby blinked, seemingly having trouble expressing his thoughts. A few seconds later, he looked at her and clarified, “Would you believe me if I said I had been hypnotized?”
“Hypnotized?” Sonia bolted into a straight posture. “You were hypnotized?”
He nodded and proceeded to share about the evil plan that Tina made with Miles.
After Sonia heard Toby’s story, there was silence from her for the longest time whereas Toby looked her in the eye, aware that she had yet to calm herself from the shock that he had been hypnotized. Thus, he kept quiet and patiently waited for her to respond. A few moments later, she snapped out of her trance and gulped. “Wow, this is surprising! I can’t believe something like this would actually happen in reality.”
