I chuckled, “I see Justin treating you well. Are you guys together?”
Her face turned dark at the mention of Justin. She was keeping her anger in check, but I was still able to discern it. She answered after a short pause, “We’re just friends. He has someone he likes, and it’s not me. So please don’t misunderstand. I am dating anyone at the moment as I want to focus on my career.”
I nodded with understanding. “Both career and relationship are equally important. A woman will only get married once in their lifetime, so you have to take your relationship seriously. When Ashton and I were younger, we didn’t get to experience the whole dating scene. We just got married. Now that I think about it, it is quite regretful. I think it is best if people could date more before getting married.”
Her eyes sparkled at my comment. “Did you and Mr. Fuller got married without dating first?”
I nodded and replied, “Ashton and I were an example of love after marriage. Our grandparents were the ones who arranged our marriage. His grandfather and my grandmother were good friends.”
Surprise crossed Stella’s face. “So you and Mr. Fuller didn’t have the freedom to date.”
I nodded in agreement. She couldn’t hide the look of surprise. “I thought that both of you had dated freely, and it turned out that it was actually because of your grandparents’ friendship. But I heard from my colleagues that the Fullers prioritize status above everything else.”
I laughed at her remark because it couldn’t be further from the truth. Not many of the employees knew my background. Rachel had always thought that Ashton was way out of my league all these years. She considered herself to be on par with me and that she could marry Ashton as well.
I laughed at my thought. “Ms. Collins, are you close to Ms. Zimmer from the Technology department?”
She was puzzled at my remark but shook her head in reply. “We’re not close. Why do you ask?”
“It’s nothing.” I shook my head and prepared to leave. “It’s getting late, and I have a date with someone, so I’ll be taking my leave.”
She opened her mouth to say something but snapped her mouth close when she saw that I was leaving. She finally uttered, “Bye!”
After leaving the company, my phone received an apology text from Ashton. I gave it a glimpse, then stuffed the phone in my purse.
It wasn’t that I was mad at him. Sometimes, some things didn’t need to be clarified too clearly.
Shortly after, I received a call from Nora. “Scarlett, what are you doing right now? Are you busy? I’m so bored that I could watch the paint dry.”
I glanced at the time, and it was two in the afternoon. I just realized that it was possible that Ashton hadn’t had lunch yet. He went to search for Zachary in the morning, then was busy searching for me. So all his work from the morning must have had compiled to be cleared in the afternoon.
“Scarlet, are you there? Why are you not talking? What’s wrong?” Nora’s questions from the phone dragged me back from my thoughts. “I’m here. What’s up?”
“Do you know the location of the company Armond is working at? I couldn’t reach him since I’ve arrived at K City. He didn’t pick up his phone, and I didn’t get any replies from him on WhatsApp. Do you know if something had happened to him?” Worry was laced in Nora’s tone.
Thinking back to the morning when I just met Armond, I frowned and said, “K City has many places of interest. Take some time out to visit them. It could be that Armond is quite busy with work these days, so he didn’t have time to take care of you.”
She breathed out a long sigh. “I know he’s busy with work, but he couldn’t have been busy the entire day, right? Even if he is busy, don’t tell me he didn’t even have time to glance at his phone. I have never asked him to pick up all my calls, but it has been a few days, so I am sure he must’ve seen the texts on his phone. I mean… he could’ve at least replied to one of my messages!”
My head was starting to ache. “I’m not sure where the headquarters of the Murphy Corporation is in K City, but even if I do know, Armond may not be there.”
She sighed, “I understand. I don’t know what’s wrong with him these days. It felt like he was avoiding me, and I don’t know what I’ve done wrong. Scarlett, could it be that he had met someone he likes?”
“Nora, how much do you like him?” I didn’t know how to advise her because Armond wasn’t sincere in dating her. I had kept quiet initially because I didn’t see his true color. However, I knew it now, and she would fell deeper into the rabbit hole if I continued to remain silent. I was worried that she would hate me for not telling her.
She was silent for a while. “I couldn’t say how much, but I was planning to spend the rest of my life with him. Scarlett, I know it isn’t wise to tie my emotions and everything on a man, but I can’t control it. He was the first person I loved in my entire life. When I couldn’t find him these few days, I wanted to head to the Murphy Residence to look for him. I know I’m not inferior to him, but I just couldn’t control myself.”
