Andrew could only nod, understanding her hesitation. He wasn't even planning to go all the way cause he knew that she wasn't ready. He had unconsciously lost control.
He had made a solemn vow to himself: until Lily truly and willingly accepted them as a married couple, he would not cross that final line.
"No, you don't have to apologize," he said, his voice thick with a mixture of regret. "It was my fault... I completely lost control."
Slowly, he stood up from the couch and gently reached down, helping Stephanie to sit up. He couldn't meet her eyes. "I think we should leave now. It's getting late, and you need to rest."
Lily merely nodded her head in silence, her quiet response heavier than any words. Seeking an escape from the tension in the room, he retreated to the children's bedroom and called for his mother, signaling that it was finally time for them to leave.
The car ride afterward was heavy with an uncomfortable silence until suddenly, Mrs. Kate shattered the quiet with a sharp, probing question.
"I asked the kids when they first met you," she began, her eyes locked on his profile. "They told me it was only about four months ago. So how did all of this happen? Had you really been sleeping with her all that time, six years ago?"
Andrew didn't look away from the dark road ahead. He gripped the steering wheel, his voice flat but strained as he answered her. "No. It wasn't like that. It was the night we celebrated Gray Enterprise's fifteenth anniversary. Claudia drugged me..."
Beside him, the older woman gulped, sensing the dark turn the memory was taking.
Andrew swallowed hard, the memory vivid and agonizing. "...At first, I thought I was just coming down with a fever from being so overworked. So, I decided to drive over to Lily's apartment, since it wasn't far away. But the moment I saw her, I realized the terrifying truth—I had been drugged. I... she suggested she go straight to the pharmacy, but I couldn't wait. My mind was completely gone."
As his confession hung in the tense air of the car, Mrs. Kate looked at him in stunned disbelief. "So... instead of Claudia, you ended up in bed with Stephanie?"
Mrs. Kate asked the question softly, speaking more to herself than to her son.
Andrew lifted his brow, his expression hardening. "You were part of it," he said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "That night, I avoided her the whole time. It was you who gave me the wine..." The realization simmered inside him until he became visibly angry, his fists clenching at his sides.
"We did it for you, Andrew. We just wanted you to have a better life," his mother reasoned, her voice trembling but defensive. Even now, facing her son's wrath, she still refused to admit that what she and her husband had done was fundamentally wrong.
Andrew let out a bitter, angry chuckle. "Was what you and Dad provided for me not enough? Or did you honestly think I was incapable of raising my own standard of life?" The weight of his resentment filling the car. "It is entirely because of you that I am in this state. By now, Lily and I should have been married. Instead, look at me—I am stuck back at the beginning, desperately trying to win her trust."
He took a sharp breath, the pain bleeding through his anger. "Two weeks after what happened between us, she called me. She wanted to tell me something important, but you blocked it. You didn't even give me the chance to meet her. Do you have any idea what she wanted to tell me?..."
Andrew stared down at his mother with pure displeasure, letting the silence hang heavily between them before delivering the final blow. "She wanted to tell me she was pregnant."
Mrs. Kate froze, staying entirely quiet as the words settled. Seeing her sudden shift in posture and defensive attitude, Andy knew immediately that something else wasn't right. The betrayal ran deeper than he thought.
"What is it? Don't force me to find out on my own," Andy cooed, his tone deceptively soft but laced with a sharp warning.
"I... I..." she stammered, completely hesitant. She was terrified of how her son would react if she told him the rest of the truth—that Stephanie had actually come to the house that very day. Looking at his face, she knew he was already far too angry to handle another lie.
Son, calm down first," Mrs. Kate pleaded, her voice trembling as she reached out to her son.
"I can't, so tell me now!" Andy snapped back, his knuckles gripping the steering wheel so tightly they turned white. His breathing was shallow, heavy with a mixture of panic and rage.
Mrs. Kate looked away, unable to hold his intense glare. Tears welled in her eyes. "That... that day... three hours after you left... she came to the mansion. Fortunately, they were stuck in a traffic jam. When the driver suddenly pressed on the brakes, it didn't cause any real damage."
"Andy, calm down!" his mother lamented, her voice cracking as she begged him to stop escalating.
He let out a bitter, devastated laugh that echoed hollowly inside the tense, confined space of the car. "God, Mom. What did Lily ever do to you? You did something to her phone, didn't you? That was why I couldn't reach her! You guys wanted me to marry Claudia, but you barely even knew her. That woman only wanted to marry me because of my money! She even attempted three murders and the police are still actively looking for her right now! Is this the 'better life' you wanted for me? For me to marry a literal murderer?"
The silence that followed was suffocating. Unable to bear being near her for another second, he slammed the car into park and unbuckled his seatbelt. He stepped out of the car, completely devastated. Leaning back through the open door, his voice went cold and dead. "Drive home. I will tell Eric to escort you to the airport tomorrow morning."
Before she could utter another word of apology, he shut the door hard and disappeared into the pitch-black night, paying absolutely no heed to his mother's desperate calls.
As a mother, a crushing weight of worry settled deep into Mrs. Kate's chest. She stared blankly into the darkness where her son had just vanished. Though they had just had a terrible argument, knowing his fragile mental and emotional condition right now, she feared he might do something reckless to harm himself. At this agonizing point, she hated to admit it, but Stephanie was her absolute and only hope to save him. Unfortunately, as she desperately grabbed her phone to call her, she realized she didn't even have Stephanie's current number.
She didn't have Stephanie's number, but she was absolutely certain Eric did. Desperate, she called him and begged for the contact details. However, knowing how poorly the two women got along, Eric flatly refused to give it to her. Left with no other choice, Mrs. Kate explained the gravity of the situation to him, finally convincing him to call Stephanie himself.
The moment Stephanie heard the news, panic seized her. She immediately dialed Andy, but his phone just rang out. She tried again and again, but there was still no reply. Frustrated and growing deeply concerned, she shot him a text message with a strict ultimatum: if he didn't arrive at her apartment within thirty minutes, she was coming out to search for him.
Back inside, Stephanie paced anxiously back and forth across the living room floor, her mind racing with worst-case scenarios. When the thirty minutes finally passed with no sign of him, her anxiety reached a breaking point. She didn't even know where to begin looking. Snatching her phone from the coffee table, she hurried out the door.
She was just about to walk away when she caught a sudden glimpse of a shadow on the floor. Turning around, she froze. Andrew was sitting slumped against the wall, completely defeated. A half-empty bottle of beer was clutched in his trembling hand, and heavy tears streamed down his stained cheeks. He was a complete mess.
Stephanie knelt down, leveling herself with him as her a frustrated melted into pure worry. "Andy..." she whispered softly, reaching for the bottle. "You were sitting out here all along. Please, give me that."
Stephanie stretched out her hand, silently pleading for him to hand over the beer. Instead, he pulled it to his lips and gulped it down.
"Andy... please, stop. Don't drink anymore," she choked out, wrenching the bottle from his grip.
He turned his gaze toward her, fresh tears spilling over his cheeks. The sight of his brokenness made her heart ache with a sharp, emotional pain.
"I'm sorry, Lily," he whispered, his voice cracking under the weight of his regret. "I am so sorry for not being there for you."
"You don't have to apologize," Stephanie comforted him, her voice trembling as she tried to remain strong. "You are here for me and the kids now. That is all that matters."
"Did they really have to go that far?" he asked tearfully, looking completely defeated. "Why can't they just accept the one person who makes my world a better place? Are parents supposed to tear away their own children's happiness?"
"No... it's not like that. Come on, let's go inside and talk."
Stephanie pulled him up, anchoring him as they walked, still holding the half-empty bottle. Inside the apartment, she gently guided him onto the couch. She retreated to the kitchen, quickly pouring the remaining beer down the sink and tossing the empty glass into the trash, desperate to rid the room of it.
When she returned, Andrew had collapsed sideways onto the couch. She quietly sat down beside him, lifted his head, and cradled it tenderly in her lap. Andrew turned, burying his face against her body as his arms wrapped tightly around her, holding on as if she were his only lifeline.