Mr. Hawthorne, Your Wife Wants a Divorce Again-Chapter 1074: Can’t Come True

Half an hour later, Ann Vaughn walked out of the study, face pale. She didn’t even notice the servant greeting her, her eyes hollow as she walked toward the master bedroom.

As soon as the door closed, the phone in her pocket rang.

After a full five minutes of repeated ringing, Ann Vaughn’s sluggish gaze finally moved slightly and she belatedly took out her phone to answer it.

"Hello?"

"...Why do you sound so exhausted?"

It was Josiah Keaton, who hadn’t shown up for a long time.

Ann Vaughn thought he had already left but didn’t expect him to still be in the country.

Rubbing her aching temples, Ann Vaughn walked to the hammock and sat down, asking, "Do you need something from me?"

"Can’t I call you if I don’t need anything?" Josiah Keaton huffed discontentedly, sounding quite self-satisfied, "Why is J Country sending someone to monitor your clinic? What did you do?"

Ann Vaughn was momentarily stunned.

Has J Country already sent people to the country?

Surprised at heart, Ann Vaughn didn’t show it and calmly asked, "What could I have done?"

"Who knows, you’ve got quite the nerve. Didn’t you almost get Number 1 to..."

"Get to what?"

Those complaints were not finished when Josiah Keaton suddenly realized, "Nothing. Anyway, there’s no need to worry too much, the evidence J Country has is not strong enough yet. They won’t easily convict you with it."

Ann Vaughn knew he was changing the subject but didn’t expose him, merely responding with a light "Hmm," "I understand, thanks for your concern."

Possibly out of guilt, Josiah Keaton didn’t notice Ann Vaughn’s perfunctory tone, gave her a few reminders, and quickly hung up the call.

The phone screen gradually dimmed.

Ann Vaughn lowered her eyes, staring at her reflection in the screen, silent and confused.

Suddenly remembering something, she stood up from the hammock, walked to the bookshelf on the wall, and pulled out the materials Josiah Keaton had given her earlier.

Plop.

Something fell along with it.

Seeing the manila notebook that dropped onto the table, Ann Vaughn’s gaze was momentarily dazed; she almost forgot about this...

Holding the manila notebook, Ann Vaughn returned to the hammock, sat down, and began to read.

The more she read, the graver Ann Vaughn’s expression became.

Without finishing the contents, Ann Vaughn stood up and dashed outside, heading to number 16 at the fastest pace possible.

Wilder Sheridan was in the living room drinking medicine when he saw Ann Vaughn run in breathlessly. He grabbed a tissue box and went up to wipe her sweat.

"Sis, what’s wrong? What happened to make you so rushed?"

Ann Vaughn paused for a moment, waiting for her breathing to steady, before asking, "Where’s elder brother? I need to find him."

Wilder hummed softly, "I can help too."

Ann Vaughn couldn’t help but chuckle, patting his head, "You come along too. This matter is very important."

The mischievous child then flashed a satisfied smile.

Upstairs, Ann Vaughn spread the manila notebook on the table, briefly explaining what she had seen to them.

"You mean... in the first two years after mom had her incident, she was actually imprisoned by Lucy Lock?" Eli Sheridan’s face turned cold, fists clenching on the table, veins bulging.

Since his birth, Wilder had never seen Shuhua Vaughn. Compared to Eli, his impression of her was much fainter.

But blood is thicker than water, and ties run deep, impossible to have no emotion at all.

To hear now that Shuhua Vaughn didn’t die accidentally in the raging river back then, but was imprisoned in a basement by Lucy Lock for four entire years, with cries for help falling on deaf ears, how could he not be angry?

"Sis, is this all true?" Wilder looked at Ann Vaughn with reddened eyes.

Ann Vaughn pressed her lips and nodded, "This diary was given to me by Ron Warren after the Lockwood Family’s fire, it’s highly credible."

"Indeed it’s Lucy Lock’s handwriting... and besides that, there’s another person’s." Eli Sheridan took a deep breath, frowning as he flipped through the manila notebook, "It’s Micah Hawthorne, he was already colluding with Lucy Lock long ago."

Unfortunately, by the time Eli Sheridan grew up and gained power to investigate the two of them, many clues had already been washed away by the flow of time found with no trace.

That’s why he had never found out that Shuhua Vaughn had been alive but tortured while being held by Lucy for four years...

The contents of the diary were shocking. Even someone as strong-minded as Eli Sheridan couldn’t bear to keep reading.

He feared that if he continued, he wouldn’t be able to resist storming into the prison to take vengeance on Lucy Lock, the main culprit!

"No wonder back then, no matter what Lucy Lock did to us, even when she almost killed us, dad never held her accountable or avenged us." Wilder clenched his fists tightly, a wave of bitterness rising in his heart, "Lucy Lock was likely using this point to constantly control dad..."

The relationship between Wilder and Stanley Sheridan had always been bad, partly because of this.

No one could tolerate their father repeatedly favoring the person who killed their own mother and ignoring the injuries suffered by his own children.

Even later, when Wilder learned that Stanley Sheridan and Lucy Lock had been in a relationship, the father-son quarrel gradually evolved into estrangement and resentment that lasted for years.

But at that moment, Wilder’s resentment toward Stanley Sheridan suddenly became complicated.

"What did Lucy Lock do to you?" Ann Vaughn couldn’t help but ask.

Eli Sheridan and Wilder exchanged a glance, tacitly choosing to hide the truth, not telling Ann Vaughn everything, so as not to make her upset with Stanley Sheridan.

This wasn’t out of consideration for Stanley Sheridan, they simply didn’t want her to be weighed down by anger.

Yet in Ann Vaughn’s heart, opinions toward that "never-before-seen" biological father started to form.

Wilder’s earlier words "even when she almost killed us" hadn’t escaped her ears, indicating the real situation was far more dangerous than they let on.

Moreover, even with her short interaction with Lucy Lock, she could tell what kind of person she was, and it seemed inconceivable that Stanley Sheridan was willing to be manipulated by her for years.

"This diary is from four years ago, and there’s no mention of whether mom escaped later... Annie, did Ron Warren ever talk to you about this?" Eli Sheridan asked.

Ann Vaughn shook her head, "No, he didn’t say anything. But I think there’s a possibility..."

"Possibility of what?"

"Nothing, just thinking, maybe mom is still out there somewhere." Ann Vaughn pressed a spot over her heart, a letter she read in the study flashing in her mind, her lashes trembling lightly.

Perhaps Shuhua Vaughn survived that chaos.

Perhaps that event never happened, and that person was lucky enough to survive.

Perhaps... there’s still a chance for redemption.

But Ann Vaughn knew all too well, maybe was just a maybe, unlikely to become reality.