Chapter 145 Lack of GratitudeRe-edited

Ziv appeared at the door holding Elsa in his arms. She was still in her nightgown and sleeping cap, thanks to Ziv’s insistence that they hurry up.

“We’re all right now,” said Elsa and gave a tap on Ziv’s arm. Immediately he put her down.

With his arms around Bella, Charles gave Ziv a cold eye and ordered him out of the room. The obedient butler had no choice but observe the order.

Elsa moved closer to examine Bella’s wound. Charles moved away so that the old woman could do her job but didn’t let go of her hand.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going away,” he said to the blank faced Bella.

His devotion did not impress Bella，who preferred to remain expressionless throughout the painful process. She did not make a single sound despite the pain she felt while Elsa disinfected the wound and removed the bullet with a pair of tweezers.

The old woman’s final piece of advice after she had bandaged the wound was for Else to avoid any form of strenuous activity until it had completely healed.

Then she was out of the room.

Bella would have gone after her if it weren’t for Charles who held her back. He put his arms around her and shoved his face into hers.

“Why did you try to protect me?” he asked.

Bella did not raise her head and made no move to run away, she just stood there quietly. Her crystal clear voice came out somehow dry. “You can call it instinct. I didn’t want to see you getting hurt.”

Charles’s blue eyes were surging with some kind of indescribable emotion. Bella, on the other hand, was still unsure about whether she had seen that illusion with the seawater. There was only one thing she remained certain about. That Charles cared about Katherine more than he cared about her.

“Tell me the truth,” she asked. “Did you ever love me?”

Charles lowered his head and at the same time, he shot her a side-glance that revealed the true intention of his soul. There was a degree of beauty and honesty in those eyes; this however could not make the truth less unpleasant.

“I see,” she murmured and dropped her head. “I must go to sleep now.”

She was fed up with him and all she wanted was to get out of there. Bella was about to walk straight out of the room when she felt his hands seizing her from behind. Once more, she was in his warm embrace, feeling his kisses all over her neck and face.

They were intense and full of passion. He bit her lips before letting his tongue slide into her mouth. Charles knew very well which buttons to push to make Bella a slave to the intense passion.

Bella however was unwilling to succumb to this relentless assault to her innermost sensations. Her tears were pouring down her cheeks while at the same moment her tongue was engaged with Charles’s in a hopeless dance.

The salty taste of her tears reached his lips, but even then, he was reluctant to let her go. Instead, he squeezed her more tightly, fearing that if he loosed his grip she would vanish forever.

Bella’s black eyes met with his blue eyes. All that she could read in them was the pettiness of his character. The shallowness and triviality of his soul.

The abyss of his thoughts.

Still, he wasn’t willing to let go of her. This kind of behavior struck her as absurd. He had just admitted that he never loved her. Why did he still cling on her in such a manner?

One of his hands was resting on her face and his thumb was over her lips that were still wet because of his kiss. A morbid kind of fascination was gleaming in his eyes.

Somehow, she managed to escape his clutch and directed herself towards the door. To her surprise, she discovered a small crowd standing there, gazing curiously into the room.

One of them was Ziv. Was he responsible for dragging all these people over there to observe her personal drama?

How long had they been there? She had no idea. The idea of having to deal with them was tiresome but it sounded a better option than having to deal with Charles.

“Honey!” he shouted out and his hand reached out for hers.

Charles!”

That was Katherine screaming from the other side of the corridor. Her voice made Charles loosen his grip around Bella’s fingers. Which turned out to be the final straw for Bella.

“Goodbye,” she said and walked out of the room.

She didn’t own him anything any longer. Thanks to the bullet she had received for his sake, she had paid back all her debts. She didn’t need his support either, for now she had the ability to earn money by herself.

Before Charles had one last chance to lunge after Bella, someone had thrown herself in between. It was none other than Katherine.

“Charles honey, are you all right?” She was crying and laughing simultaneously while saying those words.

Charles’s eyes were still locked on Bella who was now moving past the crowd. Her shoulder was bare and the blood stained gauze was visible by everyone.

He did not worry about Bella not being able to recover from her injury, but his heart seemed to be taken away along with every step she took further from him.

Despite his promise to spend his entire life with Katherine, Charles’s heart was now aching for Bella. He could not understand how she was so cruel to walk away from him.

His eyes were frozen with fear he watched her walk away from his life.

No!

It was unimaginable for Bella to leave him at this moment.

“How did you find out?” he asked Katherine in an indifferent manner while he continued to stare at Bella’s direction.

“I had a nightmare where someone was trying to kill you, and I woke up frightened. That moment my maid told me there was a gunfight in the mansion.”

“What a strange coincidence,” observed Charles.

“Are you hurt, honey?” she asked in a considerate manner.

“Thanks to Bella I wasn’t shot. She took the bullet for me.”

“Bella? So how is she?”

“She’ll be fine.”

This wasn’t what Katherine was expecting to hear. Now that Bella had saved Charles from the shooting, he would be unwilling to kick her out of the Williams Mansion. If only that bullet had done away with Bella. How convenient things would become!

Katherine wanted to say something, but Charles interrupted her. “You had better go back to bed. I need to carry out an interrogation.”

Without giving a second glance at Katharine, Charles ordered Ziv to have the prisoner delivered to the interrogation room.