Love Began with the First Meeting

Aldrich remained silent the whole time, carefully observing the three people before him with his sharp eyes. After James left the room, he finally opened his mouth to talk very slowly,"I didn't expect you to be here today."

As Aaron turned around to face him, his lips curled up in disgust. Taking Ximena's hand in his, he walked towards Aldrich and sat down in front of him. After he let go of her hand, Aaron pulled a cigarette out of a Moroccan leather case and lit it as he sat there, chin pointed up arrogantly. "It's your 60th birthday. How could I not come?" The smile on his face disappeared almost as soon as he looked straight into Aldrich's eyes. If looks could kill, their sharp gaze would have flatlined each other. "You didn't expect me to be here?" Aaron snickered a little as he continued slowly, "You have promised a woman that you will marry her before you turn 60. I'm here out of sheer curiosity. I'd like to see if you will follow through with your promise." It seemed as though Aaron had hit a raw nerve.

All of a sudden Aldrich snapped. Anger flashed across his face as he stood up and banged his fist down the table with such force that he knocked some books down to the floor.

Ximena, who was drowning in her sorrows, was startled by the unexpected loud sound. Blinking her eyes as if she had just woken up from a dream, she finally came to feel the tension in the air.

Disregarding Aldrich's violent outburst, Aaron casually took a drag from his cigarette and blew the smoke upwards while smiling. In his deep, serious voice he said, "You asked to see me, as soon as I arrived. If you really want to talk to me, then I guess you'll have to bear it when I say things that annoy you."

As an experienced soldier, Aldrich should have been good at controlling his temper. However, every time he was faced with Aaron, he would lose his temper quite easily. "You are here just to ruin my day, aren't you?"

Aaron smiled cheekily at him and shook his head. "No, I'm not here to annoy you." His smug smile faded in a more serious expression. "I'm here to watch you die."

"You..." Before he could finish, the old man wheezed and slumped back in his chair, with one stiff, gnarled hand to his chest, a pained expression across his face.

Startled, Ximena released a sharp yelp as she tried to reach out and help him without a conscious thought. But before she could do anything, she was pulled back into her seat.

In utter disbelief, Ximena turned to look at Aaron, who took a drag on his cigarette and blew the smoke out through his nostrils. "You shouldn't stress yourself out with a weak heart. It wouldn't be fun if you weren't alive long enough to see how I take away everything you hold dear from you."

Aldrich stared at him in shock, grimacing, his hand still on his chest. His hands trembled as it took all the strength he had to take out some pills from the drawer.

All the while, stunned by what had happened, Ximena suddenly felt a cold chill quickly pass by her heart. Aldrich swallowed the pills down, but nearly spilled the water when he set it down on the table. After a while his laboured breathing settled down and it seemed as though he was no longer in pain, but Ximena was still frozen in silent panic.

"I won't let you do that," Aldrich hissed with gritted teeth after collecting himself. "You will never get anything from me. Not one bit of my property."

"No, you are wrong." Aaron was still wearing a smug smile on his face. He casually put out the cigarette before looking up at Aldrich with sharp eyes, and declared, "It is I, who will not leave anything for you to keep. I will take everything away from you." Aaron's eyes darkened; his disdainful expression frozen in place. He stood up and pulled Ximena to her feet. "I've been going easy on you all this time. I've finally come to realize that my expectations of you were too high. A man of your character can never live up to such expectations." With a disappointed look on his face, Aaron snorted in contempt. Before walking to the door with Ximena, he cast Aldrich a sympathetic glance one last time.

However, he suddenly stopped, just as he was on his way out. "Oh, I almost forgot. There's something I need to tell you." With his eyes to the door, his usual cold expression was temporarily replaced by sadness, which he failed to hide. In the blink of an eye, Aaron looked like someone whose entire world had collapsed right before his eyes. "She died. Five years after you left us, she died." Aaron sighed in resignation and his lips curled up. "You know, none of that would have happened if you had married her. What a pity."

Aldrich stared at Aaron's back, blankly. It made his innards ache and his heart squeeze tightly with pain when he heard the words,"She died".

Turning his head back to face him again, Aaron glanced at Aldrich, his reproachful eyes filled with disgust and hatred. Finally, he withdrew his gaze and walked out of the room with Ximena, who remained silent still. The housekeeper, who was standing outside the door, displayed mixed emotions on his face as he saw them out.

"Take good care of him," said Aaron, his deep voice showing no sympathy. "I will make him see how I, the one he's so ashamed of, will take away everything he ever cared about."

"Young..."

Aaron raised his eyebrow and gave the housekeeper a stern look to cut him short at once. "Your Highness," he lowered his head and continued, "please go easy on him."

"I will." Aaron smiled bitterly and narrowed his eyes. "At least I won't take away his sons, whom he has always been so proud of." The timbre of his voice, his posture and bearing, gave him an aura of steady authority. "Besides, they'll have to be there to take care of their dying father before they bury him afterwards, right?" The housekeeper looked up in shock with his mouth gaped open. Aaron didn't even bother to glance at him before he left with Ximena.

"Why did you do that to an old man?" Ximena asked curiously, with furrowed eyebrows as Aaron pulled her forward. "I don't know what happened between you and Aldrich, but I can see that both he and the housekeeper care a lot about you." Aaron didn't respond, he just kept walking with his head forward.

"Let go of me!" Ximena's wrists were hurting, so she shook him off. "Where are you taking me to?"