My Darling, My Dearest

"About what?" Jack finally raised his head, but his voice was so calm it didn't even waver for a second.

Rachel lowered her eyes and smiled bitterly. "What do you think?"

As soon as she said those words, Jack looked away and lowered his head again. He held out his chopsticks to pick on the vegetables on his plate, but he didn't respond any further.

Rachel felt like her chest was stuffed with a big mass of cotton, it was suffocating. After a moment of silence, she asked, "Where have you been these past two days?"

It turned out that asking this question was not as difficult as she thought. That question had been weighing down on her mind for several days and now she was finally relieved.

Jack closed his eyes for a while. When he opened them again, his clear eyes gradually became a little stormy. They carried too much unspoken emotions. He reached out to hold Rachel's hand tightly. "Your aunt passed away."

'My aunt passed away?'

Looking straight at into his eyes for a while, Rachel suddenly grinned and laughed. "Jack, are you kidding me? I just had a video chat with Eric and the two of them were laughing happily. How could she pass away all of a sudden?"

She looked up, withdrew her hand, and pressed it on her forehead. She kept denying what she heard. "No, my aunt is very healthy. How could she suddenly die?"

"Rachel, calm down." Jack looked at her with worry and licked his lips. "That night, your aunt and Eric drank too much at home. She fell down the stairs by accident and hit her head against the railing. She died on the spot."

"No, that's impossible." The realization came in her mind like an explosion. Rachel's limbs slowly stiffened at a speed visible to the naked eye. She kept shaking her head in denial. "She just hit the railing? How come she wasn't rescued? Jack, you must be kidding me, right?"

She frantically searched for something in his suit jacket. She muttered, "Jack, where's your phone? Give me your phone. Today is April Fools' Day, right? You're lying to me, aren't you?"

Seeing that Jack was just looking at her without uttering a single word, Rachel finally couldn't control her emotions. She grabbed his arm tightly and roared, "Jack, say something! Why aren't you saying anything? Tell me that you're lying!"

Her gloomy eyes instantly glistened and her tears welled up like she had stored them with water for a long time.

Rachel sniffed and tried her best to hold back her tears. Her pretense of being strong just made Jack more distressed.

His thumb gently caressed her cheek, and he felt like there was a lump in his throat. He choked, "Rachel, if you want to cry, just cry on my shoulder."

"No, I won't cry." Rachel kept saying in defiance while shaking her head and biting her lips.

Despite that, her tears kept spilling out and the more they spilled, the more she couldn't stop.

Although her aunt was like a cloud in the sky which couldn't be stopped and caught, she still wandered and spent some time with Rachel.

Still, she was the only elder member of her

family in the world.

Her parents died when she was a child. Only this aunt could make her feel like she wasn't alone in this world. But now, even her aunt had left her.

And it all happened so suddenly.

She finally broke down and leaned on Jack's shoulder. She cried so hard, so desperately, and her tears poured out of her eyes like a broken dam. Even he felt an immense sorrow in an

instant.

After crying for a long time, Rachel's eyes were red and swollen. Her tears seemed to have dried up when she asked in a hoarse voice, "What about my cousin? How is he now?"

She was so grief-stricken with her aunt's passing so she couldn't even begin to think what Eric was going through.

As soon as she thought of him, Rachel felt a lump in her throat, and tears flashed in her eyes again. Jack quickly reached out to wipe her tears and said in a deep voice, "He's still in the hospital. He held your aunt to try and save her, but they fell down the stairs together."

"What happened to him? Is it serious?"

"He's fine. He'll be discharged from the hospital after two days' rest. But he's blaming himself for his mom's death. He's just lying in the bed without saying a word. He keeps staring at the ceiling with his eyes wide open every day."

He hesitated for a while, but Jack slowly told her the truth about Eric's condition.

When he saw Eric's state, Jack decided he didn't want to hide anything from Rachel. He was kind of preparing her because if something happened to Eric, he was afraid Rachel would also be in that same condition.

Julie was standing behind them, so she clearly heard the entire conversation. Although she had never seen Rachel's aunt and Eric, she understood the affection and intimacy between them when she heard the term "aunt." She saw how hard Rachel was breaking down on Jack's shoulders, so she quickly went upstairs to the bathroom. She took a towel, dipped it in warm water, and twisted it before handing it to Jack. "You'd better use a towel to wipe her face. I'm afraid that using a tissue would severely rub her skin."

"Okay." Jack kept wiping her tears, but he didn't know what to say to comfort her.

He had never experienced the pain of losing a family member, but it pained him nonetheless to see how miserable Rachel was. It was like his heart was torn apart.

No one knew how long Rachel had cried. She just leaned on Jack's shoulder and continued to cry so hard there wasn't even any sound. He thought she already fell asleep so he tried to lift her up, but she stopped him and said in a whisper, "Jack, when did you know?"

"That afternoon when I asked you out for dinner. " Jack smiled bitterly. When he came back, he knew how angry Rachel was because of her attitude towards him.

Rachel straightened herself and took a deep breath. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Jack frowned and seriously said, "That time, I got the news that your aunt was still being revived in the emergency room. I was afraid to make you worried unnecessarily, so I wanted to see the specific situation first and pick you up when your aunt's condition stabilized. But..." He stopped and didn't go on.

Rachel opened her arms and held him tightly. She leaned against his chest and listened to his steady heartbeat. "I'm sorry, Jack. I misunderstood you."

She let her imagination run wild with all kinds of unreasonable guesses on his whereabouts but those were all misunderstandings.

Right now, Rachel realized that she was too narrow-minded. While she was staying at home and thinking of nonsense, Jack was overseas, dealing with things that should have been done by her as the niece. "It's okay. As I said, your business is my business. For me, as long as you are safe, everything will be fine." Jack gently stroked her hair.

He had planned to stay overseas for a few more days, but he suddenly received a call from Austin. He said something had happened to Rachel, so he hurried back.

Sitting beside her bed and looking at the red mark on her neck, Jack felt apologetic when Rachel woke up. If he had taken her overseas at that time, could this have been avoided?

The remorse in his heart couldn't gradually disappear even with Rachel's recovery. He sighed deeply and said, "Rachel, I'm still too useless. I can't protect you well." Her eyes were swollen and uncomfortable after crying for a long time. After lying in bed for a whole day, she felt a little better.

Jack was in the kitchen preparing lunch for two people. He threw the chopped green onion into the soup just as he heard the footsteps behind him. He looked back and saw Rachel slowly walking over in a night robe. His suddenly became nervous. He quickly put down the things in his hands, walked closer to hold her arm, and let her sit down on the chair nearby. "Why did you go down? Call me if you need anything. I'll be upstairs soon."

"We're just separated by one floor. It's too troublesome to make a phone call." Compared with yesterday, Rachel's mood was much more stable.

She held Jack's hand and asked, "Have you booked the tickets? When are we going there?"

"The date isn't decided yet. Do you want to wait another two days? Let's wait for your physical condition to stabilize," he said and looked at Rachel worriedly.

Shaking her head, Rachel insisted, "I'm fine now. Let's go tomorrow, okay?"

Seeing that Jack didn't agree immediately, she persuaded more. "If I don't go see Eric, I would be restless even if I stay here. Jack, let me go there."

"Okay." Jack understood her point. There was only one thing in her mind so how could she possibly just sit here and wait?

What was more, he was actually a little worried about Eric. The psychologist called him in the morning to update him about Eric's condition. He said that Eric had a tendency to fall into depression and his future condition might be bleak.

Once things were finalized, Rachel felt that time was moving faster. She sat in her seat as soon as she got on the plane. She tightly held a seal in her hands and whispered, "Eric, you need to be strong. You will be fine."

Jack gently covered her with a blanket. When he saw the thing on her hand, he asked, "What's that?"

Author's note

Goose BBSS

Translator: Scarlett5555