He Thought I Came For Money, But Got My Last Words Chapter 05

I didn’t want to go back to that house. I went to my dad’s old house.

My phone buzzed.

Jason had sent me his first real text message in three years.

[Come back and make Sophia some oatmeal to apologize.]

I looked at it for a long time. I almost laughed.

The call finally went through. His voice was impatient. “Did you hear me? Sophia said she wants yours…”

“Jason.” I cut him off. My voice was barely a whisper. “If I died, would you be sad?”

The question that had haunted me for months, I finally got to ask it.

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end.

Then his voice suddenly got louder. “What the hell is wrong with you lately? Who told you to keep talking like that? Just tell me how much you want. It’s not like I won’t give it to you.”

“Where are you? I’ll come right now.”

In the end, he still didn’t give me an answer.

But it didn’t matter anymore.

The call ended.

I lay down on the old wooden bed I used to share with my dad when I was little. I took out an old phone from a rusty tin box.

Inside were our chat logs from when we were in our early twenties.

[I saw a rainbow today. Think that means my chances just went up?]

[Chances for what?]

[Asking a certain weirdo named Emily Watson out. You know, the one with the slowest reaction time on the planet.]

The pain had spread from my leg bone to my whole body. It felt like something inside me was being ripped apart.

I wanted to laugh, to cry, to scream, to shout.

But no sound came out. Just a few tears at the corners of my eyes.

I read through all eight thousand of our old messages, then I deleted them.

With my last bit of strength, I swallowed the sleeping pills and the painkillers.

My consciousness started to fade, and the pain finally began to ease.

For the first time in months, I smiled a real smile and closed my eyes.

Jason.

I’m free.

I don’t hate you.

I hope this time, you get to marry the girl you really love.

—

Jason stared at the disconnected call. He felt restless.

Instinctively, he opened the phone tracking app.

He had begged and cajoled her into installing it when they were dating, and back then, he used to check it every so often.

He hadn’t opened it since he found out she was a con artist.

The red dot was at an old, rundown neighborhood.

He frowned and stood up to get his keys.

“Jason?” Sophia tugged at his sleeve, her eyes still red. “You promised to take me to the company gala tonight. My finger still hurts.”

He paused, looking at the small bandage on her finger. Then he sat back down.

“Yeah, okay.”

Jason was distracted the entire gala.

The woman’s faint voice kept echoing in his head.

He tugged at his tie, irritated, and told his assistant Chris to look into who Emily had been seeing lately.

What kind of con artist had such a good act?

But why did he even care? Emily was just a liar who would sell her own body for money.

Jason rubbed his forehead as Chris gave his report.

“Mrs. Mitchell hasn’t been in contact with anyone except for going to the hospital.”

“She has a very small social circle. Only her father, who passed away three years ago.”

Jason’s hand tightened on his wine glass. He stood up abruptly.

Everyone turned to look, but he didn’t care. He asked again, his voice low. “She had a father?”

But Sophia had told him Emily was an orphan who made her living scamming rich men.

“Yes, sir. Three years ago. Her father died of bone cancer.”

Jason’s mind went blank, his knees almost giving out.

So there was a chance. A chance she hadn’t been lying.

Bone cancer.

Those two words. He had seen them somewhere before.

Where?

And then it hit him.

The message Emily had sent months ago.