Blessing In Disguise
"You call this madness? Are you kidding me now?" Alejandro smirked.
"You heard me, right, dad. I wasn't bluffing when I told you," Mary affirmed. She stood on her ground and refused to be intimidated.
She wasn't even bothered if an arrangement had been put in place already.
"If there's madness, then it has to come from you because you're being delusional right now," Alejandro chastised Mary.
Despite his rage, he tried his best not to scream. He didn't want the guests to have the slightest idea of what was happening.
He had already lost some of his guests. The last thing he wanted for himself was to be labelled a big disappointment.
Alejandro had already bragged to his friends and close associates that the wedding would be a memorable one.
Mary wasn't far from the truth when she said the wedding meant a lot to Alejandro than to anyone else.
Seeing her father speak to her in such a way was quite heartbreaking.
She would have preferred if someone else had called her delusional but her Father? That's something she couldn't accept.
With rage in her eyes, she marched to Alejandro.
She looked at him in the eyes and said, "Call me delusional once more Dad, and see the stuff I'm made of,"
Edging backwards to find his balance, Alejandro pointed to himself, "Are you threatening me right now?"
He looked behind him to be sure if there was someone else that Mary may have directed the question to
Sadly, he couldn't find anyone. It was enough proof that his little Mary of yesterday had suddenly inculcated the nerves to talk back at him.
"What kind of Father are you? Why do you hate me so much?" Mary wept.
She quickly wiped off her tears when she saw some guests approaching her.
As much as she hated her life, she didn't want to give anyone the impression that she was speaking to her Father in so much disdain.
"A while ago, we escaped an assassination attempt on our lives, but what did you do?" Mary halted to exhale.
Alejandro was about to speak up, but she was fast enough to cut him off with an upraised arm," I am not done talking. You speak when I'm done. Are we clear?"
She spoke to her father as though he were her kid brother. Like a statue, Alejandro stood still.
He kept glaring at Mary like a dummy. He widened his mouth in a fly-catching position, as though he were hypnotized by Mary's charm.
It now dawned on him that Mary couldn't be tamed anymore and he was willing to live with the truth for the rest of his life
"You didn't call the police because you wanted the marriage to still proceed.
What if I were shot dead in the process? Do you think Antonio would have dropped the charges against you?" Mary confronted Alejandro with the mind-blowing questions.
She spoke as though she were a trained force. If she weren't his daughter, he would have sworn that she was a private investigator for a criminal case.
"You were attacked?" A baritone voice spoke from behind.
Immediately, Mary froze.
She could feel her soul departing from her body.
The voice sounded familiar, but she hoped and prayed that it wouldn't be Hilton.
She has been through a lot of shit for the last couple of hours.
She would rather not complicate things with the presence of Hilton.
She's quite sure that Hilton won't understand her, even if she explained a thousand times.
"I asked again where did you attack? When did this happen? And why didn't you tell me?" The voice spoke again.
This one spoke differently, which aided Mary's comprehension.
With the last confidence embedded inside of her, she spun around and saw Romeo standing next to her.
"Romeo?
Oh, shit," she held her chest in relief when she discovered that it wasn't Hilton.
Now she understood why Romeo didn't yell at her or do something stupid when he overheard her conversation with Alejandro.
She knew that with Hilton, it would have been a different story.
Alejandro was confused.
He has barely said a word since Mary warned him not to.
However, this seemed a lot more convincing. He couldn't fathom why Mary was quite relaxed to see Romeo.
"Isn't he Hilton's brother? What gave you the impression that he won't tell his brother?" Alejandro asked Mary after the prolonged silence.
He has numerous questions in his head and he's pretty sure Mary is the best person to satisfy his curiosity
"In this, the point where someone starts doing the talking? I don't want to do what's in my head now,"
Romeo flared.
He turned out to be quite the opposite of what Mary envisaged.
She thought he'd be a walk in the park. She had no idea that he'd become his biggest nightmare!
"Fine!
I'll talk.
At least, I stand a better chance with you than with your brother," Mary finally surrendered.
Romeo stayed on red alert.
He widened his ears to avoid missing out on any important information that Mary was about to disseminate.
On the verge of letting the cat out of the bag, Hilton appeared out of the blue to interrupt them.
He seemed a lot more disturbed than they were. He constantly stared at his phone and paced around as though he were searching for a lost item.
"Hilton, what's wrong?
I've never seen you like this before," Romeo said as he got closer to Hilton.
It was quite strange how his attention had drifted to his brother. He suddenly forgot about Mary's confession.
None of that meant anything to him anymore. He may be at loggerheads with Hilton. However, it's not enough to break the bond between them.
Without saying a word, Hilton passed his phone over to Romeo just to feed his eyes
"What the heck?"
Romeo screamed the moment he read the text on Hilton's phone.
His voice was so loud that it alerted Antonio.
In the next minute, Antonio had already joined Hilton and the others. Romeo's scream was too loud for him to ignore.