Sorry? For what?
"I'm sorry. You just came back after going missing and were already a mess, and I just..." He let out a sigh and then patted my hand.
"I'm sorry, Laurie. But I just... I couldn't help but get angry at her. You were gone for more than 24 hours, no one knew where you had gone, you didn't take our car either, I couldn't find you or track you anywhere—and when she said you went there because she told you to do so, I lost it," he said with a remorseful face.
"It's okay. Sometimes you can't help but... burst out all your frustrations. Thank younfor standing up for me, by the way," I said softly.
He jerked his face toward me, eyes widened in shock.
"Are you okay? Did you hit your head somewhere? What did you do to my sister? My sister never says thank you!". His expressions, his tone, his body language, it all changed as soon as i said it...the playfulness in his voice chnaged into a one filled with seriousness.
As he began saying those words, I felt my heart leap into my throat, thinking he knew I wasn't the real Laurel... but then, when he said that Laurel never says thank you, I felt at ease.
Stop over reacting Sarah!
I laughed at his words and smacked his shoulder playfully, trying to act nonchalant.
"I am your sister, and you're the one who got his head hit—not me!" I said and turned my face sideways, staring out of the window as Kalix's chuckle reached my ears, making me smile a little.
"Don't sulk, baby sister. Let's get your mood cheered up." He said and pulled into the parking lot of an ice cream parlour.
It was the famous ice cream parlour—the one Laurel always went to for a treat, and where she saw Cassian and Elodie going on their first date.
Yes, Elodie. Elodie West, the female lead of the novel, the only daughter of Valor Enterprise's chief director.
The one Laurel never liked. Elodie was kind, naïve, loving, and caring—someone who was the total opposite of Laurel Miller. These were the reasons why Cassian never came to love Laurel, but fell for Elodie at first glance.
I kept staring at the ice cream parlour, my eyes burning slightly for not blinking. My chest felt queasy. Why? Maybe because it's Laurel's body.
I guess even after the soul has left the body, the heart still craves for him.
"Laurie?" Kalix snapped his fingers in front of my face, breaking my chain of thoughts.
"What are you thinking? I thought you liked this place?" Kalix said with worry.
"No, no, it's not that. I was just thinking about... something. Let's go."
We both walked inside together and ordered our flavours, and I did the thing I had been wanting to do my whole life—I was finally tasting their most discussed flavour.
Kalix sat with me at the table. The way Kalix was treating me, I felt like a five-year-old with her father—the way he led me to the table and pulled out the chair for me, then fed me ice cream with his own hand. I was loving it either way. I was all alone and broke before, but now I had everything with me—especially a brother. Even though I had always preferred being alone, maybe it was because I never knew the real meaning of the word family.
The ice cream was so good, I felt like I could eat a lot of it, all at once. Kalix never stopped talking—talking about how Katherine thinks she owns us, and all. However, she would never be our mother.
"I still remember when Mom left, you were so small I could barely hold you. Mom… she didn't want to leave, but Father—he forced her to do so… all because of that woman."
But i was still confused...in the novel Katherine was the biological mother of both Kalix and Laurel Miller.
Even though his words were harsh, his expression showed how broken he actually was.
He wasn't the exactly how Kalix Miller the author portrayed him as in the novel. He was just a little boy, who still had his heart churn whenever he missed his mother.
"Well, we can't change something that has already happened, right? But we can change what's about to happen." He said and got up from his chair, as if trying to console himself.
"Let's have dinner out too. I don't feel like going back home. And not must you..." Kalix held my hand, and we both exited the parlour, and he drove us to a five-star restaurant where we had our dinner.
The way Kalix behaved was not like his character. Kalix was the last person to ever talk about his own feelings—especially to his own sister— He did love her a lot but he never talked about the thing that used to disturb him and I was also confused about one more thing, If Katherine wasn't the biological mother, who she was supposed to be, then who is?
After Kalix and I had returned to the Miller estate, I stepped inside the mansion before walking straight upstairs to Laurel's—my—room. My eyes wandered around the room, looking at the things I had already gone through before. I slowly walked to the desk present in the corner of the room. Papers, files, pens, and different documents were piled up on it, but the brown leather journal stood out in the middle of it all.
I reached out to it and grabbed hold of it, expecting it to be cold—like it was in the morning when I grabbed it—but the fact that it was warm, arouse weird suspicions within me. I turned around again and walked around every corner of the room attentively.
Even though I had not properly checked the whole room, I still remembered how things were placed when I first came here. Nothing had been touched—everything was in its place. The vanity, the bedside tables… all of it looked normal. Only one place was left to be checked.
The closet.
The hard sole of my shoe clicked against the floor as I walked closer to the closet and held the doorknob.
It was warm too...
I opened the door and walked inside, looking around. The pile of folded clothes, which had been completely organized, was now scattered. I checked everything, since one thing was clear: whoever had come here was looking for something—but hadn't found it. I was deeply engrossed, trying to find a clue to figure out what the person could have been looking for.
A knock on the door made me flinch. I took a deep breath and walked out of the closet.
"Laurel, it's me—Kalix. Open the door."
I let out a sigh. I had gotten so scared by the sudden knock, but I was confused—what was Kalix doing here? We had just returned from dinner together.