"Mom, what happened? Why are you crying?" Rong Shaoze asked with concern.
This was the first time he had ever seen his mother shed tears as long as he had been alive.
A twinge of distress tugged at his heart. Who had caused his mother such heartache?
Rong’s mother sat on the bed, covering her face with a handkerchief as she suddenly broke into loud sobs.
Rong Shaoze’s brow furrowed slightly as he approached and embraced her shoulders, asking softly, "Mom, what’s really going on? Have you been wronged, or did you have a fight with Dad?"
Rong’s mother suddenly lifted her head, her expression a mix of anger and sorrow.
"Don’t mention your father... sob... that heartless man, I’ve been blind my whole life to have married him... sob... Shaoze, what am I to do, how could he do this to me, sob... How can he do this to me..."
Rong Shaoze discerned a hint of the problem and, furrowing his brow, ventured a guess, "Mom, does Dad have another woman outside?"
Rong’s mother was taken aback, fiery hatred flashing in her eyes as her crying intensified with sorrow and grief.
He had guessed right.
"Where is Dad now?" he stood up and asked indifferently, but his eyes were cold, devoid of any warmth.
Rong’s mother lifted her head and said tearfully, "Your dad isn’t home now, nor is he in B City."
He looked at her, waiting for her to continue.
"Your father has been secretive and hasn’t been coming home recently, so I suspected that he had a woman outside. That’s why I hired a private investigator to follow him, and these photos were the result."
She opened the drawer and handed him a stack of photos.
Rong Shaoze took them and looked through them one by one.
The photos all showed his father being intimate with a pretty young woman in her twenties.
With each photo he saw, his eyes grew more piercing.
Rong’s mother said chokingly, "I wanted to pretend I didn’t know about this, hoping he would come to his senses on his own and not disgrace the Rong Family. But yesterday, he told me he was going away for a few days with friends, and despite my pleas, he left. Naturally, I suspected he left with that woman, so I had someone follow him. The news I got today was that the two of them went on a holiday to a seaside villa together, look at these..."
She handed him more photos.
"These are the photos faxed by the private investigator. Look at your father, how shameless he is, at his age, still indulgent in his lust!"
In the photos, his father and the woman were frolicking and playing in the water on the beach in swimwear, kissing and embracing each other.
Seeing such indecent photos of his father felt odd for the son, and a sense of shame welled up inside him.
His father was truly bringing shame upon him.
Rong Shaoze put away the photos, his expression icy, "Mom, don’t worry. I’ll go find Dad and bring him back right away. As for that woman, I’ll handle her too."
Men being promiscuous was common, and he was promiscuous himself.
But he would never allow his father to be promiscuous, because he could not allow him to hurt his mother!
Upon hearing her son’s words, Rong’s mother felt a warmth in her heart, "Shaoze, you must go yourself, we can’t let others know about this. Our Rong Family can’t afford to lose face, and neither can I, understand?"
"Yes, I understand." Such scandals, of course, could not be leaked, especially for a family like theirs.
After comforting his mother a bit more, Rong Shaoze went downstairs.
Lin Xinlan followed him out, got into the car, but did not ask a single question.
Rong’s mother didn’t want her to know, so she didn’t ask...