His Secret

Chapter 15

The butler looked as if he wished the earth would swallow him up whole. "I'll get it right away, sir..."

"Don't bother." He looked at me. "Did you get what you came for?"

He'd heard everything, I realized. He thought I'd come for my inheritance. He thought that was the precious thing that had brought me here. It wasn't.

I turned to Mr. Huang urgently. "Did she throw out my things?"

"She wanted to," he said darkly. "She told me to burn it all. But I boxed it all up and left it in your attic room. I knew she'd never bother to go all up the way up there to check."

"Bless you," I whispered, and hugged him. "Stay and have coffee," I called to Sehun. "I'll be back in a few minutes." I started up the stairs, carrying my sleeping baby with me.

Climbing three floors, I reached the attic. It looked even more desolate than I remembered, with only one grimy window, an ancient metal bed frame and stacks of boxes.

Setting down the baby, I went straight for the boxes.

"What are you looking for?"

Hearing Sehun's husky voice behind me, I turned.

"These boxes hold everything from my childhood."

He stepped inside the attic room, knocking his head against the slanted roof. He rubbed if ruefully. "I can see why Jimin wouldn't come up here. This place is like a prison cell."

"This was my home for over ten years."

His dark eyes widened. "This room?" He slowly looked around the attic, at the rough wood floors, at the naked lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. "You lived here?"

I gave a wistful laugh. "From the time my parents died when I was fourteen, until I left last year when...well. It looked nicer then, though. I made decorations, paper flowers." A lump rose in my throat as I looked around the bare room where I'd spent so many years. The bare mattress on the metal bed frame where I'd slept so many nights. I gently touched the bare lightbulb and swung it on the cord. "I had a bright red lampshade I bought from the charity shop."

"A charity shop?" he said sharply. "But you're Jimin's cousin. A poor relation, I know, but I'd assumed you were well paid for all your work..."

This time my laugh was not so wistful. "I was paid a salary after I turned eighteen, but that money had to go to the other things. So I started earning a little money doing portraits at street fairs. But Jimin allowed me so little time away from the house..."