Leilani leaned back, chuckling dryly as she stared at the man, hoping that he would laugh at his own joke too.
But, he was unfazed.
His lips didn't even move.
His eyes scrutinized her face like he was reading every detail on it, and his hands were clasped together on his thighs.
"Y… you're serious," she stated when there was still no change in his facial expression.
"Marry you?!" She widened her eyes and he only shrugged his shoulders off.
"You have no idea what you're talking about,"
She shook her head.
And he probably does not.
First, he was asking a total stranger to marry him!
Second, she was just getting the fuck out of a fucking marriage!
"I mean every word of mine, Leilani. Marry me, and I will help you enact punishment on everyone who has hurt you. I will…"
"What punishment?" she cut him short, frowning.
"F… for someone who is meeting me for the first time, you seem too informed about me. You sound as though you know me and everything that I have been through, but you don't! You can only assume. You can only presume so…"
"You need me," he cut her short too.
"I don't need–"
"Leilani Wheelers. You were married to Jonathan Henderson for four years before he suddenly sent you packing after he brought another woman home. Trust me, you need me."
He knew.
He knew everything about her.
He knew of her predicament and tribulations.
No wonder he was too confident.
No wonder he looked at her as though he could see through her.
He didn't look at her with pity in his eyes. Not even close to it.
He looked at her as if she were weak and he was her redemption.
"W…who are you?"
She asked him, her voice shaky.
"Lorenzo Byers."
Leilani shook her head. That was not the answer she was expecting and she knew this mysterious man knew that much.
Did Jonathan send him to finish his unfinished business?
Was he even crippled at all?!
He looked so confident and finer than the nondisabled men she had met her whole life!
"D… did he send you here? How did you… how did you know everything?" she asked, scooting away from the man.
But still, he only watched her.
He did not look like he was ready to convince her to start explaining who he was and how he knew her.
"It was not hard looking into you, Leilani. You are being paranoid."
"Paranoid? S… someone is out there trying to kill me and you think I am being paranoid? I don't even know who to trust or turn to. I am seeing you for the first time and you know every shit about me and as if that was not enough, you ask that I marry you!"
Lorenzo compressed his lips, suppressing his emotion as he stared at the woman in front of him.
She was crying profusely and the only thing he could do was watch her.
Deep down, he knew proposing to marry her was an outrageous idea, but it was the best he could do.
If she agreed to marry him, it would be a win-win situation for them.
After his accident which led him to the wheelchair eight months ago, he had been staying with his family again and now, his father and stepmother were bent on finding a woman for him to lessen their burdens as he had overheard his stepmother say.
Although he could refuse, but he was supposed to be weak, and gullible and he needed to stay in that character.
He picked up his tab, browsed through it, and then stretched it over to the woman who flinched.
Slowly, she loosened up, collected the tab from him, and then drew her brows together as she stared at the person in the picture.
"T… this is…"
"She hired the assassin."
Leilani's eyes raised as he said and she shook her head. "What?"
But he didn't answer her and only watched while she shook her head in disbelief.
"This is my mother-in-law!"
"Ex," he corrected.
"No… no way. Nancy would never go this far to get rid of me. She would never have…"
She sniffed and shook her head.
She never would have tried to kill her, right?
Although the woman hated her, she never would have come this far, right?
"Marry me, Leilani," he said to her again.
Leilani shook her head vigorously. She just left a marriage the previous day. There was no way she would rush into it again.
Not when she had the chance to make her own decision and leave the country.
But… Why should she run?
He was right. It only made her more pathetic.
But maybe if he knew what she had gone through in the last four years, he would know that all she needed was to rest.
"As long as I live, I will protect you from all harm and I will help you get revenge against the Hendersons."
She wanted this as much as she wanted to run away.
She would love to see Jonathan plead for her forgiveness.
She would love to see her ex-mother-in-law, Nancy crumble to the ground, wishing she had never tried to kill her.
She knew for certain Nancy would not have come up with such a plan on her own.
Maxwell was definitely in on it.
Both the mother and daughter were so close and were the type who could plan a murder together.
"A…and…" she stared, her eyes exhausting into the man's.
"What do you get out of this?" she asked him.
"I get a wife," he answered shortly.
She raised a brow and asked, "What?"
Leilani could swear that he was smiling through his eyes.
His face had lit up when he said those words and she could only wonder if she was seeing correctly.
His hands were clasped together and he leaned in his chair rather comfortably.
"I get a wife, Leilani," he said again.