As such, Zhu Baoguo had always been particularly close to his aunt from a young age. She remembered clearly that Zhu Baoguo had cried his eyes out on the day she had gotten married. He had even said to her, “Auntie, can you not leave me? I’ll marry you when I grow up. Auntie, don’t leave. I can’t bear for you to go. What if I can’t fall asleep without you by my side?”

  That adorable and obedient Zhu Baoguo.

  Mother Zhu had almost forgotten what Zhu Baoguo looked like, but suddenly, his image appeared clearly before her eyes. She even remembered the small snippets of her interactions with Zhu Baoguo before her marriage.

  She had always thought that her obedient nephew had been brought astray and eventually killed by those hooligans. Who would have known… She glanced at Wang Yang, who was kneeling beside her bed, and wanted him to leave. “Alright, stop kneeling here. I’m sure you know that I don’t really want to see you. When I look at you, I think about Baoguo’s death. My heart… I’ve wronged my dad, my brother, and my ancestors. I have no face to see them. Perhaps, I was no longer a Zhu the moment I insisted on marrying your dad and gave birth to you. This is all my fault. I’ll have to atone for my sins for a hundred years once I meet them after my death.”

  Her son had killed off the entire Zhu family, and her in-laws had always been protecting him. That was why she had never found out about the truth behind her nephew’s death.

  \r \r \r

  If Qiao Nan had not exposed the truth, she might never have found out about how Zhu Baoguo had died even up until her death! Once she met her family and was lambasted by the entire Zhu family, she might even remain oblivious as to why she was being scolded just because she had been cheated by her own son!

  “Mom…” Wang Yang’s voice was hoarse. So many years had passed since Zhu Baoguo’s death, and even Zhu Chengqi had never suspected anything about Zhu Baoguo’s death, much less mentioned it to Wang Yang. It was true that Wang Yang had felt a burden being relieved off him the day that Zhu Chengqi had died.

  He knew that once Zhu Chengqi died, the last person on earth who cared about Zhu Baoguo would be gone. From then on, there would be no one who would investigate the truth behind Zhu Baoguo’s death.

  That way, the only grave mistake he had ever committed in this lifetime would be buried alongside Zhu Chengqi, never to be discovered again. But Wang Yang had never expected that his mom would have thought about Zhu Baoguo and even found out about the truth while he had been the most relaxed. In fact, his mother had even gotten so emotional over the matter.

  Perhaps, it was not that Wang Yang had never expected such a reaction from Mother Zhu. It was just that he had hidden the truth so well in the past. Since such a long time had passed since then, especially now that Zhu Chengqi was dead, Wang Yang had thought that his mom would never learn of the truth.

  It was Qiao Nan again. Why was Qiao Nan like a ghost who pursued him endlessly? Why did Qiao Nan always have to barge in on his family’s matters? Qiao Nan was a devil! She was purposely taking revenge on him and refusing to return the Zhu family’s assets to him just because of the matter with Chen Jun.

  “Mom, Qiao Nan’s an outsider. I’m your only son. How could you choose to believe an outsider over me? Brother Baoguo’s death has nothing to do with me. Don’t you remember that I was at home the whole day with you on the day of his death? How could you suspect me just because of something an outsider said? You’re not even giving me a chance to explain myself. Mom, you’re being too unfair to me.”

  Wang Yang had initially been shocked by Mother Zhu’s sudden fainting spell, but some time had passed, and he had already calmed himself down. “I’m sure you have some understanding of the kind of person Qiao Nan is too. I’m fighting a lawsuit against her at the moment. I’m now her enemy. It’s no surprise that she would speak ill of me in front of you. But Mom, how could you take Qiao Nan’s words seriously? She’s maligning me and trying to frame me!”

  “She knows that I respect you and she’s trying to destroy our relationship. Then, I’ll be so distressed that I’ll have no time to care about that lawsuit. That’s Qiao Nan’s evil plans! Mom, you can’t believe her! You should believe me…”

  As a mother who loved her son, Mother Zhu had the urge to believe her son upon hearing his righteous explanations and seeing him kneel before her. After all, Wang Yang was sincere in his words and no one could even see that he had lied.

  But it was exactly because of his behavior and actions that Mother Zhu believed that Wang Yang definitely had something to do with Zhu Baoguo’s death. It was not that Mother Zhu was suspicious of Wang Yang or that she could spot something from Wang Yang’s expression.

  It was because she loved her son, Wang Yang, dearly and trusted him the most. As such, she had never suspected her son. Mother Zhu had no idea how Wang Yang looked like when he lied, but she did know how Father Wang looked like when he lied.

  Mother Zhu spotted a glimpse of Father Wang in Wang Yang, who was eloquently convincing her. That recognition pained Mother Zhu.

  She had given her whole heart to her son and yet, he was still lying to her at this point in time. Since Yang Yang had truly told a lie, it meant that everything Qiao Nan had said was true. Baoguo’s death had not been an accident. It was not that Baoguo had gone astray. Baoguo had been deliberately led astray, and the one who had instigated everything was none other than her own biological son!

  “Alright, you don’t have to say anything. The more you say, the more heartbroken I feel as a mother. Do you really think I can’t tell whether you’re telling the truth as a mother? It’s because I can differentiate between the truth and a lie that I’m heartbroken. Yang Yang, why have you turned into a person like this? I was happy marrying your dad and I’ve never regretted it. But now, things are different. It’s my fault as a mother that you grew up in the Wang family and became this way. I’ve wronged the Zhu family. I’ve wronged you.”

  How was she to have known that the Wang family would have been so evil? They had been so scheming toward her family and had even influenced her son negatively.

  Earlier on, she had thought that her brother had been crazy to leave behind such a will, leaving all of the Zhu family’s assets to an outsider without even mentioning Yang Yang.