Chapter 146: The Final Straw
Regardless of whether Jackson was setting her up, if he continued to make noise and disturb her, Eilis wouldn't hold back. After making her stance clear, she crisply ended the call.
The beep signaled the end of the call, and Easton was left envisioning the easily swinging door of Ellis's home, his expression darkening. Despite the repeated ringing of the doorbell, Ellis remained unmoved, and Jackson realized he wasn't going to get her help.
With his head hung low, he turned to leave when his phone rang—it was Easton. Jackson's mind raced, trying to figure out how to explain his failure to recover the items.
Before he could respectfully greet him, Easton's voice, cold and tinged with anger, cut through. “Jackson, are you looking to die? Who gave you the audacity to harass Ellis?”
Instinctively wanting to protest that he wasn't harassing her, but faced with Easton's fury, a survival instinct kicked in, and he stammered, “Mr. Hudson, I wasn’t harassing Ms. Harper.”
“Leave Ellis’s place immediately! And don’t bother coming to work tomorrow!” Easton had hoped Jackson could recover the items, which would have warranted giving him another chance. But his foolish actions were inexcusable.
“Mr. Hudson…” Jackson attempted to plead his case.
But the order had been given, and Easton wouldn’t hear another word. Ending the call, he then contacted the director of human resources. “Collect Jackson’s things, revoke all his company access, and draft his termination papers. Give him a few months’ salaries as severance.”
The increased severance was a nod to Jackson’s past efforts and hard work. Working late was routine, and although being called back to the office after hours happened occasionally, the HR director was shocked to receive such an order in the middle of the night—to fire Jackson, Easton’s right-hand man.
“Yes, Mr. Hudson.”
Easton’s voice, chilling in the quiet of the night, spurred the HR director not to meet the same fate as Jackson. She hurried back to the office to finalize his dismissal.
After handling these tasks, Easton called Ellis again. The doorbell had stopped ringing, and she was about to take a shower, forgetting to block that deadbeat, when she saw he was calling again. Annoyed, she thought, Does he ever give up? Was Jackson really sent to trap me?
She snapped. “As a lunatic, you should find a doctor to monitor you around the clock; stop having these fits that scare everyone!”
Easton was silent. Good, Ellis has learned some new insults. Words like “you psycho” didn’t affect him anymore; he seemed almost immune to her scolding. Perhaps he was indeed a bit sick; unlike ignoring him, her insults felt like some form of engagement; at least it wasn’t a monologue.
“I called to tell you, I’ve sent Jackson away,” he massaged his aching head from lack of sleep. “You might want to move; that house isn’t safe.”
Using safety as a pretext to make me move? This scumbag! Why does my living in Stonebridge bother him so much?
Ellis scoffed, “I’ll live wherever I want; it’s none of your business! Mind your own life. If you think running into me is bad luck, I suggest you gouge out your eyes. Out of sight, out of mind.”
This deadbeat never acts like a decent ex-husband, she thought, disgusted by her past blindness in falling for such a man.
After venting, she added him back to her blacklist and went to take her shower. Placing her phone back on the nightstand, Easton’s gaze unintentionally fell on the large wedding photo on the wall. The Ellis in the photo, although somewhat posed, smiled warmly, her eyes curved in genuine happiness, clinging to him…
Chapter 146. The Final Straw
And he could imagine her scowling during their call. After the divorce, she is supposed to disappear from my world, he thought, unable to stir any emotional turmoil. But the stark contrast between the past and the present, the divorce papers in hand, only intensified his headache.
As the HR director contacted him to come to the office to collect his personal items and sign the termination agreement, Jackson realized there was no turning back. What started as a normal day at work ended with unemployment, barred from even entering the company building. Looking at the company building and the surrounding architecture on the warm summer night, he felt his efforts over the years crumble, no longer the prominent assistant to the CEO of Hudson Group. As Jackson fell from grace within a day, the HR director, despite not feeling sorry, sensed the tragedy of his situation.