Chapter 435 The Storm Before the Funeral

The past couple of days, Capital City had been filled with the tension of an approaching storm. All the prominent families had heard the news: the Wynn family’s eldest grandson was dead.

Lately, many people had sent in their calling cards to visit the Wynn family home, but Wayne had refused to see anyone.

It was during this time that Shane returned.

“Why are you back?” Jade frowned at this debt-collecting ghost.

“Is it true? Johnathan’s dead?” Shane asked. He had rushed back as soon as he got the news.

Jade glared at him and didn’t want to speak, but wanting to avoid a bigger mess, he finally said, “It’s true. Several professors were present at the time. The Wynn family home has shut its doors these days. No one can get in.”

Shane frowned when he heard this. When he first got the news, he thought it was fake. He hadn’t expected it to be real.

Johnathan.

That arrogant man was really dead?

“What happened? They never found an antidote?” He couldn’t help asking.

Jade didn’t know Shane had been involved in that whole affair. He replied, “I don’t know the details. I just heard there was some medicine, but it didn’t work; it only slowed things down. And every time it relapsed, it got worse. In the end, they never developed a cure. He died on a bed in the lab.”

He knew how rocky the relationship was between his son and Johnathan, so he warned him, “This is a sensitive time. No matter how happy you might feel inside, keep it to yourself. Don’t stir up trouble right now.”

Shane glanced at him, eyes full of mockery.

Once he got the answer he wanted, Shane left without looking back, leaving Jade seething with anger. If he were still fertile, he’d never bother with this unfilial son.

Even back in his own room, Shane still couldn’t believe it: Johnathan was dead. So what about her?

He pulled out his phone. After hesitating for a long time, he still couldn’t bring himself to dial that familiar number.

Over at the Wynn family home, the courtyard was crowded with people, most of them from the extended branches of the Wynn family. No matter how they really felt about Johnathan’s death, all of them wore mourning faces, like they’d lost their own fathers.

Jose had been urgently called back, too. His face was pale, showing no trace of joy.

Already today, several people had been circling around him, openly or subtly trying to cozy up to him—the newly crowned heir.

Johnathan was dead. Jose was the only remaining grandson of the main line. According to family tradition, he was next in line to be the head of the Wynn family.

But he felt no joy at all.

How could Johnathan be dead?

He had wished for it before, sure. But after what happened at the hospital last time, he’d completely let go.

All these years, even though Johnathan hated him, he had never laid a hand on him. He had no right to complain.

He had left Capital City willingly. But now, the brother he had always looked up to was gone—and he didn’t even get to see him one last time.

I can’t accept this, he thought. How could Mom and Dad?

His father looked like he had aged a decade. His mother cried herself to sleep every day. They kept saying sorry to Wendy—Johnathan’s mother.

He didn’t know what had really happened between the three of them, but he could feel their grief because he was grieving, too.

Suddenly, he remembered something.

“Where’s Sierra?” he asked.

“In her room,” the butler replied.

Jose waved away the relatives trying to show off in front of him and headed to the room Sierra had shared with Johnathan.

He knocked on the door. It took a long time before there was any response.

“What is it?” Sierra’s voice came from inside.

“I… just came to check on you.”

Jose didn’t even know what to call her. He wanted to say “sister-in-law,” but Johnathan had never acknowledged him as his brother, even up to his death. He probably wouldn’t have wanted Jose calling Sierra that either.

“I’m fine.”

After saying that, Sierra fell silent again.

Jose didn’t know what else to do, so he told someone to keep an eye on her.

Soon, the day of Johnathan’s funeral arrived. Every prominent family in Capital City showed up.

They watched with their own eyes as Johnathan’s casket was lowered into the ground. Shane was among them. He saw Sierra standing there in black, and his brow furrowed.

Sierra had lost a lot of weight. The light in her eyes was completely gone.

This Sierra felt like a stranger to him. The Sierra he knew never backed down from anything. But this time, he saw her… defeated.

And yet, the satisfaction he had imagined never came. Instead, all he felt was anger.