On the day of the press conference, Olivia's cell phone is bombarded with Emma and Oliver telling her to get back to the old house immediately.
Olivia ignored them until noon the next day when Elijah's call came through.
"Olivia, will you stop being so capricious? Mom was so angry with you that she went to the hospital in the middle of the night to get hooked up to fluids and just got out, so hurry back!"
Hanging up the phone, Olivia grabbed her car keys and headed out the door.
Not to give Elijah a face.
She hadn't even paid them back for the humiliation on the day of Emma's birthday party, and now that she was thinking about what Noah had said every day, she'd almost forgotten about the whole launch thing.
The most angry people at the Johnson family press conference were Oliver and Emma.
They didn't expect the Johnson Family to do such a drastic thing. Even if they really wanted to break off the engagement, they should at least discuss it with them!
It's too bullying to have a direct launch without even notice!
Smith has recently lost several projects in a row, and Oliver has basically lost money on several projects he invested in this year, so he desperately needs the Johnson Family to pull him up now.
Because of one woman, the marriage of two families was broken off.
Emma isn't sure about the company; she's pissed off that the Johnson Family didn't even say hello and, in fact, unilaterally backed out of the marriage.
The wedding is approaching, but the daughter was returned by others; I do not know what kind of rumors are outside.
Inevitably, she will be ridiculed and talked about, and her face will be lost, and in the future, when she goes out for afternoon tea, she will be designated as a joke.
Olivia enters slowly on her heels.
Emma was so angry last night that her stomach hurt. She went to the hospital and got some medicine. Her whole body was still weak, but it didn't stop her from cursing.
"It must have been the stupid thing you did the other night that pissed Liam off.
"Why do you care about an outside woman when you're engaged?
"Ava said that Sophia was a hick and couldn't even get into the Johnsons, so can't you put up with it?"
Olivia took off her jacket, and inside was a burgundy waist-defining dress with five-centimeter high heels. She purposely went for a long, curly perm before she came.
The aura is sufficient.
Upon hearing this from Emma, Olivia only threw her a blank stare. Thinking to herself.
"Still have the nerve to talk about me? Think back then: your husband raised a female college student outside; that college student's family is poor and small, can't enter the Smith Family's big iron door, and you didn't put up with it either.
"You ran to school and humiliated the person, and threw money in her face, and found someone to cyber-violate her, and she lost all her face and ended up depressed and dropping out of school.
"I just threw Sophia in the water. I'm much kinder than you.
"It's all about being robbed of your husband, and you can't stand it, so who are you to persuade me to be God?"
The college girl was financed by Oliver and slowly evolved into a little lover kept in the shadows, a little darling of Oliver's.
Oliver even beat Emma back then because she was running around the school and making trouble.
It's been years in the past, and it's the last thing Emma wants to talk about, and suddenly Olivia brings it up again and is straight-up pissed off.
Elijah and Ava rushed to hold her up, "
After a moment of soldiering on, Elijah carried Emma back to her room, and Ava called the Smith Family's family doctor.
Oliver had been attracted to the college girl, and now the novelty had worn off long ago, and now all that was on his mind was that he couldn't afford to have any problems with the Johnson Family, and that he couldn't afford to break his marriage to the Johnson Family.
When he and Olivia were the only ones left in the living room, he gave a direct order.
"You're coming with me to the Johnson Family to apologize!"
Olivia quirked her mouth, "So I have to marry into the Johnson Family, do I?"
"Yes!" Oliver tensed his face, "I don't care how you've messed up before; this time, you have to go and apologize, and you have to marry into the Johnson Family, or I'll break your legs!"
Olivia reaches toward him, "Fine, you and Emma, each give me ten million dollars, and I promise I'll marry into the Johnson Family."
Noah is a Johnson, anyway.
Oliver gaped, "Ten million dollars?"
Olivia: "Yeah, I'm going to apologize for having to buy a gift to make amends.
"The Johnson Family is so rich that a $20 million gift probably wouldn't even look good, and I'd have to stick my own money into it."
She got two slaps that night, and it was two slaps they were going to pay for.
She's not holding on to her backers yet; 10 million dollars a person is considered cheap for them; when she and Noah get married, she'll have to blackmail two more suites high and low.
Olivia said she'd go apologize, and Oliver didn't suspect a thing.
In his opinion, there is no way Olivia will give up Liam, and the last time she said she wouldn't marry, Sophia should have irritated her.
Olivia was nice this time, and he was generous.
Olivia collected the check and remembered something else, "Other people's gifts are good to buy; Noah isn't, and with all the antiques in Elijah's collection, I'll go pick one out?"
It wasn't too much to ask; it was quite reasonable, and Oliver obliged.
"Fine, tell your brother directly that he disagrees with having him come to me."
Oliver still had to go to a meeting at the office and left after the instructions.
There's washed fruit on the coffee table in the living room, and Olivia sits down, crosses her legs leisurely, and eats grapes, having just stuffed herself with two when Ava comes down the stairs.
"I'm so sorry. If I'd known Sophia could drive you crazy, I wouldn't have invited her to my birthday party."
Ava took a seat on the couch next to her, apologizing for the words but not sounding apologetic.
Olivia spits out the grape skins, claps her hands, and gets up.
Two steps brought her up to Ava, rolled up her sleeves, and towered over her, and by the time Ava realized what she was trying to do, it was too late.
Olivia's slap has landed.
Bang!
"You're an adopted daughter who dares to lord it over me, and those blind ones in Elijah favor you.
"OK, parents and brother, you take it; I don't want it, as long as you stop and we can live in peace."
One slap isn't enough. Olivia bends over, flexing her knees against her waist to keep her from moving, yanking her hair with her left hand and flinging her right hand in her face without stopping.
"An adopted daughter is more valuable than a biological one, and you've ruined my reputation; you got what you wanted, and you still have the nerve to set me up? I gave you face, didn't I?"
Ava gasped in pain and reached for her hand, "Olivia! You're crazy!"
Olivia blew on the palm of her hand, hurt from the beating, then went back to choking her.
"Crazy? Didn't you just drive me crazy on purpose? As you wish, you're still not happy; why are you so hard to serve?"
She tightened her grip.
"You don't want me to marry into the Johnson Family because you don't want me to marry better than you. But what to do?
"I'd marry better than you in any random marriage; why? Because you couldn't marry as soon as all that shit you did with Elijah saw the light of day."
Ava, who had been struggling, banged at her words and glared at Olivia in fear.
"How do you ... how do you ... how do you ..."
Breathing was stifled, words were incomplete, stumbling.
Olivia snorted, "How do I know about your crap with Elijah?
"Heh, not only do I know that I know you're dangling Elijah while coveting Noah."
After listening to Mason that night, Olivia slept through the night before slowly figuring it out.
Ava is probably just possessive of Elijah, just a tool person to sideline her, and it would have been Noah that Ava wanted to marry all along.
In fact, that Elijah and Ava shit, Olivia hadn't seen it.
She heard it from Elijah's ex-wife.
She was sent abroad after her high school exams, and Elijah got married the year after she left. She didn't return, and when she did, their marriage was over.
The former sister-in-law was Elijah's first love, and the two snuck together when Olivia was in middle school.
She thought, like everyone else, that their divorce was a child issue Until one day, she meets a drunken Elijah's ex-wife in a bar.
"Everyone is spreading the word that it's because I can't have children that I'm disliked, and that's why I've come to the point of divorce.
"It's so wrong, it's not that I can't have children, I've actually had one.
"Why not? Because I witnessed your brother cheating on you, and do you know who he cheated on you with?
"Ava! His nominal sister! I can't believe they were kissing, do you know how sick I was when I saw it? I hated that I couldn't poke myself blind.
"Elijah, how could he? I was so pissed off I had a miscarriage, and all he would say was sorry.
"I'm going to tear Ava's hypocritical mask, that he got down on his knees and begged me, that he's so high and mighty that he got down on his knees for that woman.
"I've had too much to drink today, and when I see you, I can't help but confide.
"Olivia, I know you have a problem with Ava, and I know you resent your brother, but can you pretend you didn't hear anything today?
"I have a boyfriend now who loves me and is talking about marriage right away. When I get pregnant, the rumors against me will go away, and I don't want to get too tied up with the past.
"I thought about revenge, then I thought, why bother? After all, it's the man I loved; why should I ruin him?
"He also loved me with all his heart, and besides, I didn't want to admit that I had even lost to Ava and didn't want to let it be known that my marriage had retired in such a sorry state.
"So just pretend you don't know for now; they'll get their comeuppance."
When she initially heard about it, Olivia was about to explode in shock.
Elijah did favor Ava, her halfway-decent sister, but she never suspected there was more than a sibling bond between the two.
Anyway, she hadn't noticed it before she left the country and moved out again not long after she returned, much less thought about it.
Her ex-sister-in-law told her to pretend she didn't know, and she respected that.
So again, trying to tear Ava down, she didn't mention it; it was a promise and because she had no proof.
More so because of Elijah.
When my grandmother was alive, she always tried to mediate between her and Elijah, and my grandmother expected a lot from Elijah.
She wouldn't reconcile with Elijah, but she wouldn't destroy him either.
She was enraged at the birthday party and almost lost her mind.
.....
The commotion downstairs alarmed Elijah after all.
When he heard Ava's screams and hurried down, Olivia slowly and methodically organized her clothes.
Looking at Ava again, her hair was disheveled, the left side of her face was horribly swollen, and there was a clear pinch mark on her neck, woefully out of place.
Heavily choked, his breathing had not slowed, and he bent over and coughed.
Elijah rushes over and swings at Olivia, who cranes her neck to let him hit her, and in the nick of time, Ava pulls Elijah's hand.
"I ... I'm fine."
She didn't want to stop it, but she couldn't help it. Olivia threatened her when she let go.
"From now on, you mess with me one more time, and I'm going to expose you and Elijah on the internet!"
Ava's mind is a mess right now, and all she knows is that it's best not to mess with Olivia.
Elijah doesn't know what's going on, but Ava stops it, and he can only keep the fire down for now.
Reaching for Ava's shoulder, ready to help her up the stairs, Olivia called out to him.
"It's not like she broke her leg; she can get up the stairs by herself."
She commanded Elijah, "Oliver said to take my pick of anything in your collection room."
Elijah wasn't downstairs at the time and didn't hear Oliver's answer; Olivia said you could ask Oliver.
Elijah called Oliver and asked.
"I promised Olivia that you'd take your sister in to pick out a gift that she was giving to Johnson Grayson, now that Olivia and Liam's engagement is more important."
Johnson Grayson was old and liked ink and writing, so Elijah chose a Chinese ink stone from the Qing Dynasty.
Olivia took it, incidentally moving the Hetian jade tea set he'd gone to great lengths to buy.
Elijah is very distraught, and Olivia kicks him twice on her way out.
"Who told you not to save me that day? I'm your own sister, and I'm only comfortable taking two of your things, so if you're not happy, just put up with it.
"Elijah, I know about you and Ava, and you better not get yourself killed.
"Either you two get out of the country and get the hell out of double-crossing and never come back or you break it off with her in a hurry.
"Screwing around with your adopted sister, tsk, you're disgusting.
"If the family is ridiculed because of your incestuous relationship, I'll get Ava killed and bury you alive, so be good."