Seeing this, Caleb Xavier lashed out with the whip again, using all his strength as if determined to strike him down. Rosalind Rowan and the others ran over from nearby, grabbing his arms to stop him. "Grandpa Xavier, please, stop hitting Donovan!" "If this continues, you’ll beat him to death!" Check latest chapters at novel⸺fire.net Caleb Xavier shoved them away with a wave of his arm. "Stay out of this! I’ve been too lenient with him. I must teach him a proper lesson today!" He raised the whip again, looking at the man kneeling on the ground, his eyes red. His voice trembled as he asked, "Will you choose her, or your grandpa?" "Her," Donovan Xavier said, his lips pale and his voice wavering with pain. The whip swung down harshly again, landing on his existing bloody wounds. The pain was even more intense. He was a man of flesh and blood, after all. Donovan Xavier ultimately couldn’t take it anymore. His body finally gave out, and he collapsed, trembling uncontrollably on the rain-soaked ground, his face completely drained of color. He struggled to get up, but his back refused to straighten. By now, his entire back had been flayed into a bloody mess. Blood streamed to the ground, mixing with the rainwater to form a shockingly vibrant pool of red. Caleb Xavier saw it all. His heart ached, but it was also filled with an icy disappointment. He clutched the whip, pointing it at his grandson. Tears seemed to well in his eyes as he took a deep breath. "Grandpa will ask you one last time—her, or the Xavier Family that raised you!" The air fell silent for a moment. In the downpour, Donovan Xavier painfully forced himself upright. His whole body was wracked with spasms of pain, and he was so weak he could barely breathe, but he still answered— Caleb Xavier hadn’t cried in years. But now, he couldn’t restrain his emotions any longer, and a single, hot tear rolled down his cheek. This was the grandson he was once so proud of, now defying him for a woman. He raised the whip once more, but after a long pause, he only managed to choke out, "I am utterly disappointed in you..." The whip cracked down, and Donovan Xavier collapsed to the ground again. His back was a bloody ruin, his hands were clenched into trembling fists, and his jaw was locked tight. Shea, seeing this, hurried to Caleb Xavier’s side with an umbrella. "Dad, please stop hitting Donovan." "If you’re going to protect him, you can kneel here with him!" Caleb roared, his eyes bloodshot. Shea fell silent. Though she felt a pang of sympathy, he wasn’t her biological son. She wasn’t about to go that far to protect him. Caleb continued to swing the whip in his hand, lashing the man kneeling on the ground. Whip after whip, for over a hundred strokes, Donovan Xavier endured it all. He gritted his teeth, not letting out a single cry of pain. As Caleb raised the whip again, Isla Xavier and Julian Xavier rushed forward, shielding Donovan with their own bodies. The whip struck Julian, and his face contorted in pain as cold sweat beaded on his forehead. Shea was instantly anxious. She ran forward, holding her umbrella over their heads and trying to pull them up. "Why are you two here? Get up! The rain is coming down so hard, you’ll catch a cold!" Guarding Donovan, Isla shook her head. "I’m not getting up! I’m going to kneel with my brother!" "If Grandpa is going to hit someone, he can hit me first! Don’t you hit my brother!" Hearing this, Caleb clutched his chest, apoplectic with rage. "Fine! Fine! So you’re all rebelling against me now, is that it?!" "Today, I’ll beat all of you together!" As the whip came down again, Donovan quickly pushed Isla and Julian away, taking the blow himself. He truly couldn’t hold on any longer. He collapsed completely, his body trembling violently in the cold rain before he passed out. The string of Buddha Beads on his wrist snapped at that instant. The beads scattered across the ground with a series of soft clicks. "Donovan!" Isla panicked, her eyes turning red as she tried to shake the man on the ground. "Donovan, wake up!" Julian reacted quickly, hoisting the man onto his back and carrying him back to his room, one heavy step at a time. In Donovan’s room, he lay on the bed with his eyes tightly shut. His face was as pale as paper, and a cold sweat beaded constantly on his forehead. A moment later, he furrowed his brow and his eyes fluttered open. "Brother, you’re awake!" Isla, who had been watching over his bedside, cried out in relief, her eyes red from crying. "I’m okay, don’t cry," Donovan uttered weakly, his whole body in excruciating pain as he struggled to sit up. He instinctively felt for the Buddha Beads on his wrist, but his wrist was bare. Panic seized him. "Where are my Buddha Beads?" Isla quickly handed him a box. "Here they are. The string snapped, and they scattered everywhere. I picked them up for you." Donovan took the box, opened it, and let out a sigh of relief. He counted the beads, but something felt wrong. There were only seventeen beads, not the original eighteen. Donovan’s brow furrowed. He counted twice more, but there was still one missing. He panicked and, without a second thought, tried to get out of bed. Isla grew alarmed. "Brother, you’re covered in wounds and running a high fever! You can’t be moving around!" "A bead is missing. I have to find it!" Muttering to himself, Donovan pushed past the others and, ignoring the pain racking his body, ran straight for the ancestral hall. Outside, the sky had opened up into a torrential downpour. Donovan reached the ancestral hall and began searching the surrounding area. The icy rain poured over him. The violent movements tore at the wounds on his back, causing them to bleed anew. The pain was like being ripped apart. The fever made his steps unsteady. He stumbled and fell to his knees, the pain so intense he couldn’t stand back up. Ignoring everything, Donovan simply knelt there in the rain and began to search, inch by inch. After a long time, his large hands were raw and bleeding, the blood mixing with the rainwater on the ground. His eyes grew crimson with desperation. He couldn’t find it. No matter where he looked, he couldn’t find it. He had lost the gift Chloe gave him... 「Late that night, at the Xavier Residence.」 In her room, Chloe Preston had just finished her bath. She leaned against the large bed, touching her warm abdomen, her mind restless. She picked up her phone and called him, but there was no answer. Chloe’s brows knitted tightly. She had called him countless times today, but none of the calls went through. Could something have happened to him? A sudden worry seized Chloe, and a suffocating tightness constricted her chest. She lowered her gaze and stroked her belly, her eyes full of tenderness. "Baby, do you think Daddy will be okay?" "Baby, when Daddy comes back, I’ll tell him all about you. Do you think he’ll like you?" The little orange cat at her side let out two soft meows. Chloe turned her head and rubbed its fluffy head, smiling. "I forgot, you’re a baby, too." Just then, a sudden, loud clap of thunder outside the window made Chloe jump in fright. She was terrified of thunder. She quickly lay down and pulled the quilt completely over her head. As thunder rumbled outside, she squeezed her eyes shut, and unwanted memories came flooding back. She remembered how, when she was a child, Stella Page would beat and scold her whenever she felt the slightest displeasure. She would punish her by forcing her to kneel in thunderstorms for hours on end. If she didn’t kneel perfectly still, Stella would beat her legs with a wooden stick. Wyatt Quinn saw it all but did nothing. He let Stella slap her face and pull her hair, his only thoughts on gambling and drinking. When she was sick, so ill she thought she might die, they still did nothing, leaving her to fend for herself. An hour later, the thunder outside was still roaring relentlessly, only growing louder. Chloe curled up alone beneath the quilt, covering her ears and trembling as she recalled those awful times with Stella Page. Suddenly, a corner of the quilt was lifted.