True Fated Marriage (Grace and Heinz)
Chapter 996

Grace felt her heart pounding in her chest while she stared at Maria in disbelief.

"Mrs. Smith?" Miss Holland noticed that something was a little off with Grace, so she asked loudly, "Are you okay?"

Even Maria was shocked by the way Grace stared at her with her eyes wide open.

"Aunty?" Maria asked timidly.

Grace finally regained her senses and said, "Oh, excuse me. Maria, I wanted to invite you over to my house later. Would you like to come?"

Maria looked surprised at first and then looked towards Miss Holland nicely, as if to seek her opinion. It looked like she was the kind of child who always listened to what the adults said instead of making her own decisions directly.

Miss Holland smiled and said, "Maria, this Aunty here is really sincere about inviting you over to join her children, Little Gary and Ernest, among others. Whether or not you would like to go over, you can just let her know."

Grace nodded and added, "Yeah, you can let me know if you would like to come over, or if you wouldn't want to. Whatever it is, it's alright as you have the freedom to choose. We'll respect your decision no matter what."

Maria hesitated for a moment before saying, "I have to ask for my mommy's permission first."

"Okay, Maria," Grace nodded. "Then let Miss Holland call and ask for you, okay?"

"Okay," she nodded.

Miss Holland went ahead to give Maria's mother a phone call.

"Mrs. Attwood, Little Gary and Ernest's mother would like to invite Maria over to their house this afternoon. Is that okay with you?"

It's unknown what Mrs. Attwood said on the other end, but Miss Holland answered, "Perhaps Little Gary's driver could send her back afterwards. Mrs. Smith, would that be fine?"

"Of course," Grace nodded immediately. "We'll be in charge of sending the children home."

"Okay, it's a deal then. Well keep in contact after school."

After Miss Holland ended the phone call, she spoke to Grace, "Maria's mother said that she has to work overtime later, so please send Maria over later and give her a call after the gathering has ended. Here's her phone number."

"Sure," Grace recorded her number down immediately. "Other students are welcome to join as well. Miss Holland, can you help to replace out who else Little Gary and Ernest would like to invite? Whoever they plan to invite, please liaise and coordinate with their parents as well, as Heinz will be able to arrange for transportation."

"Okay, no problem."

Grace chatted with Miss Holland a little while more before she finally left the kindergarten.

She was deep in her thoughts as soon as she got in the car.

Maria looked really similar to her cousin, Zachary.

Hence, the whole time she couldn't help but wonder if that child was related to her cousin in any way at all.

Heinz was curious over the way Grace looked to be so deep in her own world, so he asked, "What's wrong? You look really preoccupied. Is Little Gary still misbehaving in there?"

She immediately shook her head in response and said, "No, it's just that I encountered something, but we'll talk about it later at night. Also, do ask our housekeeper to go purchase some ingredients for the feast tonight. Make sure that the ingredients are fresh so that the children's stomach won't be upset. Oh, I'm not sure how many children will come for the night, but I managed to invite Maria over." "What else did you want to say just now?" He had a gut feeling that she was hiding something from him, considering how she looked so preoccupied after she left the kindergarten. The more she tried to hide, the more he felt concerned. "Why don't you just share with me? Perhaps I can help to point out a thing or two and figure out what's going on."

Grace turned to look at him and sighed. "You look so curious about it as well. Fine, I'll share it with you then."

"Yeah, don't worry about sharing it with me." he felt that as her husband, he was obliged to help her deal with everything.

She paused for a while before saying, "I realized that Maria looked really similar to my cousin, Zachary."

"What?" He raised his eyebrows and looked a little doubtful. "You mean that girl looks like Zachary?"

She nodded seriously, "Yeah, in fact, they look really similar to one another especially upon closer inspection when I got near her. She looked really beautiful and cute, probably because she inherited her parents' best genes. I also felt a really strong affability with her and took a liking the moment I first saw her. Moreover, she's aged 5 and comes from a single parent family. Coincidentally, my cousin went to the United States to further his studies 6 years ago. Now that she just transferred over recently, I can't help but wonder if she's related to him in some way."

"Why don't you ask Zachary about it then?" Heinz said, "We're close to him, anyway."

"Maybe it's because I got pregnant before marrying, that's why I thought that the same might happen to others as well. Maybe I'm just overthinking after all," Grace hesitated before saying, "It'll also be too abrupt for us to contact my cousin directly. We can't just do things so hastily."

He nodded, "If they really look so similar, your doubts sound valid as well. Also, I do agree that we shouldn't tell Zachary about it yet, but what if we invite him over tonight?"

"Right, that means we can observe whether the both of them look alike to one another right? I agree with your plan," she responded.

"Okay," he got ready to call Zachary. "So I'll invite him over for dinner tonight and well observe the similarities between them and perhaps collect their DNA to confirm it. Let's keep this a secret before we can confirm anything." "Yeah, that sounds good," Grace agreed with Heinz. "We have to do things maturely instead of going about it so hastily. This is a serious matter after all."

"I know!" He called Zachary who answered quickly, "Zachary, are you free tonight?"

"What's up?" He asked.

"If you're free tonight, maybe you could come over to my house tonight. The thing is, Little Gary and Ernest will be inviting their friends over for dinner later, so I thought of inviting you along to join the fun. Is that a plan?"

"They're all kids. It'll be weird for me to join," Zachary laughed about it. "I think I'll sit this one out. Enjoy yourselves though."

"Oh come on, don't say that," Heinz answered immediately. "Wouldn't you want to come and see a bunch of cute children? Who knows if that might pique your interest to get married as well!"

"Come on, what do you mean by cute? What's so cute about Little Gary who's always so rude to you?" Zachary teased him, "Let's get straight to the point, what's your hidden motive behind?" "What do you mean by hidden motive?" Heinz was shocked, "Don't you think you're being a little too sensitive?"