"Really?" Zachary obviously didn't buy it. "Heinz, it's a gathering for little children. Did you think I'll really believe that all you really wanted was to invite me over? Why don't you be straightforward and tell me what's your actual purpose?"

"Oh my God, you are really sensitive. Why are you suspecting everyone all the time?" Heinz suddenly felt drunk. "Well, fine, I'll be direct then."

"Yeah, please be direct," Zachary laughed.

"Zachary, you're not young anymore, and your mom really looks like she can't wait to have grandchildren already, so you should really start thinking about marriage before it's too late. How long more do you plan to keep your mom waiting?"

"Did my mom ask you guys to convince me regarding this?" Zachary asked.

"Uh, I think you're overthinking now. Your mom does hope for you to get married soon and so do we. After all, we're all in pairs already while you're still single. We all wish to see you settle down with someone. Thus, perhaps if you came and have a look at those children and understand more about them, who knows if that might make you want to get married?" Heinz realized Zachary derailed from his primary objective.

He laughed again. "What does my marriage have to do with those children? Maybe I won't even want to get married after looking at them."

"Zachary, so are you coming or not?" Heinz found this to be a lot more complicated than it needed to be. "We just invited you for fun. Do you really have to decline our invitation to this extent?"

"Fine, I'll try to go over tonight unless something important comes up."

"You'd better!" Heinz said, "You'd better come here directly. We'll be waiting for you. It's a deal then."

"Alright, it's a deal," Zachary replied.

After he hung up his phone, Heinz sighed at Grace, "Your cousin is so difficult to deal with. Isn't it just a marriage? He's reacting as if we're asking for his life instead. Does he have some trauma when it comes to women?"

She also frowned and asked, "Mr. Jones, were you only focusing on marriage just now?"

He was startled for a moment before regaining his senses. "Of course I didn't forget that we called him over to observe if Maria and he look alike. Anyway, it doesn't matter how we get him to come over as long as he agrees to it."

That evening.

Grace confirmed with Miss Holland that five children would be coming over, so it would be a total of eight children including Little Gary, Ernest and Lowell.

It turned out that Little Gary had only invited five children who were all girls. When Miss Holland mentioned the names, Grace was surprised, "Why are there no boys at all?"

Miss Holland laughed, "Your son said that the house is full of guys already but still lacks a sister, so perhaps his mommy could give birth to a baby sister after looking at all those little girls." "Uh!" Grace wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.

She couldn't really figure out what was in her son's mind anymore.

Soon, she hung up the phone and asked Heinz to go pick them up.

"So how many of them are confirmed to be coming?" He checked with Grace.

"Five, and all of them are little girls," she answered.

"Why?" He was shocked too, "Why are they all girls? You mean they didn't invite any boys at all?"

She nodded. "Nope, no boys. All of them are girls."

Heinz paused for some time and finally said,

"Wow, I don't know what to say. Why didn't Ernes want to invite some boys over, then?"

"Little Gary is the older brother. I'm pretty sure he called the shots so Ernest didn't dare to say anything."

"That's true," Heinz said. "Well, I'll ask Lester and the housekeeper to go to the kindergarten in three cars and pick them up then." "Okay."

Soon, Heinz sent Lester to pick the children up.

Grace saw that the housekeeper had already prepared everything for an outdoor barbeque. Food and beverages had been prepared, not to mention toys for the children to bring home as souvenirs. It looked like it was going to be a grand night.

Soon, everyone arrived. Little Gary and Ernest truly brought five little girls home.

When Heinz got out of the car and looked at Grace, he seemed helpless.

She had no chance to say anything.

Little Gary grabbed the chance and spoke first, "Let me introduce everyone. This is my and Ernest's mother. You can call her aunty. Don't be shy, I'm pretty sure you girls have met her before." "Welcome, everyone," Grace greeted them with a

smile.

"Nice to meet you, Aunty," the five little girls shouted in unison.

"Nice to meet all of you, too," Grace greeted them as well. "Come, go wash your hands so that we can start eating. Little Gary and Ernest, can you guys lead them to go wash their hands?" "Okay."

Soon, the children went to wash their hands.

Grace turned to Heinz and asked, "What do you think? Do you think she looks like my cousin?"

"Sixty percent similarity," Heinz said.

"My cousin will probably get shocked as well when he arrives later," she said.

"He's not coming anymore," Heinz said. "On the way just now, he called and told me that he had something urgent to deal with, so he can't come anymore."

"Could he have done it on purpose?" She frowned, "Didn't you tell him that he had to come over?"

"I did, but he sounded really urgent."

"What happened then?" She asked, "Did you ask him?"

"He didn't want to let me know." He said, "I could sense the urgency in his voice. It really sounded like he had an emergency to deal with.

Grace took out her phone and said, "I'll try calling him then."

"Yeah, maybe you can try," Heinz said.

Zachary didn't pick up her phone, and she received an automated message, "I'm busy. I'll return a call later."

She frowned and said, "He didn't pick up the phone. It looks like he's really busy."

"Don't worry about it. This little girl can't run since she's classmates with Little Gary and Ernest. If she is really related to Zachary, she can't run away either," Heinz said, "Maybe you can even get in contact with her mother and see if you could extract any information from her."

"Yeah." Grace nodded and said, "That's the only way for now."

The party was very lively. The little girls had different personalities as well, with Maria being super quiet and well-behaved, whereas the other girls were almost as active as the boys.

Grace stroked her belly and said, "I hope that if I am pregnant with a girl, she would turn out as well-behaved as Maria."

"Don't you think that child is actually lacking self-esteem?" Heinz responded, "Nowadays, all parents treasure their children a lot, which would make them develop into confident, outgoing members of the society. I don't actually think it's necessarily a good thing for Maria to be so well-behaved."

She looked at him and suddenly felt lost for words.

Suddenly, the phone rang.

Grace checked her phone and realized that it was a phone call from Maria's mother.

She quickly answered the call, "Hi Mrs. Attwood, is that you?."

"Yes, Mrs. Smith, nice to meet you," she sounded apologetic and nervous on the other end of the call, "I'm so sorry for bothering, but something suddenly came up. I'm really sorry but can I please trouble you to help me look after Maria? I might only be free after midnight."

Tip: You can use left, right keyboard keys to browse between chapters.Tap the middle of the screen to reveal Reading Options.

If you replace any errors (non-standard content, ads redirect, broken links, etc..), Please let us know so we can fix it as soon as possible.

Report