chapter 198

Lucy almost stumbled upon her feet. "So... so you just nodded your head in a daze!? You didn’t actually hear what your family was talking about?"  Eric thought about it. He nodded. "En. I didn’t pay any attention to them."  Lucy felt dizzy. She put her palm forward. "Wait, Boss. Let me just digest this… This is too much for my dumb brain to understand."  *So it was all a misunderstanding?*  He pursed his lips. "My woman is not dumb."  "No, I am actually quite dumb—" she froze and looked at him in confusion. "What did you say?"  "That you are not dumb."  "No. Say it exactly the way you said it just now."  Eric softly smiled. "My woman is not dumb."  Lucy was dumbfounded. "My woman?"  Eric smiled. "En."  "Who?"  "You."  Lucy was dumbstruck. "When did I become your woman?"  Eric didn’t understand her question.  Suddenly, Lucy had a bad premonition that there must be a lot of things inadvertently kept from her that she was unaware of. She felt as if she was stuck in a web of misunderstandings that spiraled out of control.  "B-Boss... why did you address me as your woman?"  *Ugh. Why do I feel that his answer would make me faint in shock?*  Eric tilted his head. "Because you are my woman. Because we are a couple."  !!!  She felt as if the whole earth shook beneath her feet and it would gobble her down whole. Her dizziness just increased a thousandfold. Eric widened his eyes and quickly caught her in his arms. "Lucy! What’s wrong? Are you sick?"  He held her face and checked her over. "Are you hurt anywhere?"  "Haha... My brain is hurt."  Lucy couldn’t decide where to begin bombarding him with her questions.  Goosebumps tingled the hair on her arms, and she asked, "Boss. How is it that we are a couple, but I don’t know about it?"  "Hm?"  She lacked tears to shed. "Boss, when did we become a couple? Did I miss something? Do I have selective amnesia? Why don’t I remember our confession? I am pretty sure I would have definitely remembered such an awesome moment! Wh-who told you that we are a couple?"  "Vicki Lawrence."  She rapidly blinked her eyes. "Vicki Lawrence. Wait, that gang’s leader who kidnapped me?"  "En. She said that you are my woman."  "Huh? Why!?"  Lucy couldn’t wrap her head around this revelation.  "Because I came to save you. She said that only boyfriends who care about their woman would come and save them. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have. She said that she wouldn’t have targeted you if she knew that you were my, CEO Eric Wilson’s woman."  *Actually, it was because he was the Mafia King, but he just altered that small fact.*  Lucy was utterly speechless.  *What the hell is with this cause and effect? Who created this equation?*  Eric smiled. "Not just that. I came to realize that I am your man too."  "!!!"  "You took me grocery shopping that day. You said that most of the crowd were couples who came for shopping. I read on the net that couples usually shop together like that. You took me with you, so it meant that you consider me as your man."  At this point, Lucy had no words to say. Eric had assumed too many things on his own. Some part of it because others gave him wrong information, while another part of it, he thought it to be true on his own.  *So... so Boss was thinking of us as a couple since that long!? And I had no idea about it?*  "Boss, this… this is... completely wrong! This is a misunderstanding. We-we are not a couple."  Eric froze. He stared at her in a trance. "Not a couple?"  Lucy wanted to bang her head on the wall.  *Ah, that leader Vicki Lawrence! You! It is because of you that things escalated to this point! You fed all the wrong things to my innocent Boss!*  Somewhere, Vicki Lawrence sneezed. "Achoo!"  *Is somebody talking about me?*  Lucy said, "Boss, didn’t I tell you last time that relationships don’t work like that? You should have feelings for that person. You shouldn’t treat me as your woman just because somebody told you that. It should be because you feel that way. I took you grocery shopping because I wanted you to experience how an average life feels like. I wanted to show you how you can find joy even in the little things like that."  *I mean, of course, I like Boss, but my intention wasn’t to take you to make it seem like a couple shopping together.*  Eric blankly looked at her. "But we kissed too."  Lucy furiously blushed. "I-I know, but it doesn’t automatically mean that we are a couple. Again, you kissed me because you wanted to," she coughed, "console me. I was crying, right? You didn’t kiss me because you wanted to. Your acquaintance told you to kiss me. So once again, you did something purely because somebody else told you to do it. But your feelings must be your own decision. Our actions should be based on how we feel, not based on what others feel."  Eric wanted to say so many things, but it was as if he couldn’t speak. He wanted to explain himself, but he didn’t know how.  "You... are saying that you are not my woman?"  She stiffened. "I-I mean…"  "Are we not a couple?"  "That y-you are thinking all this because you have been told like that. Your feelings—"  Eric suddenly grabbed her arm and pulled her toward his chest. He held the back of her head and crashed his lips onto hers before she could say anything.  ---Â