Eleven Years All to the Wrong Man novel Chapter 21

It was a deep, heavy sleep. Emma felt like she had gone back ten years, to the first year Evan came to Riverside Millford.

Riverside Millford. A humid, southern town. A place she had despised and yearned to escape as a child, only to miss it dearly as an adult, knowing she could never go back.

Emma came from an ordinary family. Her parents were well-known doctors in town, a couple who ran a tiny clinic. Though the clinic was small, it had many patients, so from a very young age, Emma was raised by her grandmother.

Her relationship with her parents wasn't particularly close, and it grew even more distant after her younger brother was born when she was ten.

Riverside Millford was small—so small that if any family had the slightest bit of drama, the entire town would know about it by the next day.

So, Evan's arrival not only caused a stir at school but naturally piqued the curiosity of the other town residents.

He came from the big city, dressed in fine clothes, yet he had no parents—only a grandmother who ran a tailor shop on East Street.

Mrs. Doyle, the tailor on East Street, had lived alone for over a decade. Then, overnight, she had a grown grandson from out of town.

During dinner that evening, her grandmother brought up Mrs. Doyle's family matters at the table.

"She's a pitiful one, that woman. Her husband died when she was young, and in her middle age, she took in an adopted daughter. Raised her through thick and thin, only for the girl to run off to the big city and never come back to visit, not even once! And now, all of a sudden, a grown grandson shows up, but the daughter is still nowhere to be seen. I'm telling you, that poor Mrs. Doyle has had a hard life…"

Emma listened, keeping her head down and eating her dinner. She asked carefully, "Grandma, why did her grandson come back? Isn't he from the city? Why didn't he stay there?"

She never asked about his parents, afraid of bringing up painful memories. But Evan didn't seem to mind at all.

Because when Emma complimented a jacket he was wearing, he would casually tell her that his mother had bought it for him. Evan never shied away from talking about his parents.

That's how Emma learned that Evan's family story wasn't so melodramatic. His father was indeed a real estate developer in a coastal city, a business tycoon, and he had, in fact, gone to prison.

But his mother hadn't died, nor was she a mistress. She was on the run, moving from place to place to escape creditors. Unable to care for him or afford the city's high tuition fees any longer, she had no choice but to send him back to his grandmother in Riverside Millford.

It sounded a little tragic, but Evan didn't seem to care. He was never a great student anyway, so it didn't matter where he studied.