When Two Winters Met (Henrietta and Yosef) novel Chapter 180

Her only hope now was that Jethro would arrive soon. What was taking him so long?

When Zelina reached the main table, Yosef stood, and Henrietta quickly followed his lead.

“Mom,” Yosef said.

“Mom,” Henrietta echoed.

Zelina beamed at Henrietta. “Sit down, dear,” she said, bustling forward. She nudged Yosef into the next seat and sat down beside Henrietta, taking her hand with great concern.

“Let me look at you,” Zelina said, studying her face. “Are you alright? The hotel staff called me and said you were in some trouble. I came as fast as I could. I’m not too late, am I?”

“No, you’re not late,” Henrietta replied, shaking her head. “I’m fine. Mr. Nash was here, so I was never in any real danger.”

“That’s a relief,” Zelina said. But then her expression hardened as she looked down at Henrietta’s hand. Her brow furrowed. “You’re hurt! Who did this?”

Henrietta glanced down and saw, for the first time, a bright red finger mark on her wrist where the bodyguard had gripped her.

Before she could answer, Winona spoke up. “I think it was when Ms. Harmon’s friends ordered their bodyguards to hold us down and force us to drink.”

Yosef, who hadn’t noticed the mark either, looked over, and his face grew dark. The lady’s skin was so delicate; this was the second time she had been bruised so easily.

Just then, Artina and her friends arrived at the table.

Before Yosef could speak, Zelina’s anger erupted. She slammed her hand on the table and glared at Artina. “Are you out of your mind? Why would you try to force Henrietta and her friends to drink?”

The girl was speechless. Another one of Artina’s friends, however, had a fiery temper of her own. She had been simmering with rage as she watched the events unfold, and now she exploded.

“Mrs. Nash, we understand that you want to protect your family friend,” she began, her voice shaking with indignation. “But you’re being deceived! Artina is the one engaged to your son! Henrietta is an outsider! And you’re defending her, even when it means twisting the truth? We may have been wrong, but they were the ones who started it! They insulted and provoked us again and again, until things finally boiled over!”

“If they had just been polite, if they had at least pretended to accept our toast, none of this would have happened! But they made it clear that they look down on us! If you were in our position, Mrs. Nash, would you have just let it go? And besides, in the end, no one was actually forced to drink, were they?”

“Why is everyone making such a big deal out of this, acting like they’re the victims? If this is the kind of unreasonable family the Nashes are, then as Artina’s best friends, we have to advise her to seriously reconsider this marriage!”

With her final words, the girl had played her trump card. She was using the engagement to threaten Zelina, implying that if the Nash family continued to favor Henrietta, the alliance could be called off. After all, from the outside, it looked as though the family was siding with a stranger against their own future daughter-in-law. Who would want to marry into a family like that?

Surely, she thought, Zelina wouldn’t risk her son’s happiness for the sake of a family friend. She had to know which relationship was more important. Perhaps this was all just for show, a way to appease the Sargent family.