17 There was another re Jax Ryder was only nineteen , and his career was at its peak . My marriage with Alex was not yet over . If our scandalous relationship were truly exposed , it would only become a stain on his fife . But this was a trivial reason , not worth mentioning . So I didn't say it , just sat in the car , watching his figure completely disappear from my sight . Then I pulled a cigarette pack from my pocket and lit one . I didn't smoke it , just watched it burn quietly between my fingers . The rising wisps of white smoke blurred my vision . The choking smell of cheap tobacco seemed to drag me back many years . My biological father was a truly repulsive man . He used his passable looks to marry into the Harding family , yet he couldn't resist cheating on his wife outside . Afraid of being discovered , he found a woman from a massage parlor - my mother . 21:41 Tue , 26 Aug < 2 % I was discovered by Isabella , the eldest daughter of the Harding family , right after I was born . My father knelt , weeping and begging for forgiveness , and only then was he able to return to the family . I grew up with my mother in that tiny massage parlor , located in a cramped , rundown apartment building . While I did my homework at an old table , my mother and her clients were separated from me only by a curtain . Sometimes she would call me in to get her a glass of water to soothe her hoarse voice . She didn't really pay much attention to me , spending all her time at the mahjong table when she wasn't with clients . No one at school liked me . They would deliberately whisper in front of me . Saying I was just like my mother , that I'd caught some kind of dirty sickness at a young age . It's hard to find a precise word to describe those days . But whenever I think of the past . The first image that comes to mind is that window glowing with cheap pink light , and the dark , lewd stares of those coming and going clients that fell upon me . My desire and ambition were greater than anyone else's . I was desperate to climb higher , and higher . For that , I would pay any price . A cigarette burned out in my hand . I was startled back to reality by the falling ash . I dialed Maya's number . < " The final phase of the stock acquisition plan begins tonight . "