Never Judge

Cedric was furious when he heard who was behind the attempted kidnapping. He never thought that the Hernandezes or the Chus would do something as absurd as attempt to kidnap a member of their family just to have her be a man's mistress.

"I'll deal with the Chus." Ray said as he began to take out his phone.

"No. They need to realize who they are dealing with." Cedric said with a dark expression on his face.

The next day at Island's Inc., Grandpa Hernandez sat behind his desk, going about work as usual when his lawyer burst in.

"Mr. Hernandez, Mr. Hernandez, we just got a demand letter. The case is being handled by Katerina Sebastian." The lawyer was in a panic. Katerina Sebastian never took any cases she could lose, nor did she take cases from just anyone.

Before Grandpa Hernandez could respond to his lawyer, his grandson from his youngest son burst in. The young man had been at brunch entertaining some very important clients.

"Grandpa, my company card and all my credit cards have been rejected. After brunch, my company car was also taken away. The bank said we owed them." The young man said frantically.

"What?" Grandpa Hernandez said in surprise.

Soon another member of the family came in telling Grandpa Hernandez how most of their investors had pulled out and their stocks were dropping steeply. This sent everyone into a panic. The Hernandez family wouldn't survive without those investors.

"Is it the doing of the Chu family?" Grandpa Hernandez said in a furious tone. "They can't blame us that the men they sent to kidnap Adrianna suddenly disappeared. They were their men!" 

"It's not them." A female voice suddenly said from the door. Everyone was shocked to see Katerina and Alexi Sebastian at the door with at least fifty bodyguards.

"Miss Sebastian, I'm sure we can settle this amicably." Grandpa Hernandez said as he eyed the young woman. 

Katerina glared at him and looked at him in disgust.

"Old man, you have no right to talk to my sister. We're here to bring your whole family with us. Either you cooperate or we take you by force. Either way, you're coming with us." Alexi paused for a few seconds after his statement. When there was no movement from the other party he gave the signal and the body guards roughly took Grandpa Hernandez and the other members of the Hernandez family with them.

There were fifteen members of the Hernandez family that were at Island's Inc. at that time, Alexi and Katerina did not leave a single one of them at the building. They were all piled up into three vans together with bodyguards to ensure that they did not try to run away.

Ayanna on the other hand went to the Hernandez residences together with Ian and Camilla to make sure every single member of the Hernandez family was picked up and brought to Mountain View.

When Grandpa Hernandez and the rest of the Hernandez family arrived, they were roughly dragged to the living room. What shocked Grandpa Hernandez the most was when he saw Edward and Mark Chu on their knees while Vivian and Katrina Chu trembled on the side.

"Mr. Chu, Mr. Chu, what's going on?" Grandpa Hernandez cried out as he saw his benefactor.

"You stupid old man!" Edward Chu cursed at him before turning back around. 

After a while, Alexi Sebastian, Raymund Laurence, Ayanna Reyes, and Katerina Sebastian all walked into the living room without even glancing at the Hernandez or Chu families. They took their seats on the couch and sat regally like modern day emperors and empresses, but the seat at the center remained empty. The empty seat worried Grandpa Hernandez the most, when they entered the compound he already knew that no ordinary person lived there. It was huge and intricately decorated, just to have a place like this staffed would cost almost the same as running a mall, how rich was the person that actually lived there. 

"I'm disappointed cousin, you couldn���t even control your own men." Katerina told Ray as she shook her head.

"Pawns like them often forget their place. You can't judge a person just by what you see." Ray said in a cruel tone. 

"Where is your brother, Ayanna?" Alexi asked.

"He'll be down in a while." Ayanna said with a grin that sent chills down everyone's spines.

At the third floor of Mountain View, Cedric was still arguing with his wife. 

"It's not safe, plus you can't have your emotions at extreme highs." Cedric was trying to reason out while coaxing his furious wife.

"If you keep me locked up and away from what is actually happening, I will be extremely furious." Adrianna told her husband as she shrugged off his hand.

"Can you handle facing your grandfather, your cousins, your uncles, and aunts, when you know that we are about to make them pay for what they did?" Cedric asked his wife in a raised tone.

"I'm mad too. I'm the victim, remember?" Adrianna asked her husband. She didn't know if her heightened emotions were because of what they tried to do to her, or if it was because of her pregnancy. 

"I don't want you to get hurt." Cedric told his wife as he looked into her eyes.

"How can I get hurt? You'll be there." Adrianna knew her husband and she knew that if she spoke sweetly and smiled sweetly at him he couldn't refuse her.

Cedric sighed in surrender. There was nothing he wouldn't do for his wife. "Fine. But don't say I didn't warn you." 

Grandpa Hernandez and the other members of the Hernandez family were made to stand and wait for the owner of the house. From what Alexander Sebastian had said, he had quickly assumed that they were in the home of the Reyes Heir and from the sheer size of the place it made sense that someone like him called it home.

They had been waiting for half an hour when the doors behind them opened and they heard a set of footsteps enter the living room. The guards and the househelp all greeted the new people with a quick 'sir and madam'. Everyone wanted to turn around and look but they were too afraid of offending the Reyes Heir. 

When the couple was finally in front of them they still had their backs turned to their guests, something felt extremely familiar about the couple. When the man turned his face sideways to kiss the women, Grandpa Hernandez felt like he was going to have a heart attack.

When the woman finally turned and took her seat next to Ayanna everyone from the Hernandez family was in shock, they watched as Adrianna chatted happily with Ayanna Reyes. And when Cedric turned and took his seat at the head, there were audible gasps in the room.

"Why do you have such a disgusting family, sister-in-law?" Ayanna suddenly asked Adrianna.

As if they were suddenly knocked back from shock Grandpa Hernandez began to beg. "Mr. Reyes, please, pity us. It was all the Chu's plans to kidnap your wife."

"Shut up old man, you are in as much to blame for this as us." Edward Chu spat.

"If it weren't for your son's perverted desires none of this would have happened." Grandpa Hernadez argued back.

"You are the girl's family. How can you be so cruel!" Edward Chu accused the old man.

"Ugh. These people are giving me a headache." Katerina Sebastian complained as the two parties continued to blame each other. 

"Quiet." Alexi suddenly commanded in a harsh tone. Both Grandpa Hernandez and Edward Chu quickly followed.

A pair of bodyguards each picked up Grandpa Hernandez and Edward Chu and dragged them in front of Cedric. Cedric glanced at his wife to catch a reaction, but she remained straight faced as she watched her grandfather dragged across the room.

"I bet you didn't expect this." Cedric grinned as he looked down at the two men. "It's funny, both of you had the perfect opportunity to launch your families into a whole new level of power and wealth, but instead you chose to go down to the bottom of the pit."

"Please, Cedric, Mr. Reyes. Spare us. We are your wife's family." Grandpa Hernandez begged as he crawled closer to Cedric.

"The reason why you are still standing now is because you are her family." Cedric said coldly to the old man.

"Shut up old man. Don't you know who you are talking to." Edward Chu said to Grandpa Hernandez. "Mr. Reyes, I have been loyal to your friend Mr. Laurence. My family will work for yours as long as you desire." Edward Chu said, shifting his attention to Cedric. 

"Both of you are the worst kind of people." Cedric stood up and looked down at the two family heads. "You will watch as both of your families and businesses crumble and your name is dragged through the mud. I gave you both too many chances to redeem yourselves, you are lucky that I'm nothing like Alexi or Ray, if I were anything like them you would have fallen long ago."