Pampered by my three brothers: the return of the neglected heiress novel Chapter 1275

Chapter 1275: Second life

Penny had always been the smart one. Grace could never deny that, even though Penny was a few years younger than her. After knowing Penny for years, Grace understood her inside and out.

Call it luck or fate, but that brief phone call had knocked Grace back on track.

She knew exactly what Penny would do and say if she found out about Grace’s condition. So, after that call, it wasn’t that Grace tried to forget about her health issues—rather, it gave her the push to act as if nothing had happened.

For months before Penny’s arrival in Anteca, Grace reminded herself to behave as she always had. Meanwhile, she continued her regular hospital visits. This became her routine. At first, it was tough to visit the hospital in secret, only to hear that her condition was not improving—though at least it wasn’t getting worse.

Eventually, she got used to it.

Did her feelings about her condition change? Not in the slightest. But Grace had accepted that her days were numbered. That was why she had been secretly training someone to take over Penny’s and her clients’ affairs, in case her doctor ever told her that the cancer was spreading.

She had also prepared everything for her mother in case she passed.

Grace arranged things carefully, even volunteering to look after Chairman Bennet. Although Penny was skeptical, she reassured her that no one would suspect anything. After all, Grace had been visiting the hospital regularly due to her condition. If anyone was watching the chairman, they wouldn’t see a connection just by looking at her medical records.

Grace had accepted the possibility of death. It wasn’t that she had lost hope—she just didn’t cling to it too tightly. For her, that was better than drowning in misery.

Life goes on.

And if she was going to die, she didn’t want to leave behind the few people she cared about without closure.

But then, something interesting happened.

On one of her secret hospital visits, Grace ran into a familiar face. Haines.

While filling out a form at the counter, she noticed a man limping into the hospital. She glanced at him, brows furrowing.

’Isn’t that... Penny’s uncle?’ she wondered, her gaze falling to his leg as he leaned on a cane. A nurse was assisting him, and just as she remembered, he kept his eyes forward—never looking around. He didn’t notice her.

"Right..." she whispered. "He and Penny came back together."

Curiosity swirled in her mind as she recalled the little crush she had on him when she was eighteen. She had met Penny when she was seventeen—just a few months shy of eighteen. Because of her circumstances, she had missed a few years of school.

Back then, Haines had been strikingly good-looking. And, to her surprise, over a decade later, he still was. He maintained his lean frame and stoic expression. A streak of white now lined the side of his hair, but rather than aging him, it only added to his allure.

Intrigued, Grace handed her form to the nurse with a smile but didn’t leave. Instead, she lingered in the lobby with a magazine in hand. Seeing him limp, she guessed he was there for a check-up on his leg.

’Penny never told me what exactly happened to him—just that he had a bad leg,’ she mused, humming softly as she settled in to wait. It was her day off, after all.

After over an hour, she spotted him again.

Using the magazine to partially shield her face, she tracked his movements with her gaze.

So why, after all this time, did she suddenly decide to pursue him?

It all started the morning after Penny’s five-day trip.