The urgency in his voice and the silent panic in his eyes were enough to make her shut up and just followed Luke.

He slowed down a bit for her to catch up when he realized she was half-panting as he dragged her behind. It would look like he was the one actually kidnapping her!

When they reached the beach area where there were more people, Luke walked at a normal pace, but he hooked his shoulder over Jess and pulled her closer to his side.

She automatically snaked her arms to his waist and they now look like a lover leisurely walking on the beach.

"Can you talk now or I have to wait till we reached our villa?" she asked in a small voice.

She was staring ahead, with a small smile on her lips, betraying the slight quiver in her voice. She doesn't know what was actually happening, but she was trained to react first before asking questions in this kind of situation.

And her body was indeed reacting. She could feel the nervous anxiety of Luke in her skin.

"We could talk… I guess," he looked over her face and saw the shadow of a smile on her lips and a crease formed in between his bushy brows. "I truly could not grasp the notion of you and Ellise acting so calm and collected in a situation like this."

"Have you talked to Ellise other than the call you just had with her?"

"Yup. This morning. When the shit actually happened."

"This morning?" she tilted her head to look at his face. "When I was asleep or when I was in the bathroom?"

"Before you woke up."

"Hmm," she slightly nodded with a smile, and after a few minutes of silence, she added, "And no, I am not calm and collected. I am nervous and scared too. I just happened to be trained in this kind of scenario."

"Trained?" he raised his voice with puzzlement, "In what situation in your everyday life learning doing this kind of training is necessary or remotely useful."

"It is of utmost importance to learn this stuff, together with learning how to defend yourself when you have a kidnapping threat growing up, -- and got actually kidnapped on the way to school," she said matter-of-factly as though she was sharing an old story about her childhood.

It was indeed a childhood story but an unpleasant one.

"When I was a kid, the only threat I faced on my way to school was bullies who took my lunch money. Other than that, life was uneventful. Just the normal stuff you would expect in a small town."

"I grew up in a small city. I mostly spent my childhood on a small island. But my grandfather used to hold the highest government position in our small city and later on the highest government position in the country."

"Say what?" His special voice leaked out with the information she casually said. He had no idea that Jess came from a family of politicians.

She just chuckled at Luke's reaction and continued walking.

"I thought you were just a rich kid," he uttered in complete shock.

"I am a rich kid!" she giggled. "On the side of my mother's family. My great-great-grandparents were these Chinese immigrants to my home country that raked riches throughout the years with their hard work."

"Oh!" was the only reaction he could muster.

He always wondered the kind of family Jess had back home and why she was quite secretive with her family background. He somehow understands her quirks when it comes to staying low-key and all those extravagant things she does as if they were nothing unusual.

"You became friends with Ellise because of this enigmatic aunt you guys shared, right?"

"Yes. She was --- uhmm, how to say it...with Ellise an aunt that was a friend of her mother, with Dana she was more of an older sister, since Dana's mother was her nanny -- and in my case, she was my legal guardian."

"But no blood relation at all?" he asked, as they started climbing the narrow steps to their villa.

"None at all." she softly chuckled. "She became my legal guardian because my mother wanted to spite my father by naming a total stranger as my legal guardian in her will." her voice turned softer with the memory.

Luke, who knew that her mother died when she was eight, caressed her shoulder to comfort her.

"You know what's funnier than entrusting your only daughter to some stranger?" she asked as she key- in the passcode to their villa.

"What?" he asked, gently.

"The stranger my mother chose to be my legal guardian was actually one of the many exes my father has under his belt." she chortled.

Luke gazed at Jess' back who went straight ahead to the couch the moment they entered the house.

She was telling the story like it was nothing but a funny anecdote of her life, and yet, Luke saw it as something so screwed up for a young child to experience. It is worse than having parents who screamed at each other in anger at three in the morning in the kitchen while dishes flew in the air like a frisbee.

"You can imagine the legal battle that ensued right after my mother died and my mother's lawyer and some child service worker went to my father's house to inform him of my mother's will."

He sat next to her on the comfy sofa and said nothing. He was lost for words with her story.

"Oh," she looked up at Luke, "my aunt also did not know that she was made my legal guardian by my mother. She was not even friends with my mom. They had just happened to hold a charity event together a week before my mother's tragic accident."

"H-how--" his jaw slackened as he began to comprehend the complexity of her childhood story.

"No one knows why my mother did that." Her face softened as tears gleamed at the corner of her eyes.