The Billionaire Ex-Wife and the Beggar He Became novel Chapter 25

"Ms. Chase?" Even after nine years apart, Winona recognized Irene Chase at a glance.

"Shepherd, six years ago you told me in an email you'd gotten married—to the Nicholsons, that old-money family in Greenwood City. But… why are you still dressed so plainly?" Irene's voice was gentle, her gaze full of concern.

Winona glanced down at herself.

White t-shirt, black windbreaker, jeans, simple white sneakers.

It was a modest outfit, true enough.

But it wasn't that she couldn't afford better.

After a grueling, twelve-hour flight and a day spent walking around at the exhibition, comfort had simply won out.

"Shepherd, are you still struggling—like you were ten years ago?" Irene asked softly.

"I'm doing fine now, Ms. Chase." Winona kept her tone polite, offering nothing about her looming divorce, not even mentioning that she'd changed her name since they'd last met.

She saw no reason to pour out her troubles to someone she barely knew.

After all, she and Irene were hardly close.

Irene was Chinese-Italian, born and raised in Italy.

Ten years ago, Irene had flown in from Italy searching for her relatives. She never found them. Instead, she contracted a severe infectious disease and nearly died alone in a foreign hospital.

Bedridden and desperate, Irene had offered a sky-high fee—over three hundred dollars a day—for a caregiver. But no one would take the job; everyone was afraid of catching whatever she had.

Back then, Winona was seventeen.

She'd been thrown out of the Shepherd family's house a year before.

Yet even after being cast out, she still answered to the name "Joy Shepherd."

Seventeen, with no education, no work experience, and not a penny to her name, she couldn't find a job anywhere in Greenwood City. At night, she'd sleep on benches in hospital waiting rooms, just to stay warm and safe.

By chance, she overheard talk of a wealthy Chinese-Italian woman desperate to hire a caregiver—no one wanted the job, afraid of the disease.

Winona took the job.

Irene called her Shepherd.

In nine years, they'd exchanged just three emails.

Irene still thought of her as Shepherd, and all she knew was that Winona had married Julian Nicholson, heir to the Greenwood City dynasty.

"Your husband… his name is Julian, isn't it?" Irene asked, her eyes kind.

Winona pressed her lips together. "Yes."

She left it at that.

She never knew quite what to say to Ms. Chase.

Irene, on the other hand, acted as if they were old friends.

She stuck by Winona's side at the exhibit, and when she learned that Winona was showing her own designs, Irene's concern deepened. "My dear, have you registered your designs under a company?" she asked.

"They're my own work. I haven't partnered with any company," Winona answered honestly.

"The project hasn't even launched, and you're already showing your blueprints to the public? Aren't you worried that someone with ill intentions might steal your ideas?"