Never Judge

The next day, Cedric was at R Tower when Adolfo suddenly came up to him in a rush. He was holding his phone and it was on a news page.

"Cedric! Cedric! Did you see the news?" Adolfo said a bit too loudly.

"What is it?" Of course Cedric already knew what Adolfo had been shouting about. Last night, Ram had released a slew of news about the Hernandez clan. 

"The Hernandez clan. Is the news true? Also did your wife leave along with the others, they said that there were six members that walked out and reported everything." Adolfo quickly asked.

"Yeah. Adrianna couldn't put up with them anymore. My in-laws left as well." Cedric told Adolfo as he went back to his work.

"Oh my gosh! Look at this! Look!" Adolfo shoved his phone in front of Cedric. In other areas of the office as well there was an audible gasp as the latest piece of news became public, Adrianna Hernandez-Reyes had just acquired Island's Inc.

Cedric hadn't yet informed Adrianna that he had purchased Island's Inc. and had transferred it to her name. He had also installed some well known consultants in key positions, it was actually the Reyes Group that was secretly managing Island's Inc. while it was being transferred to Adrianna.

"You can leave and relax now!" Adolfo teased his friend.

"I like making my own money and not depending on my wife." Cedric said with a grin, technically, Island's Inc. was now a subsidiary of the Reyes Group.

At the old Hernandez house, representatives from various banks knocked on the door as they came to collect. Due to the scandal and the transfer that happened after, the banks felt like all the loans that the Hernandez family had taken out would not be paid. 

Their solution was to go after all of their remaining assets, this included the old Hernandez house as well as all the cars that the family members owned.

Inside Asia was crying like a child as everyone else panicked. 

"Oh shut up Asia!" One of her cousins shouted. "This wouldn't have happened to us if it weren't for you! You insisted on tricking Mark Chu, then you married him and couldn't satisfy him!"

"Don't blame my daughter!" Celine Hernandez answered back. "You were part of the plan to kidnap Adrianna and give her to the Chus. You are as much to blame for this as Asia."

"This is the police, we are here to arrest members of the Hernandez family for attempts at slavery and prostitution." When the Hernandez family heard the police outside they could do nothing but give in, they were nothing against them.

When the door swung open, Grandpa Hernandez, Aunt Celine, Asia, Aunt Janine, and several uncles, aunt, and cousins of Adrianna came out. They all looked like they hadn't slept the whole night, there were dark circles under their eyes and they all had an exhausted look on their faces.

Not everyone from the Hernandez family was arrested, Only Grandpa Hernandez, Aunt Celine, Aunt Janine, and five others were arrested. As for the others, they were left without their homes and without any properties. 

At R Tower, Cedric was about to go home when Martin approached him. 

"We need to talk." Martin said as he led Cedric to a stairwell.

Martin checked to make sure that there was no one else around, upon seeing that the coast was clear he spoke.

"I saw the news, we need to know if you are still with us." Martin told Cedric.

"Even if the rest of the family is gone, I won't be happy earning less than my wife. Plus I have a score to settle with the Reyes Heir." Cedric explained. 

"Remember, if one of us falls, we all fall." Martin warned as he left.

Cedric made a mental note to speed up his investigations since people would probably find it suspicious that he was still at the Reyes Group despite Adrianna owning Island's Inc.

When he got home he was hungry and exhausted, luckily the maids had already set the table for dinner and everyone was already on their way to the dining room.

"How's Adrianna?" Miguel asked as he came up behind his friend.

"She was fine last night, I'm not sure about today, I had to go to work and haven't seen her." Cedric was full of regret that he couldn't accompany his wife during the aftermath of the Hernandez family incident.

"You should be more attentive." Miguel scolded his friend.

"You're one to talk. Can you even sleep in the same room as your wife yet?" Cedric teased Miguel, he knew that the newly weds were still sleeping in separate rooms.

"Don't worry, your wife was with my wife the whole day. She cried a bit." When Miguel told Cedric this he frowned. He never liked it when Adrianna cried, it felt like he had failed her somehow. "Oh and your mom took her parents to Kashmere this morning, they just got back." 

Cedric had completely forgotten about his in-laws, they may not have been perfect but they were still Adrianna's parents and they had always placed Adrianna first. He was glad that his parents had quickly picked up on what they could be feeling and whisked them away for a day of relaxation.

When Adrianna and Veronica arrived at the dining room, Adrianna quickly hugged him and cried in his arms. No matter how badly they had treated her they were still all family. She was happy that they got what they deserved, but she was also sad to see the family falling as they had.

Soon after the parents also arrived and everyone took their seats as dinner was served. While everyone ate there was an uncomfortable silence that loomed over the group. 

"Cedric, we don't blame you." Charles Hernandez said, breaking the silence. "My family was cruel in many ways, I knew that in time they would mess with someone they shouldn't."

"Dad, you don't need to pretend to be okay with this. I sent you father, brother, sister-in-law, cousins, nephews, and nieces to prison. I would understand if you feel like I hurt you." Cedric said as he placed down his cutlery. 

"Son, listen first." Priscilla Reyes gently reminded her son.

"Thank you, Priscilla." Charles Hernandez said with a nod. "Cedric, they aren't good people. They got what they deserved. I'm just glad we didn't get roped in." Charles Hernandez said with a genuinely sad smile. 

"Cedric, we treated you wrongly over the years. We thought that when we moved in that your parents would have us thrown out." Gracia Hernandez said as she suddenly spoke up. "It was your parents that showed us true compassion and understanding. We are learning from them, what you did may have been difficult for us, but we understand, because what they did was wrong and because they had hurt us too." 

Cedric was surprised at his mother-in-law's words, it seemed that spending so much time with his parents was changing them too.

"Mom, you're spending too much time with my mom." Cedric said with a light laugh.

"Well I need to start saving people somewhere." Priscilla Reyes teased as that whole table burst into laughter.

"We are genuinely sorry, Cedric." Gracia Hernandez said as the laughter faded. "We were not the best in-laws, but we will try to be better in the future." 

Charles Hernandez who sat beside his wife simply nodded in agreement.

"All is forgiven, mom, dad." Cedric said as he smiled back at them.

"So what happened to the Hernandezes?" Miguel suddenly asked. His question got him a quick and hard elbow from his wife.

"You're being insensitive." Veronica scolded. 

"It's okay Veronica. We want to know too." Charles Hernandez said with a laugh.

Cedric glanced at his wife to check if hearing about what had happened would be alright with her. Adrianna just smiled and nodded, Cedric reached out and squeezed her hand to comfort her in advance, he knew that there was no good or light way of telling them what had happened.

"I bought Island's Inc. and transferred it to Adrianna's name. Because of that, all the people that the Hernandez family owed money to or took out loans from began knocking at their door looking to collect. From what I know, the old Hernandez House and all properties under all members of the Hernandes family that stayed with Grandpa Hernandez were seized by the banks. On top of that, Katerina filed multiple cases against multiple family members including Grandpa Hernandez, Aunt Celine, and Aunt Janine. No one wanted to take their case so the trial was swift and they are now at Cavern Prison." When Cedric said where the members of the Hernandez family were sent Charles, Gracia, and Adrianna gasped. 

"Isn't that too harsh?" Charles said, feeling a little guilty about the fate his family had suffered. Cavern Prison was known to be the toughest prison in the country that had very bad living conditions. The government had allowed for the gangs to run Cavern Prison and if you weren't one of them you were treated extremely harshly. The worst and most dangerous criminals had been sent to the maximum security facility there where guards were barely needed due to the difficulty of just getting to the cells in the prison.

"The Laurences run the gangs there and the Sebastians have control of the guards." Cedric said with a shrug. "It is the safest and most controlled place to have them, but honestly dad, I won't lie, they have just entered a place worse than hell."

Adrianna shivered at Cedric's cold words. "What about those that didn't go to prison? Did you let them walk free?" Adrianna asked her husband.

"Of course not." Cedric said with a grin. "They will find all their properties gone and all their bank accounts drained. Despite their shining degrees and illustrious backgrounds, no one will hire them. They won't find a job in the formal sector and they won't be able to borrow money from anyone. If anyone takes pity on them they too will suffer the consequences for crossing the Reyes Family. On top of that, their names will forever be in the mud and if they try to even boast about who they once were they will only end up dragging themselves further down. The whole country knows the repercussions of going against the Reyes clam, and no one has ever succeeded." Cedric said, ending with the grim warning.

"Is Asia one of them, the ones you threw out on the streets?" Adrianna asked.

"Of course, but she came crawling back to the Chus. They asked permission to take her in, I agreed. She is a pregnant woman after all, but of course it was all under certain conditions." Cedric told Adrianna.

The only condition Cedric had set was that Asia was to be kept away from Adrianna and that her child would be brought up by her sister-in-law, Katrina Chu and that the child's Hernandez heritage was to be completely forgotten.

In the coming months, the Chus proved that they feared Cedric more than they cared for Asia. As soon as she had given birth to a son, the child was taken from her and she was locked away in a small room in a distant province with only a maid to feed her. The people of that province would come to think that the particular room in that house was haunted as they would often hear cries and screams, and when the residents were asked they would always say that they heard nothing and that the room was empty. When police officers would inspect the room, they moved Asia and showed the police the empty room instead.

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