Never Judge

Cedric stood on the windy balcony as he took another drink from his glass, emptying it. It had been a week since Jam passed and a week since the Lobo family found out that he was the Reyes Heir.

The Lobo family had chosen to hold five days of the wake at the Capital to let Jam's friends from university to come and mourn him, today was the fifth day. The Lobo family would depart with Jam's body to their province tonight. Cedric, his family, and his friends had decided to come with them for the remaining four days of the wake before the boy would finally be laid to rest in the family tomb.

A pair of arms suddenly hugged him from behind, he turned to see his wife, whom he hugged back.

"How are you holding up?" Adrianna asked Cedric. She knew he blamed himself, he had spent days trying to find out who was behind the murder and yet he still came up against false leads and dead ends.

"I'm just trying to find who did this. Jam was innocent." Cedric said with a sigh.

"Yeah, I asked Amanda. Jam was never with the wrong type of people, yes he drank, but only socially, he didn't do drugs, he didn't gamble. He was a good kid." Adrianna said as she continued to hold her husband. 

"We leave in an hour. Are you packed?" Cedric asked his wife.

"Yes. Are we taking your plane, or…" Adrianna was afraid of asking if they would be flying commercial, she knew her husband had heightened security everywhere.

"We're pretending to fly commercial on one of Ray's planes. It's all ours but the only people traveling in it will be our family, the Lobos, Uncle Matthew, and Henry." Cedric explained. The remaining members of the Hernandez family wanted to pay their respect and had decided to come along. 

The Reyeses and the others would fly in after them on their private planes, the official story was the Jam was a good friend to the five princes, so they had all flown over to pay their respects.

It was a big deal for everyone, very few people could make these powerful families fly out and spend four days in a distant province.

When Cedric and the rest arrived at the Lobo Family's hometown Tony offered Cedric his office to temporarily work from. Cedric welcomed this and as soon as things were set for the wake, he went on over followed by Camilla and Ian. 

"Have you found anything out?" Cedric asked Ian.

"No not yet. All we know is that someone paid him, other than that, nothing." Ian gravely told Cedric.

"How's the company?" Cedric asked Camilla. In the days after Jam's death he was waiting for someone to launch an attack on either the Reyes Group or on Mor Co. 

"Peaceful sir. It doesn't seem like we were the target." Camilla reported.

"I don't want to be complacent, make sure to keep an eye out for everything. Anything out of the ordinary happens you tell me. Understood?" Cedric asked, to which Camilla nodded.

"Sir, these are the documents you need to look through and sign." Camilla said as she placed a few folders on the desk. "The department heads also send their condolences on your cousin-in-law's death." Camilla informed him in a sad tone. The higher ups of both Mor Co. and the Reyes group had gotten to know Cedric more over time. They saw him as a stern and demanding boss, who in his own way asked them to put family first always. Despite his cold and distant personality to them they all admired and appreciated this boss, so their sadness in his loss was genuine.

"Your wife asked me to remind you not to work too hard." Ian told Cedric as he served a cup of tea. "This should help, Nicole sent it over, it's some traditional tea that's supposed to calm you down. It's a recipe that's been with the Chans from the very beginning, even from back when they left the mainland."

Cedric thanked Ian and drank his tea while reading the files Camilla had given him. Cedric went back and forth between working and entertaining guests at the ancestral Lobo home for three days. 

On the night prior to Jam's burial the three of them were all engrossed with their work when Cedric's phone rang, breaking the silence.

"Honey?" Cedric asked as he answered. It was Adrianna.

"Can you come over? Uncle Ivan and Amanda are having a shouting match. Mom and dad are trying to help but they're not getting through to uncle Ivan. And to make things worse Tony's daughter is here and she's too young to witness these things. I sent her and little Emilio with the nanny to another room for the meantime." Adrianna said, not giving her husband a chance to reply.

"I'll come over immediately." Cedric said right before he said goodbye and dropped the call.

"Bring the car over. Let's go to the Lobo home." Cedric instructed Ian, who left his documents to Camilla.

Cedric and Camilla tidied up and brought all the documents down with them. No matter how much he trusted Tony, he couldn't just leave Reyes Group confidential files on the table.

He soon arrived at the grand ancestral Lobo home, the viewing of Jam's remains was currently being held here and many people from the province visited to pay their respects. Oddly enough it seemed that they had all cleared out as soon as the tensions between family members rose.

When Cedric entered he heard Ivan shouting at his daughter.

"Your brother just died and yet you continue to defy my orders?" Ivan said furiously as he looked at Amanda.

"I will not marry him!" Amanda shouted back.

"And you have the gall to bring Tony and his disreputable daughter here!" Ivan shouted.

"Brother, let the child choose who she will marry, don't force her. There is no need." Gracia begged her brother. What Gracia said was true, as in-laws to the powerful Reyes family the Lobos had nothing to worry about, all the opportunities will be handed to them.

"What are you talking about Gracia? Your son-in-law is still good for nothing. He continues to hide from the public. When will we Lobos benefit from that?" Ivan accused. He was still oblivious to the fact that Cedric had already joined them.

"My husband is keeping his identity a secret because of me, because I asked him to do so." Adrianna told her uncle. "There are other ways to help the Lobos that doesn't involve revealing his identity." She added.

"Adrianna is telling the truth." Cedric suddenly said, drawing the attention to him. "I don't need to be visible to back you up." 

"Nonetheless we Lobos should not be dependent on the Reyeses. What if you fall? Even the mightiest empires fall at some point." Ivan Lobo said as he looked at Cedric. He was unafraid to confront Cedric, he relied on the fact that Cedric felt guilty for his son's death.

"And you plan to do this by marrying your only child to Aiden Ortiz who is a well known playboy who does nothing but rely on his family's wealth?" Cedric asked Ivan.

"You're one to speak, your friend Alexi is known to be a playboy as well, he often has a new woman on his arm every week." Ivan retorted. "Aiden Ortiz is not lazy and he is capable of running a business. He is in the Capitol mostly working so that he can learn what he needs to run his family's business. We need a man like him in the family now more than ever! And Tony will not do, his reputation would ruin us."

With the way Ivan Lobo was speaking you would think that Tony was not in the same room as them, but the man stood next to Amanda, holding her hand and coaxing her, trying to get her to calm down.