Fake Heiress Real Fall Chapter 02
Stella lay on the ground coughing for a long time before letting out a scream loud enough to rattle the roof.
“Jasper! You kicked me? You kicked me for a country girl who just got back! My dad is a martyr! He took a bullet for your dad! How could you do this to him!”
Daniel looked at Stella rolling on the ground in pain, his eyes turning bloodshot.
He charged over and raised his hand, slapping Jasper across the face.
“You bastard!
Are you out of your mind!”
The slap landed squarely on Jasper’s face.
He didn’t dodge.
His jaw snapped shut against his teeth, and a trace of blood seeped from the corner of his lips.
He wiped the blood away with his thumb, staring coldly at his father without saying a word.
Daniel ran over to help Stella up, dusting her off and checking her injuries.
“Stella, does it hurt? Where are you hurt? Uncle Brooks will call the military doctor right away!”
Stella leaned into his arms, weeping pitifully.
She pointed a finger at me.
“Uncle Brooks, I tried to help her carry her luggage, but she called me shameless, said I stole her place, and pushed me on purpose. Jasper came back and hit me without even asking what happened… Uncle Brooks, I don’t want to live anymore, just let me go down and join my dad…”
Hearing this, Daniel turned to glare at me as if I were his enemy.
“Evelyn! You just got back and you’re already tearing this family apart! Get on your knees right now! Kneel down and beg Stella for forgiveness!”
I clenched my bleeding palms.
My nails dug into my flesh.
“I didn’t curse at her. She was the one who threw my things, and she was the one who pushed me. Why should I apologize?”
“How dare you talk back!”
Furious, Daniel pulled the belt from his waist.
“You’ve run wild in the countryside, haven’t you! No manners, no upbringing! I’ll beat you to death today, you ungrateful wretch!”
The belt came cracking down with a sharp whoosh.
I didn’t dodge.
Let him hit me.
After all, over these fifteen years, what beating haven’t I suffered through?
I was beaten with a fireplace poker by the farmers who raised me.
I had been pelted with stones by the village kids.
Human traffickers burned the backs of my hands with cigarette butts.
The belt didn’t land on me.
Jasper reached out and grabbed the belt with his bare hand.
The sharp metal buckle bit into his palm, and blood trickled down his wrist.
“Enough. Can’t you see the injuries on her hands? I saw it clearly from the car when Stella pushed her. How much longer are you going to favor one over the other?”
Daniel pointed at his nose, the veins on his neck bulging.
“She pushed her because this brat doesn’t know the rules! Thomas Morgan took a bullet for me back then, and didn’t even leave a whole corpse behind! I owe my very life to Stella!
Whatever belongs to the Brooks family, if Stella wants it, she has to yield!”
The Brooks family’s things.
My last name is Brooks too.
But coming from his mouth, I was worse than a mere “thing.”
Jasper let go of the belt and said no more.
He turned around, crouched down, and used his uninjured hand to help me up from the ground.
“Does it hurt?”
I bit my lip, trying desperately to hold back my tears.
I shook my head.
He looked at my scraped palms, said nothing else, and stood up to shield me.
Just as Daniel was about to continue his outburst, a sharp female voice suddenly rang out from outside the courtyard gate, carrying a piercing fury.
“I think the one who should get the hell out is you, Daniel!”
Sophia Harris strode briskly into the courtyard.
She was my biological mother.
Director of the Logistics Department at the Military Command Base.
She swept her gaze over the scene: me crouching on the ground, my palms scraped and bleeding.
Jasper shielding me, his palm sliced open by the iron buckle.
Daniel standing in place, gripping the belt.
Stella leaning behind Daniel, her eyes welling with tears.
Sophia didn’t ask a single question.
She walked straight past Daniel and right up to Stella.
Stella subconsciously took a step back.
Too late.
A hard slap struck Stella across the face, snapping her head to the side; half her face swelled up, and blood seeped from the corner of her mouth.
She was stunned.
The next second, her eyes rolled back, and she fell stiffly to the ground, faking a faint.
Daniel stomped his feet in a panic.
“Sophia, are you crazy! Stella has a heart condition! What if you’ve seriously hurt her!”
Sophia pulled a stack of receipts and invoices from her bag and threw them right into Daniel’s face.
“A heart condition? She’s pitiful? Last month she used the family’s ration stamps to exchange for three Schwinn bicycles and resold them on the black market. The day before yesterday, she used my name to get five cartons of premium Marlboro cigarettes from the store. Feasting on meat and fish every day and drinking Ovaltine, she’s strong enough to beat a cow to death.”
Daniel bent down, picked up the receipts, and looked at them, his face turning pale and green by turns.
“Stella isn’t that kind of person! She must have bought them for someone else—”
Sophia turned her head and ordered the guard behind her.
“Go, call Dr. Carter over. Tell him to bring the thickest needle. Stab it right into her philtrum as hard as he can. If one prick doesn’t wake her, stab her ten times. If anything happens, I’ll take full responsibility.”
Stella, playing dead on the ground, suddenly twitched.
Two seconds later, she slowly came to, clutching her forehead and sitting up weakly.
“Auntie, you’ve misunderstood me.
Those things were bought for Percival Miller, it wasn’t convenient for him to show up…”
Hearing this, Daniel immediately breathed a sigh of relief, as if clutching at a lifeline.
“I told you so! Percival’s family really did have relatives visiting—”
Sophia didn’t even acknowledge his words.
She walked over to me and crouched down.
She took in my raw, bleeding palms and my worn, heavily mended rough clothes.
Her eyes instantly turned red.
“Evelyn, it’s Mom’s fault. Mom came back too late. Come on, Mom will take you upstairs. We’ll ignore all of them.”
