Chapter 101

"Joanne's brazen defiance infuriated several of the women. They ripped the clothes right off her. She dropped to her knees, pleading and begging us to let her go."Hahaha... But when they saw your mother like that, they were absolutely delighted. They dragged her onto a busy street, stripped off every last stitch of clothing, and forced her to dance in front of everyone."Your mother was so dead drunk that she couldn't even stand on her own. 'The number one socialite of Coasthaven,' 'the pretty little thing' everyone raved about? Yeah, all of that was destroyed that night!"The look in your mother's eyes when she finally begged us to let her go. Tsk, tsk. I'll remember it for the rest of my life."Elaine had reached the part of the story she enjoyed the most. She threw her head back and laughed, completely intoxicated by the memory of her revenge.Lucille kept her head lowered. Before she realized it, she had gone completely still.Everything they said matched, piece by piece, th

Chapter 102

Lucille snapped her head up. Her eyes blazed with a fury that could have incinerated everything in front of her. "I said I've finished recording your little performance."The drone hovered steadily overhead. The matte-black high-definition camera mounted beneath it pointed straight down, its lens capturing everything without mercy."You! You actually had the nerve to set us up!" Elaine's expression twisted violently as realization hit her. "Hurry! Knock that drone down! We can't let what just happened get out!"Cold sweat beaded across Elaine's face.Wendy looked ashen, her entire body shaking uncontrollably.Rayne had completely lost her composure. She clamped both hands over her mouth, her whole body trembling."Too late. The footage has been streaming online in real time. Every vicious word you said, every unspeakable thing you did to my mother, it's all out there for everyone to see."And I want to make something clear right now. My mother lived with her head held high every

Chapter 103

Elaine looked at Sven, and a wave of confusion swept through her.Who was this man? Why had she never seen him before? He had just addressed Lucille as "Miss." Why would he call her that?Questions crowded Elaine's mind, but before she could ask a single one, a massive hand struck her across the face.The slap left her ears ringing. She crumpled to the floor with a cry she couldn't suppress. Around her, the sharp crack of slaps rose and fell in rapid succession.Wendy and Rayne were already terrified enough to act without being told. They furiously slapped their own faces.Elaine screamed, clutching her burning cheek, "Do you people have any regard for the law?! This is a hospital! Someone get the director! Someone's being murdered here—"A fist seized the neat bun at the back of her head and yanked hard, sending a bolt of pain across her scalp.She looked up. Sven's pale, expressionless face hovered inches from hers. His eyes were so cold they seemed to belong to something lurk

Chapter 104

"What was done to me during my month of recovery is a debt of blood. And for every way Gideon has mistreated me, you deserve full credit. You too. Just wait," Lucille said.Gwen shook her tiny pink fist and shouted with unwavering conviction, "All of you, wait and see. Wait and see how Lucille deals with every last one of you!"Then she lowered her head, grabbed Lucille's arm, and hurried her away from the scene. "Lucy, you were amazing! When you said all that just now, you looked like a superhero!"Gwen puffed out her chest and planted her hands on her hips, mimicking Lucille's stance from moments earlier and doing her best impression of the entire performance.The tension in Lucille's face melted away. She almost laughed, but the instant her facial muscles moved, a sharp wave of pain shot through her cheeks. "Gwen, my face hurts so much. It feels like it's on fire..."Gwen immediately snapped to attention. "Come on. Let's find a doctor right now!"More than 100 slaps were no la

Chapter 105

The owner was an elderly man who loved rabbits, and he had taken an immediate liking to Lucille. Behind the restaurant, he kept a small colony of rescued rabbits in a wooded enclosure.Lucille had round eyes and two slightly prominent front teeth. When she was calm, she was quiet and gentle. When she was upset, she had a habit of snapping and sometimes even biting. Her older brother had nicknamed her "Bunny" when she was little.Later, after the movie Zooradise swept the world, she fell in love with Officer Binky Thumps and never quite got over it. Her affection for rabbits had only grown stronger since then.Gideon pushed open the door to the private room and walked in.Lucille sat with her chin resting on one hand, gazing through the glass window at the rabbits bounding freely through the enclosure outside.Her baseball cap concealed most of her face, leaving her expression hidden. Even so, her silhouette told him everything he needed to know. She looked thin and broken, as thou

Chapter 106

Gideon's words set Lucille off instantly. Her whole body began to tremble."So, Gideon. I spent five years of my life with you, and all I am in your eyes is some money-hungry, morally bankrupt woman?"Lucille swore before she could stop herself. More than anything, she wanted to go back five years and scrub her own eyes clean. She wanted to ask herself how she had ever fallen for a man who had never understood her and had never once tried to.Gideon never saw it coming. The clean, sharp slap cracked across his face. His temper flared in an instant, and his hand flew up in reflex.But Lucille ripped off her mask, revealing her swollen, deeply flushed face. The puffiness distorted her features, making the injuries impossible to ignore.His raised hand froze in midair. The anger burning inside him vanished by half as his breath caught.Gideon cupped her face with both hands and stared at her in stunned disbelief. "How... how did you end up like this?"Lucille slapped his hands away