Secret Billionaire’s Contract Bride: Marrying My Enemy’s Lover

Chapter 30

“This is your sister,” my father had declared one sunny afternoon. It had been a three-hour drive to get to the huge mansion that loomed behind him, his shadow falling over me and my mother.

The little girl clutching my father’s hand smiled brightly at me, wearing a pretty violet dress that probably cost more than my mom’s apartment.

“I’m Adelaide!” my new sister cried. With her bright eyes and sweet smile, I could almost believe that she was welcoming us, even that she was excited to see me.

But my mother’s nails digging into my palm reminded me of the truth.

“It’s their fault,” my mother would always say on nights when her glass bottles lined the floors. On days when she’d cry herself to sleep, calling out my father’s name between sobs.

When I meant nothing to her.

I always knew I had a sister. My mother never let me forget as she’d tell me the story over and over. How my father married the witch and left us with nothing.

It was their fault that my father could only visit us for a few minutes once a month. Their fault we had to live in an apartment that was falling apart. It was her fault I couldn’t wear a pretty dress like her but one my mom had fixed up from a donation box.

It was all Maelyn McNair’s fault. And her daughter.

Adelaide.

She was the reason I didn’t have a father to come home to. Why the other kids teased me about my clothes being mismatched, why I didn’t have pretty dresses and a garden full of flowers.

All the things that should’ve been mine were hers.

She had taken everything from me my entire life.

If the witch hadn’t died, we still would’ve been in that dirty place, outcasts despite being a daughter of the Hildebrands, too. And she dared to smile at me, like everything we went through wasn’t her fault.

Chapter 30

So that day, standing in front of my new house and my new sister, I made a silent vow.

I would take everything away from her. Just like she’d done to me. We’d see how she liked being the forgotten one. The outcast.

“–And the florist is arriving at eight in the morning with the centerpieces, but they wanted an extra fee to set them all up,” I complained loudly into the phone. “I know, it’s so unfair-”

in the hair dryer. My wet hair pulled up into a towel to dry and dressed only in a bathrobe, I looked more like a drowned poodle than the actress Corinna

everything. That was what my mother

heard the slamming of the front door, and I paused from talking into the phone.

hanging up. I turned in my seat as Ashton stumbled

growled, crossing

slur to his words. He moved toward me but lost his balance and grabbed my table to straighten himself

is the third night this week you’ve been gone all night!” I shouted, getting to my feet and ignoring the destruction he’d just caused. “May I remind you that

yelled, collapsing back onto the bed with

you?” I huffed. “I practically had to plan this wedding by myself!”

eyes bloodshot as he bared his

might hit me, but

said bitterly and

Chapter 30

in his

It

good drunk. Not a

hair dryer off the floor. I glanced at Ashton

had planned. Even if I was taking everything

but I was realizing that everything he said and did was fake. He wasn’t

to him and leaving for long periods at night, without telling me where he’d been or why. I could barely say a word to him before he’d start

child he was. He was going to have to get himself together. I never

left on the bed. He let out. a

someone lately. I knew he was probably cheating on me. Our relationship meant nothing to either one.

a real relationship, my pride wouldn’t allow me to lose

at his phone

too good to

careful not to make a sound with my bare feet on the carpet. I crept slowly over to the bed and snatched up the

lit up in a blue glow, showcasing the standard background.

change it from the default.

Chapter 30

swiped up, however, the

the limp form of Ashton. What

right side up, and softly pressed his thumb on the screen’s surface. He didn’t

I snatched it up and began to