The crowd burst out laughing, as if I'd lost my mind.

Maria stepped out from behind them, unhurried, chin lifted, eyes dripping with contempt. She looked at me the way someone looks at an insect beneath their shoe.

"You really think warming a man's bed for a few nights and popping out a kid gives you the right to run your mouth at me? Get on your knees. Right now. Bow your head to the floor and beg my forgiveness, and maybe I'll have my husband toss you a few scraps. Otherwise, the consequences won't be something you or your daughter can afford."

The crowd erupted.

"Don't waste your breath on a homewrecker, Maria! She needs to be taught a lesson right here, right now, so she knows what happens when she opens that mouth!"

Someone spat at me. Others hurled insults without restraint.

My gaze went cold enough to kill. I spoke slowly, every word deliberate.

"I didn't come here to listen to you twist the truth. You're a mother who put her own son up to hurting my daughter."

"And you," I turned to Ursula, "are a teacher who abused your authority and enabled every bit of it."

I let my eyes sweep over every face in that crowd.

"Every single one of you is complicit. And I will settle the debt with each of you, down to the last cent, with interest."

WHAM.

A dull impact knocked me off balance. My knee hit the ground hard, and white-hot pain shot straight through the bone.

I looked up at the woman who had just kicked me.

She stood right beside Maria, chin raised, voice venomous.

"She told you to kneel and apologize. Are you deaf?"

I braced my hand against the ground and staggered back to my feet. When I glanced down, my white suit pants were smeared with dirt and blood.

The jeering didn't pause for even a second. If anything, it turned sharper, uglier.

The circle tightened around me. That same woman reached into her designer bag, pulled out a lipstick tube, and hurled it at me. The others followed her lead.

Wadded tissues, cups of coffee, loose coins. Anything they could throw, they threw.

"A cheap mistress who can't even show her face in polite company, and she actually thinks she's Rosalind Black? Threatening us!"

"Look at her in that little power suit, playing dress-up! All you're good at is seducing married men. Your kid's just like you. Both of you deserve every bit of this!"

The commotion drew a crowd of onlookers to the villa gates, phones raised, recording, snapping photos, whispering among themselves.

I lifted my hand and wiped the filth from my face. I straightened my jacket. Then I looked up, directly at Maria, who stood on the highest step.

"You're not some uneducated thug. Your son bullied my daughter at school. Now you're standing here watching these people attack me, verbally and physically, and doing nothing to stop it. You really think you can afford the consequences of this?"

Maria tilted her chin higher, radiating arrogance.

"I need someone's permission to put a homewrecker in her place? I'm doing God's work. You, your daughter, your whole family could walk through that door right now, and I'd make every last one of you kneel and beg. And you'd take it."

The parents around her chimed in immediately.

"You wreck someone's family, and getting hit is the least of what you deserve."

"Maria is the real CEO's wife. You think climbing into someone's bed means you've made it?"

Unbelievable. Every kind of fool crawled out of the woodwork today.

Walter had once tried to take over the parent company's operations. One look from my father sent him scurrying back with his tail between his legs.

It was me who saw a sliver of ambition in him and handed him a thousand-person subsidiary to cut his teeth on.

And somehow that had turned him into a publicly traded company's CEO in these people's eyes?

Maria's expression grew more triumphant by the second. Then her gaze dropped to my neck and her eyes turned vicious.

"You shameless wretch. You spent my husband's money on gemstones? A one-of-a-kind piece from an auction house? You think you deserve to wear that? Give it back!"

She lunged forward and grabbed the stone at my throat with her bare hands. The chain bit into my skin and tore free, leaving a line of searing pain across my neck.

She clutched the blood-smeared gem like it was a holy relic, then looked at me as though she wanted to rip me apart with her teeth.

"Something this exquisite, wasted on trash like you. And that suit, Maria, look at the cut. Must be couture. I wonder which designer she conned it out of?"

I pressed my hand against the jacket instinctively, and my voice came out cold as frost. "You'd better stop. Right now."

### Chapter 3

Olympia Whitney, the biggest bootlicker in the group, looked at me with undisguised contempt. She pulled her kid's set of markers from her bag, raised her hand, and dragged one straight down my chest.

A thick black line tore across my couture white suit in an instant, running from my collarbone all the way down to my thigh.

The other parents saw what she'd done and snatched markers from pencil cases, rushing at me all at once.

Within seconds, my pristine white suit had become a mess of garish colors layered over black.

Olympia was the first to whip out her phone, snapping photo after photo of me. She let out a cold laugh.

"Who are you trying to fool with that classy act? This is more like it. This look actually matches your trashy little soul."

"Do you have any idea what this suit and those jewels you just ruined are worth?"

I looked at the wreckage around me, then calmly took out my phone.

There was a message from Attorney Fox. He was ten minutes away.

That one small move set Maria off. She lunged at me, ripped the phone from my hands, and hurled it into the pool. "Trying to call for backup? Someone gives you an inch and you really start thinking you matter."

The rest of them wore the same mocking expressions.

I lifted my gaze and swept it slowly over every single one of them.

"I already told you that you'd pay ten times over for what you've done. I'm giving you one last chance. Apologize to me and my daughter. Otherwise, in ten minutes, every single person here is going to deeply regret coming to this little gathering."

Finally, I fixed my stare on the teacher who had watched the entire thing without lifting a finger.

"This is exactly how you stood by when my daughter was being tormented at school, isn't it?"

Ursula scoffed.

"Playing the victim? When you were busy destroying someone else's family, did you ever stop to think that Owen is only six years old?"

"Someone like you has no right to point fingers at anyone."

With the teacher leading the charge, the other parents grew bolder, some even clapping in agreement.

"The teacher's already spoken. What are you still doing here, making a scene? Does anyone here actually want their kid in the same school as some illegitimate child?"

"Throw them both out! Let everybody see what happens when you wreck a family!"

Maria toyed with the gemstone necklace she'd just snatched, her tone dripping with arrogance.

"Hear that? It's not just me. Everyone here is disgusted by you. A pair of low-class trash like you and your daughter belong in a basement where no one ever has to see you. You should never even dream of holding your heads up again."

Their words kept getting uglier.

Carly was trembling in my arms.

Even Owen, standing off to the side, had a grin spreading wider and wider across his chubby face.

Ursula saw her opening and hurried over to Maria.

"Mrs. Perez, I'll take care of the paperwork for these two personally. It's just that the principal has been hoping to open a new campus near the International Tower. Do you think you might be able to put in a word?"

Maria struck a magnanimous pose, like she was bestowing a favor.

"That's nothing. The International Tower belongs to my husband. You handle this cleanly, and forget one campus. I'll have him sign over ten."

The moment those words left her mouth, the parents' eyes lit up. One by one they crowded around Maria.

"Mrs. Perez, our family runs a premium flower farm. Whatever your husband's company needs, we'll supply it all, top-shelf quality, guaranteed!"

"Mrs. Perez, my husband's in architectural design! We'd love the chance to work with Mr. Perez."

Someone even pressed a thick stack of gift cards into her hand, promising favors on the spot.

Maria parted the crowd, walked up to me, and looked down at me. She leaned in close and deliberately lowered her voice.

"See that? That's the difference between us. One word from me, and every single one of them falls in line, begging for scraps."

"A homewrecker like you will never have what I have. While I'm still in a generous mood, take your little brat and leave the country. Don't ever let me hear your names again. Otherwise, your daughter losing her voice will be the least of her problems."

### Chapter 4

The words hit me like a physical blow. My whole body trembled as I looked down at Carly, crying without a sound.

It struck me then, the thing I'd been too overwhelmed to see. Carly hadn't been refusing to speak these past two days. She couldn't.

My stomach dropped. I crouched down and took her hands in mine.

"Carly, you can't speak, can you?"

She hiccupped through her sobs and nodded, her small face twisted in pain.

"Where else does it hurt? Tell Mommy. Don't be scared. Mommy won't let them get away with this."

I kept my voice soft, terrified she'd be too afraid to show me.

Carly stopped crying. She looked down at her feet.

I followed her gaze, and something inside me caught fire.

Her shoes were black, so I hadn't noticed before. But now I could see that one of them was darker than the other, the surface saturated with something wet.

My hands shook as I slipped the shoe off her foot. Cold flooded through me. Not fear. Rage.

The little toe on her right foot was a mangled mess of blood and flesh, crushed by something heavy.

How scared she must have been when it happened. I didn't need to imagine. I already knew.

My eyes burned red.

"Did your son do this, or did you tell him to?"

Maria showed no trace of guilt.

"Does it matter? Compared to the filthy things you've done, this is nothing. I could've had Owen beat her to death, and it would've been a mercy that I didn't."

I lost it. My foot slammed into her stomach.

Years of taekwondo behind that kick sent her flying back two or three yards. I heard something crack. A rib, at least one.

But even that was nothing compared to what Carly had suffered.

Maria sat on the ground, stunned and furious, jabbing a finger at me as she screamed.

"You trashy little bitch! You dare kick me?!"

The pack of sycophant parents finally saw their chance to perform. They rushed me and grabbed me by the hair.

"You've got some nerve! You think you can put your hands on Mrs. Perez?!"

"A homewrecker, and she has the gall to hit the real wife? Your daughter deserved everything she got. That's what happens when your mother is trash like you."

Even Teacher Lane came over and spat in my face.

"You don't know your place. Today everyone's going to teach you some manners."

Carly saw them swarming me and threw herself forward, crying, trying to pull me free. Owen came running out of nowhere, grabbed her by the braid, and yanked her to the ground.

Even then, she struggled to get back up, trying to shield me.

Ursula Lane watched the whole thing. She took Owen's hand, her voice dripping with flattery.

"Owen, sweetheart, just stand to the side. This sort of thing isn't for a child to handle. But you were very brave. A real little hero."

Owen puffed up at the praise, lifting his chin with a smug grin.

"She made my mommy upset. My only regret is that I just made Carly drink boiling water. I should've poured glue down her throat so she'd never talk again!"

I was pinned to the ground, covered in dirt, but none of it compared to the fury tearing through me.

"Every single one of you will pay for this!"

The crowd laughed. Sneers all around.

"Still running your mouth? Even now? Are you delusional?"

"Mrs. Perez is the wife of the CEO at the International Tower. If she said that, we'd believe it."

"Is that lying mouth how you wormed your way into Mr. Perez's bed?"

Maria walked over, crouched down in front of me, and pulled out an eyebrow pencil. She scrawled across my face, pressing harder and harder, until she got bored. Then she pulled out a razor blade and pressed it flat against my cheek.

"Consequences? I'd love to see how a piece of trash like you makes me pay. But first, let me show you the consequences of running that mouth." She angled the blade. "How about I carve 'whore' right across your face, so you never forget what you are?" She started to press down.

Before the sting could register, a helicopter roared overhead, whipping up a gale that blasted through the crowd and tore them off me.

I could finally see what was around me. And that helicopter was unmistakable.

It was the first birthday gift I'd given Walter after we started dating.

The helicopter touched down on the open ground by the entrance, and a man in a couture suit stepped out.