My Mother and Husband Both Chose Her Over Me Chapter 01
When I learned the woman carrying Adrian Whitmore’s child was the classmate who had bullied me.
I went looking for Serena Vale with a knife.
I wanted one life in exchange for another.
My mother stepped between us and slapped me across the face.
“She already ruined your life once!”
“Are you going to let her ruin it again?”
“They’re both worthless, Noelle. Why would you throw your own life away for them?”
I never got my revenge. My husband never cut Serena off, either.
The depression triggered by years of bullying came back.
Every day, fresh cuts appeared on my wrists.
On Serena’s due date, news broke across Harbor City that she and the baby had both died. My mother, Diane Hart, was arrested at the scene.
When reporters crowded around her, she faced the cameras with red eyes.
“Sweetheart, if that woman had to die before you could breathe again, you still shouldn’t have paid for it with your own life.”
She smiled. I cried.
After reports said she had been convicted of capital murder and executed, I tried to jump from a rooftop. Adrian pulled me back again and again.
“If you jump, I jump,” he said. “I caused all of this.
“Hate me if you need to, Nell, but stop punishing yourself.”
It took me three years to climb out of that darkness.
Then, during a follow-up appointment, I saw Adrian at the hospital with an older woman and a little boy.
The older woman was my mother, holding a child who looked exactly like him.
“I’m sorry you have to sneak around just to see your own son,” she told Adrian.
“You’re the one who’s suffered, Mom. You’re alive, but because of that unstable woman, you have to live like a ghost.”
My mother smiled. “If we hadn’t done this, Noelle would have hurt Serena and the baby eventually.
“She trusted me more than anyone. She had to believe I was dead before she would stop.”
Adrian’s eyes reddened. “Thank you, Mom.”
“Just take good care of my goddaughter.”
My fingers went numb, and my purse slipped from my hand.
The sound echoed through the corridor, making both of them turn toward me.
…….
“Noelle?” Adrian and my mother said together.
She clutched the boy tighter, pressing his face against her shoulder as if she needed to hide him from me.
One look at his brows and eyes had already told me everything: he was Adrian and Serena’s son, and my mother had been helping raise him.
I took a step forward without thinking.
“What are you doing?” Adrian moved in front of them at once.
My mother turned away, shielding the boy in her arms.
Both of them watched me with fear and suspicion.
Even my own mother was afraid of me.
Even she had chosen the people who had hurt me.
