Chapter 4: Chapter 4
My hands trembling, I slowly lowered the steel pipe.
The moment he finished speaking, with a resounding crash, Vincent slammed the urn onto the concrete floor. It shattered, sending porcelain shards and gray dust everywhere.
“I already had your sister released! You were the one who brought some chemical in here, pouring it everywhere and screaming that I deserved to die for taking your ring.”
She sighed, a perfect picture of a magnanimous victim. “Let’s just forget it. It’s not like you succeeded, anyway. Let’s just let this go…”
“That was just a warning. If you ever try something like this again, I’ll make sure your mother’s real ashes are scattered among the pig carcasses.”
“We can’t just let this go!” Vincent snarled. “For a signet ring, you were ready to kill Tessa. If I don’t teach you a lesson, who knows what you’ll do next!”
It was no use.
My eyes locked on the urn. With the steel pipe raised high, my arms trembled. I couldn’t bring it down.
Vincent and Luke froze, their gazes shifting to the still form on the floor.
Seeing them waver, Tessa quickly adopted a wounded expression. “Why are you telling such lies to deceive them?”
“Aunt Tessa…”
He kicked at the broken container, scattering the ashes.
He walked over and looked down his nose at me. “Stop trying. Those aren’t your mother’s ashes.”
“Tessa, are you alright?”
The moment I lowered the pipe, the father and son rushed forward, shoving me off Tessa.
“The one who’s been disfigured is my sister! Her body!”
“Let go of Tessa!”
“You’ve gone too far! How could you try to disfigure Aunt Tessa? Someone like you doesn’t deserve to be my mother!”
“No!!!”
Seeing me in such pain, Vincent looked satisfied.
“Or we’ll smash your mother’s urn!”
I was the one who placed her ashes in that urn. How could I not know they were hers?
Tessa got to her feet, brushing herself off. Her eyes were red-rimmed as she said to me, “Isabella, if you really wanted the ring back, I would have given it to you. You didn’t have to be so cruel!”
My eyes felt like they would burst from their sockets. I lunged forward like a madwoman, scrambling on the filthy floor to gather the dust.
I had no choice. I couldn’t watch them smash my mother’s urn.
I couldn’t pick them up… I could only watch helplessly as the ashes drifted down onto the bloody, filthy floor of the cold storage unit, mixing with pools of animal blood.
Seeing my hesitation, Tessa, still pinned beneath me, cried out, “Isabella, it was just a ring! Were you really going to melt my face off for a ring?!”
I was so furious I screamed at them, “I wasn’t trying to hurt her! She’s the one who poured the acid!”
Hearing her words, the resolve hardened in Vincent and Luke’s faces.
Vincent and Luke shouted in unison.
“Don Antonio,” I said, my voice cold and clear. ” I’ll take your deal. But I want ten times what you offered.”
Not far away, Vincent and Luke echoed her outrage. “Isabella, how did you become so vicious?!”
But he wasn’t done.
After they left, I pulled out my phone and dialed a number that had sat untouched in my contacts for nearly ten years.
