Chapter 404: Chapter 404: It’s Only Natural to Be Angry
Iris Lockwood looked dazed and sorrowful.
After a long time, she choked out, "Then, what should we do..."
"Don’t be afraid."
Evelyn Clayton only said two words.
Half an hour later, Evelyn Clayton brought Yara Reagan and Iris Lockwood to a teahouse Charlotte Sterling often frequented.
"You two wait in the room next door, no matter what you hear, don’t come out."
After settling them, Evelyn Clayton went to the private room where she had arranged to meet Charlotte Sterling.
She actually didn’t have to bring Iris Lockwood, she did it just to reassure her.
Not even two minutes later, the door of the private room was pushed open.
Charlotte Sterling walked in with a grim expression, her steps steady.
Unlike her once glamorous appearance, Charlotte Sterling now looked like an ordinary woman. Although her attire was still expensive, her face, which hadn’t been cared for in a long time, seemed to have aged by decades.
She was far from the image in Evelyn Clayton’s memory.
She stared fixedly at her mother for a long time before saying coolly, "Please sit."
Charlotte Sterling stared intently at her daughter.
Seeing Evelyn Clayton exuding more poise than before and the limited edition handbag beside her, Charlotte Sterling recalled the two fashion shows rumored to have been organized by Evelyn Clayton recently.
Jealousy crept in, making Charlotte Sterling restless.
Evelyn Clayton perceived her strange gaze, and she understood.
A mocking glint flashed in her eyes.
All these years, Charlotte Sterling thought she hid her feelings well, but in fact, she couldn’t conceal the envy that was almost tangible.
Indeed, envy, a mother’s envy of her own daughter.
"It’s been a while since we last met. You’ve made something of yourself, haven’t you?" Charlotte Sterling bit her lip slightly, "I hear you have your own company now. Where did you get all the money?"
Evelyn Clayton smiled brightly, "It certainly wasn’t from marrying someone and taking money from a man."
Charlotte Sterling’s expression twisted for a moment, "I’m your mother! Are you mocking me with that remark?"
Evelyn Clayton chuckled lightly, "If not, what else? Am I supposed to be greeting you, exchanging pleasantries?"
She never uses malicious words to speculate about or define a woman because Evelyn Clayton herself is a woman. She wouldn’t attack another woman.
But Charlotte Sterling was different.
Years of psychological abuse had long disillusioned Evelyn Clayton toward this woman. She would rather wear the most vicious mask and cut her down than show any softness.
Because Charlotte Sterling was a wolf; as soon as Evelyn Clayton showed any sign of weakness, she would pounce and tear her throat apart.
"Evelyn Clayton! Don’t go too far!"
Charlotte Sterling glared at Evelyn Clayton in anger, her eyes slightly reddened, "When I got married back then, it was for whose sake, don’t you know? If it weren’t so you could have a father, to stop other kids from saying you had a fatherless birth, a motherless raising, would I have married Philip Lockwood, and flattered someone else’s daughter?!"
Evelyn Clayton raised her eyebrows and let out a faint, ironic laugh.
"Oh? So it seems, I should be eternally grateful, kneel down and thank you for your immense kindness and virtue?" Evelyn Clayton laughed incredulously, "My dear mother, could you be any more ridiculous? Back then, besides you, who ever said I had a fatherless birth? These hurts, weren’t they all inflicted by you on me?"
When her father left and the family business collapsed, Charlotte Sterling drank day and night.
When she was drunk, she would hit Evelyn Clayton, and when she was sober, she would hold Evelyn Clayton and cry.
At that time, Evelyn Clayton almost had no part of her body unscathed.
Often, before the bruises and scars had faded, new wounds would be added.
Even so, Evelyn Clayton never hated Charlotte Sterling.
On the contrary, it was as if she suffered from Stockholm syndrome. The more she feared Charlotte Sterling’s unpredictability, the more she wanted her attention, her favor.
She worked hard to be top of her class, to receive various school awards, just to bring them home, hoping Charlotte Sterling would see them and smile, praising her.
Back then, Evelyn Clayton thought, her mother was in such pain because of her, because of her deceased father, because after her father died, she couldn’t take his place to stay with her mother.
She was so useless, her mother’s anger was justified.
Until Charlotte Sterling met Philip Lockwood, fell in love, and talked of marriage.