They Thought I Was Just Her Husband

CHAPTER 14

Hope froze on the spot, her cheek still stinging from the slap.

In all the sixteen years she had been alive, this was the first time her mother had ever raised a hand against her...and it had been a full, brutal slap across the face. Judging by the sheer, stinging force behind it, Tracey hadn't held back in the slightest.

Hope could endure the physical pain throbbing on her cheek, but she couldn't accept was the painful crack that seemed to open wide inside her chest.

"Mom..." Her voice trembled, tears immediately welling up in her eyes. "You... you hit me?"

Seeing the stunned, innocent look in her daughter's eyes, Tracey felt a momentary flash of guilt, realizing she might have gone a little too far. But her gaze remained piercing, cold, and razor-sharp. She reached out, attempting to stroke Hope's burning cheek, but Hope jerked her head back, turning her face away in defiance.

Tracey withdrew her hand, her posture tall and unyielding. "What did I tell you before you left this house? If your father doesn't come home, then none of you are supposed to come home either. I ordered you to bring him back."

Tracey took a step closer, her voice dropping into a harsh tone. "He is having problems with me, but he would never make things difficult for you kids. And what did you do? You left your sister behind and came back here all by yourself to throw a tantrum."

Her tone became even firmer, leaving no room for argument. "Second, I gave birth to you. Who on this earth could possibly know better than me who your father is?"

 

She stared directly into Hope's tear-filled eyes, emphasizing every single syllable. "Remember this, Hope. Theo Hanks is your father."

Hope wanted to argue back, but her mother's overwhelming, commanding presence was too intimidating. Standing under the shadow of the great Tracey Teague, she couldn't bring herself to challenge her directly.

After being severely lectured for several more minutes, Hope only felt more wronged, more humiliated, and more deeply bitter. Still, she stubbornly held on to her one remaining point.

"But... but there's an official paternity test," Hope choked out through her tears. "It says Theo isn't my biological father."

"That test is fake!" Tracey cut her off instantly.

Hope blinked, wiping her nose with her sleeve. "You're saying... the report Theo gave me was fake?"

"What else could it possibly be?" Tracey snapped, throwing her hands up in frustration. "You're the only one foolish enough to fall for a desperate, petty trick like that!"

Tracey looked at her with sweeping disapproval. "Think about how exceptionally well your father has treated you all these years. He practically wishes he could give you the world, and yet you actually questioned whether he's your real father based on a piece of paper."

Tracey shook her head, her expression filling with deep disappointment. "You've disappointed him, Hope. And you've disappointed me too."

Seeing that she had successfully intimidated and silenced her daughter, Tracey didn't continue scolding her. She coldly instructed Hope to stay inside the house, grabbed her car keys, and left for the hospital to pick up her other two daughters.

 

What Tracey didn't realize was that the moment the heavy front doors closed, the more Hope thought about the slap, the more resentful she became.

In a fit of white-hot rage, Hope slipped out of the estate, caught a cab, and went straight to her grandmother to complain.

By the time Hope arrived at Lora Teague's luxurious residence, her tears were pouring down her face as if a dam had burst. She sobbed so uncontrollably that even the stern Lora couldn't help feeling an immediate pang of pity.

Through dramatic, breathless sobs, Hope accused Tracey of beating her and spun the miserable story of how she had just discovered Theo wasn't her biological father, begging her grandmother to stand up for her.

Naturally, Lora's heart ached for her favorite granddaughter. Especially when she saw how red, raw, and terrifyingly swollen one side of Hope's face was, she immediately assumed Tracey had truly lost her mind and beaten the girl senseless.

What Lora didn't know was that on the taxi ride over, Hope had intentionally slapped herself across the cheek several more times with all her strength, deliberately making the swelling look far worse than it was.

The truth didn't matter to Hope...only the leverage did.

Furious, Lora immediately dialed Tracey's number, gave her daughter a blistering, ear-splitting scolding over the phone, and ordered her to come over to the house at once.

"Grandma, please don't let Mom come here!" Hope cried dramatically, burying her face in her hands. "She'll hit me again! She's out of control!"

"Let her try!" Lora snapped, her eyes flashing with rage as she held the phone. "Even if I gave that woman all the courage in the world, she wouldn't dare touch a single hair on your head in front of me! I could never even bring myself to hit her when she was a child, and now she thinks she can lay a hand on you?"

Lora pulled the girl into a tight hug. "You're staying right here with Grandma this weekend. You don't need to go back to that house."

"Grandma loves me the most!" Hope snuggled into Lora's arms, letting out a small, trembling sigh.

A faint, victorious smile flickered at the corner of her lips where her grandmother couldn't see it.

Then, smoothing her expression back into innocent confusion, she looked up at Lora. "Oh, Grandma... Theo told me he isn't my biological father. He even showed me a paternity test report." She blinked her large eyes. "What's really going on? Who is my real father?"

Over the past few days, Tracey had been calling her parents repeatedly to vent about the crumbling marriage. In particular, she had told them about Theo's outrageous court filing demanding billions of dollars in financial compensation. That alone had already left Lora viewing Theo as a greedy, ungrateful parasite of a son-in-law.

Lora gave a cold, disgusted snort. "Theo told you he wants a divorce, but did he happen to mention how much money he's trying to extort from your mother?"

Hope blinked, genuinely caught off guard. "No... Theo wants Mom's money?"

"Of course he does," Lora scoffed, her lip curling with contempt. "He's trying to use this divorce to demand billions from her estate. Just listen to that disgusting appetite! Give an insignificant man an inch and he'll try to swallow the whole world."

Lora patted Hope's hand gently, her tone turning ominous. "Don't you worry about him. Your grandfather has already gone straight to Oakridge General Hospital to find Theo. He's determined to knock some sense back into that man's head once and for all."

Hope nodded heavily, her chest swelling with renewed spite.

So Theo had just been using her to play his pathetic mind games! That proved he really was useless and evil.

Even if that paternity test turned out to be fake, Hope decided right then and there that she would still feel utterly ashamed to be related to such a broke, shameless man. And even if Theo and Tracey somehow managed not to get divorced, she had already made up her mind completely: she was going to cut him off as her father regardless.