Their Poor Daughter Was Secretly a Billionaire

At twenty-six, I was brought back by my birth parents to one of the country's top elite families.

On my very first day home, my mother told me,

Zoe, I know the Sanchez engagement was originally yours, but young Mr. Sanchez has been deeply in love with your sister for a long time now. Don't fight Madge Hughes over this match. Mom will make it up to you, I promise.

My elder brother lifted his chin and added, contempt all over his face,

"The Sanchez family is a reclusive dynasty that's stood for a century. They value manners and breeding above all. You're coarse. Marry into a house like that and every clumsy move you make will only shame the Hughes name."

"Spend the next two years learning high society etiquette from Madge. You're a little old for it, but with the Hughes family and Madge and Benjamin Sanchez backing you, marrying into some second-tier house won't be a problem. Just don't reach for anything more."

My fianc let out a sneer, dragging his eyes up and down over my plain clothes.

"My brother's wife speaks eight languages and models for fashion magazines. If I married some backwater country girl, then the Sanchez-Hughes union is off, and there will be no cooperation between our families ever again."

My father sat on the sofa, took a sip of his tea, and studied me with a hard, level gaze, as if checking whether I was really going to make an ugly scene about it.

I gave a small laugh.

I'd only come back to acknowledge my family and then leave, yet they were acting like they faced some great threat, coaxing and threatening me all at once.

Never mind. I'd seen the house. I'd acknowledged my parents.

I wouldn't get tangled up in any of this.

The smile went out of my eyes, and I spoke calmly.

"Mom, Dad, don't worry. I won't fight my sister over the marriage."

"Tomorrow I'll go back to Dragon Bay, and I won't return."

The living room fell silent at once, nothing left but the sound of tight, held breath.

Madge was the first to cry. She actually dropped to her knees in front of me with a thud.

"Sis, it's all my fault. I never should have taken your place, or let Benjamin fall in love with me."

"Mom, Dad, I won't put you in a hard spot. I'll leave the Hughes family right now and give Benjamin back to her."

My parents rushed to pull her up, aching for her, and Benjamin yanked her into his arms, the tenderness in his eyes practically spilling over.

"Madge, I won't let you go."

"I swore an oath. In this life I love only you, I'll marry no one but you. Everyone else isn't worth a single strand of your hair to me."

Then he glared at me, fury in his eyes.

"Zoe Carrington, you're a backwater country girl. Do you honestly think you're good enough for me?"

"I'll tell you the truth. If it weren't for Madge, the childhood betrothal between the Sanchez and Hughes families would have been scrapped long ago."

"You can keep dreaming about marrying up, but it won't get you anywhere. Even if I don't marry Madge, I'd never marry a stupid woman like you. Give it up."

My mother thought I was using my departure as a threat, and her face filled with disappointment too.

"Zoe, it wasn't Madge's fault that you were taken all those years ago. Your father and I have carried that guilt for over twenty years. But you can't use it to back us into a corner."

"The Sanchez family truly is a top-tier house, but the one Benjamin loves is Madge. You're my daughter. Surely you wouldn't force a man to marry you."

"Don't worry, Mom isn't favoring your sister. I just want to find someone who's right for you."

As a mother, her reasoning wasn't wrong.

I didn't know their etiquette, my clothes were dowdy. I really didn't fit with a family as high as the Sanchezes.

They'd found their birth daughter and mended an old regret. Guaranteeing I'd never want for food or clothing was already going as far as decency required.

If I fought for more, I'd be the one who didn't know her place.

But what she didn't know was that I wasn't using family ties to pressure them. I truly meant to go back.

Because she had no idea I was a hidden billionaire heiress, that at eighteen I'd taken over my godmother's entire empire, with assets spread across the globe, spanning the Starlight Institute, investment, tech research and development...

I'd only wanted a simple reunion, nothing complicated, no drama, which was exactly why I'd dressed so plainly.

It had never occurred to me that in their eyes, that plainness would read as country-bred, unfit to be seen.

I smiled at myself. Whether they played favorites or not, I couldn't say. But which child they loved more was plain as day.

Watching the whole family cluster around Madge, I felt something in me let go.

Thank goodness the years of my godmother's love had already filled the hollow places inside me. Otherwise, today might actually have cut deep.

At that thought, I lifted my eyes and looked calmly at all of them.

"Mom, I'm really not trying to force your hand. It's just that my godmother genuinely"

I couldn't come right out and name who I was, so I meant to use the excuse that my godmother couldn't manage without me, and leave with my dignity intact tomorrow morning.

I'd barely opened my mouth when Madge suddenly cut in.

"Sis, if you've really forgiven me, then accept your little sister's gift."

She straightened up as she spoke, eyes rimmed red, and came to stand right in front of me.

"Sis, this bracelet was passed down to Mom from her grandmother, and Mom gave it to me. Now I'm giving it back to you. Please, stop fighting me over Benjamin, okay?"

She yanked the bracelet off her wrist, tears dripping, and shoved it hard at me.

I was just about to push it back when there was a sharp crack. The bracelet hit the floor, splitting clean into three pieces that scattered at my feet.

"Sis, I gave you back the bracelet that marks us as daughters of the Hughes family. Why would you smash it?"

"Do you hate me that much? You'd really fight me for Benjamin no matter what?"

Madge screamed the words at me, grief and fury mixed together, then dropped fast to the floor and snatched the broken jade into her hand. Blood fell from her palm, drop by drop, onto the boards.

"Mom, I'm sorry. I don't deserve to be your daughter. I couldn't even protect the bracelet Grandma passed down to you."

Three seconds of shock, then I stepped back and looked coldly at Madge, crouched there weeping her heart out.

This time my brother charged first, slamming a palm into my chest.

"Zoe Carrington, how can you be so vicious? You really won't rest until you've driven Madge out?"

"Let me tell you something. Madge is my real sister. The idea that I share the same blood as someone as shallow and ugly as you makes me sick."

Even as he spoke, he'd already grabbed Madge's hand, pressing down hard on the wound, shouting for the butler.

Mother was crying too, holding Madge close.

"Silly girl, broken is broken, why go picking up the pieces? You've bled so much. What if it scars?"

Then she turned back to me, her voice heavy with sorrow and helplessness.

"Zoe, what exactly do you want? Do you want your mother to pay for this with her life?"

"We only just found you, and already you're making a scene about leaving. You're really set on breaking my heart like this?"

She wept as though I were a daughter with no feeling at all for a mother's tender heart.

She'd already agreed to compensate me. Agreed to find me a good second-tier family's son down the line.

They hadn't wronged me.

Compared to my days in Dragon Bay, digging up medicinal herbs and living in a thatched hut, this was a thousand, ten thousand times better.

Why couldn't I just be content?

Everyone was looking at me with disgust, and even that last thread of tenderness in my father vanished.

"Zoe, Madge has been raised at our side for twenty years. There's no blood between us, but she's long since been our own daughter."

"If you go on making trouble like this, with no sense of your place, then you can forget ever returning to high society and living in silk and comfort."

I looked at his grave expression and knew he meant every word.

After all, a daughter with a mind of her own who knew how to please was far better than a stiff, country daughter like me.

Set against profit, blood sometimes didn't count for much.

Fine. In the end, at least there'd be no more tangled ties to sort out.

I cleared my throat, straightened up, and spoke in a voice gone cold.

"Dad, I never wanted to fight for anything. A life of silks and luxury, I can give myself"

"Mom, Dad, my head is spinning so badly. Am I dying? I'm so sorry, I haven't repaid you for raising me"

Madge collapsed neatly into our brother's arms, and every face in the room went pale as they scrambled to hold her up and rush her out of the mansion.

Denys carried Madge, and just as he crossed the threshold, he glanced back, a flicker of murderous intent in his eyes.

"Zoe, if anything happens to Madge, I won't let you off."

My gaze darkened as I watched the whole cluster of them vanish hurriedly into the night.

The courtyard glowed warm and bright, yet a chill radiated from every part of me as I stood alone in the middle of the living room.

I don't know how long it was before I came back to myself and walked, step by step, toward the guest room they'd hastily prepared for me.

The room was genuinely tasteful and immaculate, snow-white sheer curtains pooling on the floor, a plush cashmere rug underfoot, soft and comfortable beneath my feet.

Compared to Dragon Bay, where I'd toiled growing medicinal herbs and slept exhausted in a straw shed, it was a far better thing.

But I knew perfectly well that Madge's room was the best master suite on the second floor, cashmere carpet running the length of the entire hallway, her private walk-in closet larger than this guest room of mine.

To them, being given a room like this was already generous. They hadn't shortchanged me.

I wasn't blaming them, really. But it was family I'd longed for over twenty years, and my heart still sank with a quiet disappointment.

I lay on my back on the soft, wide bed, staring wearily at the lush silk tree beyond the courtyard, its pink petals drifting down.

In a daze, I remembered my mother holding me under that tree when I was small, murmuring softly,

"Our little girl is Mommy's prettiest treasure, Mommy's most beloved little princess."

My brother came running over and pressed a cotton candy into my hand, his childish face all seriousness.

"Baby sister, when you grow up I'll give you all the best things to eat. From now on I'll protect you. Anyone who bullies you, I'll beat them to death."

That hazy memory circled through my mind again and again, the reason I'd yearned for twenty years to be reunited with them.

Yearned to throw myself into their arms and say,

"Mom, Dad, big brother, your baby sister is home."

"Mom, Dad, big brother, I missed you all so much. I dreamed of finding you."

Half asleep, it seemed a silk-tree flower had landed on my face, a cool, wet touch.

Then a searing sting tore across it, and I bolted upright with a jolt, clutching my face, a shrill scream ripping out of me.

The scalding pain swept over my whole face in an instant, every ache in me gathering there at once, then spreading out through my arms and legs.

I sprang up from the bed, hands clamped over my cheeks, and rolled to the floor, howling in agony.

Beside me, my brother Denys Hughes's voice came, cold.

"You brought this on yourself." His voice was that piercing, that frozen.

"I wasn't going to do anything to you. But you just couldn't behave, going against Madge at every turn, fighting her over everything."

"Madge is kind. She couldn't bear to see Mom and Dad hurt and torn, so now she's at the hospital refusing treatment. She'd rather die than not hand the position of eldest Hughes daughter back to you."

He crouched down, wrenched my hands away from my face, and looked at my raw, ruined cheeks with not a trace of pity in his eyes, only the satisfaction of a grudge settled.

"Zoe, with your looks destroyed today, hideous beyond recognition, do you still dare to covet what was never yours?"

"Let's see how you fight Madge now. Do you still dare to bully her?"

My screaming brought my father and mother rushing back, and the instant they pushed open the door, their faces changed all at once.

My father's normally steady face went to frost in a heartbeat.

"Denys Hughes, you bastard."

He barked the words as he lunged forward, seized him by the collar, and drove a fist into his face.

"Zoe is your own sister, and you did something this vicious. Throwing acid to ruin her face. Is this how a big brother behaves?"

In a fury, my father kicked Denys into the corner.

He roared,

"Stuart Lambert, bring the family disciplinary rod. Today I'll beat this cold-hearted, ruthless son of mine to death."

Denys had his own stubborn backbone. He dropped to his knees on the floor with a thud, craned his neck, and said,

"Today, even if you beat me to death, I'd still throw this bottle of acid."

"She's not my sweet little sister anymore. She's just a selfish, greedy country girl. Look at what she's driven Madge to. Do you want her to destroy this whole family?"

My father froze. For a second his eyes wavered, then the rage surged up again, and he brought the rod down hard across Denys's back.

"That still doesn't give you the right to throw acid. She is your own sister."

The rod cracked, and Denys let out a muffled grunt, yet he kept his spine straight and never begged.

My father's brow knotted. He raised the rod high again and struck.

"Still won't admit you were wrong? Still won't apologize to your sister and beg her forgiveness?"

The rod came whistling down, and just as it was about to land on my brother's back again, my mother screamed and threw herself over Denys, clutching him tight in her arms.

Heedless of the pain, she cried and wailed,

"Burton, stop, stop hitting him. One of our children is already in the hospital. Do you mean to beat the other one to death too?"

She wept until she came apart, her whole heart aching for Madge, aching for the son who had brought down this disaster, and from beginning to end she never once saw me curled on the floor, my face streaked with blood, wishing I were dead.

My father stopped, breathing hard, and let out a heavy sigh.

My mother only held my brother and sobbed as if her heart were being torn out.

A long while later, Burton threw down the rod, turned, and looked at me with guilt and helplessness. He gently helped me up, an apology in his voice.

"Zoe, it's my fault for not raising your brother right. In this, we've wronged you."

He was silent a moment, as if weighing it all carefully, before he made his promise.

"Tomorrow I'll set up a card for you and transfer two hundred thousand dollars as compensation."

"Once this has all blown over, once Madge has fully recovered and she and Benjamin are married, I'll send you abroad right away to find the best doctors. I promise you, I'll have your face made even prettier than before, without a single scar left."

As the words fell, my sobbing mother let go of my brother, hurried over to me, reached out and held me tight, her tears dropping one by one onto my neck.

"Zoe, my good child, I'm sorry, I'm truly sorry. Mama never thought it would come to this. It's Mama's fault, I didn't protect you."

Crying, she apologized and explained over and over.

"Zoe, you'll understand your mother. They're all my flesh and blood. On one side is a child we raised for twenty years, on the other is your brother. Your mama truly had no choice."

"Just forgive your brother this once, all right? Even if your face really does scar and isn't pretty anymore, your mama will never think any less of you. Your father and I will take care of you for the rest of your life, provide for you always, never let you suffer the slightest wrong."

Her warm tears fell onto my raw, festering wound, sending wave after wave of fine, splintering pain through it.

I leaned in her arms, listening to these hollow words of comfort, the searing pain in my face long since numb, while that last thread of hope I'd held for family love shattered, finally, completely into nothing.

Father called the butler to fetch a doctor for me. I let them lift me onto the bed and work over my face however they wanted.

Under the heavy anesthetic, I slowly drifted into unconsciousness.

When I woke again the room was pitch black. The sharp pain in my face had faded, leaving only a dry, stinging soreness in my throat.

I sat up slowly and felt my way out to find water.

Standing at the bend of the second-floor landing, I looked down into the great room below. Burton sat on the sofa, his face dark, while Mother tended the wounds on Denys's back with aching tenderness, crying and complaining as she worked.

"Burton, how could you be so cruel to your own son? He did it for Madge. His heart was in the right place."

Burton let out a breath, his face iron-hard.

"Right place or not, he had no business hurting her that badly."

"If I hadn't come down hard on Denys to give that girl her due and calm her down, if she'd run out today and called the police, tomorrow the Hughes name would be splashed across the headlines. And then do you think the Sanchez family would still let Madge marry in?"