My mother screamed at me with all her strength.
Ignoring the thick smoke and choking dust, I ran into the mine, desperate to reach her. The moment my hands touched her, the entire mine collapsed.
The smoke engulfed me, and rocks rained down, knocking me unconscious.
When I finally regained consciousness, I saw the anxious face of James' mother.
"Charlotte, you’re awake. You almost gave your aunt a heart attack."
I tried to sit up, my voice weak with concern. "Aunt Lorie, where's my mother? Where's my father? Are they okay?"
Her face instantly shifted to panic, but she quickly forced a smile.
"Charlotte, your parents are fine. They're in another ward," she reassured me, though her words sounded hollow.
I could see through her attempt to comfort me. I didn’t believe her flimsy explanation. "Take me to see them," I insisted.
Seeing that she could no longer hide the truth, she called out to James, standing outside the door, and ordered him to kneel in front of me.
"Charlotte," James' mother said, her voice trembling, "your parents are gone. It’s all James' fault. But don’t worry, the Donovan Family will take care of you."
Hearing this, it felt as though I had been struck by lightning. My mind went completely blank.
After a brief moment of numbness, panic gripped me, and I began to scream uncontrollably, lashing out at the people around me.
The mining disaster that took my parents had already left me with deep scars, and now I was sinking deeper into the abyss of panic disorder.
To "make it right," the Donovan Family arranged a marriage between James and me. James showed no resistance to this arrangement. In fact, over the past three years, he had treated me with kindness and care.
But everything changed when Mia entered the picture.
Mia was the daughter of the Donovan Family’s live-in nanny. She came to live with them just a year after I got engaged to James. Aunt Lorie, who had a great fondness for Mia’s mother, agreed to let her stay with the Donovan Family, understanding how hard it was for Mia’s mother to raise her alone.
From that moment on, I felt like everything I had in the Donovan Family was slowly slipping away, unseen and unnoticed, as Mia quietly took it all.
Mia was everything I was not—gentle, sensible, and obedient. She could make Aunt Lorie and Uncle Dan laugh with just a few well-chosen words. Everyone in the Donovan Family adored her, except for James.
At first, James looked down on Mia, seeing her as nothing more than a rustic girl.
Since Mia transferred to the class where James and I were studying, James began to bully her relentlessly, finding every opportunity to embarrass her.
Despite the harsh treatment she faced at school, Mia never mentioned it when she returned to the Donovan Family. Instead, she showered James with praise in every possible way.
Over time, James' attention and care toward Mia grew, far surpassing any concern he had for me.
I sensed the growing distance between us and, in a desperate attempt to reclaim my place, I began to trouble Mia, thinking that as the future mistress of the Donovan Family, I could put her in her place.
I believed that by doing this, I would make Mia hesitate and somehow win James back. But instead of bringing us closer, everything I did only pushed James further away and gave Mia more opportunities to gain his favor.
I still remember the anniversary of my parents' death this year. James came to me, fuming with anger.
In front of my parents' grave, he pointed at my nose and shouted, "Charlotte, you’ve gone too far! How could you call Mia a bastard?"
His baseless accusation left me stunned. Friends and relatives who had come to pay their respects to my parents quickly stepped in, trying to calm James down.
"I don't know whether Mia is a bastard, but I do know that you're a jinx who killed your own parents," James spat.
The attempts of relatives and friends to calm him down only seemed to fuel his anger, and he insulted me without restraint.
In a burst of frustration and pain, I slapped him across the face. The sharp sound of the impact silenced the moment, leaving Uncle Dan and Aunt Lorie, who were standing beside him, frozen in shock.
"James, you say this to me in front of my parents' grave? Do you have any conscience left?"
James, stunned by the slap, raised his hand to retaliate, but Uncle Dan and Aunt Lorie quickly motioned for the bodyguards to step in and pull him away.
