Chapter 4

Janet talked me down too, telling me not to get into it with the kids, that it would only wind me up worse.

So I swallowed the fire in my chest for the moment and ate the leftovers.

While we were carrying the plates and bowls to the sink, the two of them were jumping and bouncing all over the leather sofa.

I wanted to storm out and yell at them to stop, but Janet said one thing.

"If you go out there and shout, all you'll get is a screaming, thrashing tantrum."

"And then what are you going to do about it?"

She was right. Against brats like these, I had nothing.

But what worried me most was, how was I supposed to keep going to work?

I finished the dishes, then went straight to the study to work late and get the project proposal done.

I'd just finished and hadn't even had a chance to stretch when I heard Janet scream.

"Ah! Get out of here, stop filming!"

I was so startled I didn't even get my shoes on, and ran out with one bare foot.

Only to see that older boy, using his phone to film Janet in the shower.

I rushed straight over and snatched the phone out of his hand.

"How rotten can you be? Don't you know that secretly filming a woman in the shower is a crime?"

Inside, Janet was crying while she pulled her clothes on.

And in my chest, a towering hatred surged up.

But what he said next was pure arrogance: "Tch, are you trying to scare me?"

"Kids can do whatever they want and it's never a crime."

Meeting that cocky face of his, I quickly deleted every photo he'd taken.

Then I fixed him with a cold stare.

"If I tell your classmates about this, guess how everyone at school is going to look at you."

"Don't you sneer and roll your eyes at me. Once I turn mean, I don't care who you are to me."

The look of fury on me stunned him, and for the moment he didn't dare throw a fit.

When Janet came out, she didn't linger a second. She grabbed her bag and left.

The little one, though, was so happy she clapped her hands. "Yes! We finally got rid of her. Now no one can take over my room."

The older boy pulled himself back together, ignored my anger, and cockily dug out the potato chips, curling up on the sofa to eat them.

I hurried out to find Janet, but she'd already driven off.

Watching the shape of her car shrink into the distance, I dragged myself back inside, gutted.

But who would have guessed, the project proposal I'd just finished had been torn to shreds by that boy.

"Ha, see that? This is what you get for daring to cross us."

In that moment, I nearly beat the both of them senseless.

Turn my whole life into a poisoned mess like this, and nobody could keep their temper.

They just figured that since I had a mild temper, I was easy to push around, right?

Well, I'd see who begged for mercy first.

The next day, I only made breakfast, then went back to work.

I wasn't coming home at noon, wasn't cooking for them. I was going to let them go hungry, and I meant it.

I sent Charity a message saying I had things to deal with and couldn't look after her kids, but she just said it was fine, to keep them shut up at home.

Since their own mother put it that way, well, I could hardly refuse such a gracious offer.

Hungry stomachs at noon, hungry stomachs again at dinner.

I used working late as the excuse not to go back, and stayed at the office doing the project proposal.

The two kids got so hungry they couldn't stand it and called Charity.

Charity wouldn't listen. She told them to tough it out, knowing full well I was doing this on purpose.

Then I'd just play along with her: only breakfast every day, and by any reasonable measure, it was true that I only got home at night.

They cried, they raged, but by then they'd already driven me half out of my mind, and I didn't care about any of it.

By the fifth day, those two plump little troublemakers had dropped over ten pounds.

And it wasn't just that they'd gotten thin. They were so starved they'd gone outside to dig through the dumpster looking for something to eat.

That day Charity and the uncle happened to pass by nearby, and they still refused to come collect the kids and take them home.

"Honey, there's no substitute for experience."

"We dump the kids on Maxwell to raise, and we get to keep living it up out here..."

But before he could finish, he nearly walked straight into the dumpster beside them.

And by the dumpster, two little beggars were rooting through the trash for food.

"Damn it! You filthy little beggars, you almost—"

"No, wait. They, they look like our own babies!"