Filed to story: I Got Married Without You
As these words came out, Karen’s expression changed drastically. She didn’t expect Stella to figure this out, even though she had concealed the truth. How could Stella…
When Karen tried to find an excuse to dispel Stella’s suspicions, she saw Stella gripping her skirt tightly, exerting great force as if she wanted to tear it off.
Karen couldn’t tell from Stella’s actions and expression whether she was shocked by the truth or suppressing her hatred. She only felt that this child had also learned how to disguise herself and was ultimately unable to control it…
But regardless of whether she could control it or not, Karen wouldn’t admit it and chose to remain silent.
But just by looking at Karen’s eyes, Stella knew she hadn’t guessed wrong. Karen was the one who made the first move.
Realizing this was even worse than knowing Karen had used Erin’s men to make things worse for Stella. Because that night, whether Erin had coincidentally come up with this idea or not, her own aunt would have done the same thing in Erin’s name.
After all, as long as they bribed the thugs and made them blame Erin as the mastermind, even if Erin had a hundred mouths, he wouldn’t be able to explain it clearly.
So at that time, when Stella woke up, Karen didn’t care about her well-being first. Instead, she kept pressing her, wanting to know who was behind it all. She claimed it was for revenge, but in reality, she wanted to destroy Erin…
If Stella hadn’t been blinded by family ties and hatred for Erin at that time, she should have thought carefully and not become a pawn.
Stella sneered inwardly, but remained calm as she questioned Karen.
“Tell me, when did you start using me? Was it from the moment you brought me to the Simpson family, or when you manipulated me to get close to Erin…”
Karen stared at Stella’s red eyes and suddenly felt like she had awakened, seeing right through everything. Facing Stella like this, it seemed pointless to hide anymore because she could feel that after today, her niece would never care for her as before.
Thinking this, Karen reached out and grabbed Stella’s hand, gently releasing her grip on her dress and placing Stella’s hand in her own palm. She then covered it with her other hand.
“Stella, Auntie brought you to the Simpson family because I felt sorry for you, losing both your parents. I wanted you to have a good life with me, but I never expected Erin to transfer her hatred towards me and Andrey onto you.”
If Karen had raised Stella just to use her, she wouldn’t have sent Andrey away beforehand and kept him by her side while using Stella as a shield. It was because she had no such intention that Karen didn’t set any traps in that regard.
Stella could already distinguish between truth and lies, so she didn’t question Karen’s words but continued to look up at her.
“Then when did you start using me?”
Since when?
Since Erin repeatedly mocked her, insulted her, and hated her with cold words, Karen wished for Erin’s death!
But with Erin’s grandfather guarding him at that time, she couldn’t touch Erin.
Moreover, Erin was clever and quickly sensed something was wrong. Several times, she tried to push Erin into the water from behind, but he cleverly avoided it.
Coincidentally, she saw little Stella chasing after Erin, wanting him to teach her medical skills. She felt that Erin was much kinder to Stella than to her, so she thought if she could transfer Erin’s hatred for her onto Stella, she would have to suffer less.
She then told Thomas how pitiful and helpless Stella was, how she was constantly bullied by Erin. Thomas heard it and saw it, and he started favoring Stella more.
Erin, being young at the time, probably felt that his father’s love had been taken away, which made him uncomfortable. The more he saw Stella, the more he disliked her, and Karen wanted to make it worse. She falsely accused him of hitting Stella in front of Thomas to add fuel to the fire.
When Thomas heard about it, he didn’t hesitate. As soon as Erin came back from school, he slapped him hard, knocking him to the ground. Erin foamed at the mouth, convulsing, almost unable to handle it. He grabbed Thomas’ leg and asked through gritted teeth why he hit him. Thomas said it was because he had bullied Stella. Erin probably thought Stella had accused him falsely, causing him this injustice. From then on, Erin completely hated Stella.
Erin did transfer some of his hatred from Karen, but the Simpson family still wanted him, the talented one, to be the heir. Despite Erin’s misdeeds, those uncles of his liked him, almost unconditionally, without considering Andrey, who was far away in Arcadia and under the care of the Evans’ butler. Karen believed that only by making Erin commit a major mistake would the Simpson family completely abandon him and consider Andrey for the inheritance. he She started provoking Erin every now and then, of course, when no one could see or hear. Whenever Erin got angry, couldn’t control his insults towards her. Karen purposely waited for Thomas to come back and acted as if she had been greatly wronged.
At that time, Thomas would scold and hit Erin, regardless of right or wrong. Every time Erin got angry, he would redirect his hatred towards Stella and find new ways to bully her…
Karen made sure the servants around her knew what Erin had done to Stella, spreading it throughout the Imperial Capital circle. Erin’s reputation slowly declined, even within the Simpson family. They believed that as Erin grew older, he became more unruly…
But that’s not enough. Erin’s mistake wasn’t big enough, so Karen had Stella get close to Erin. She wanted Stella to fall in love with Erin first, and then use that love to get Erin’s heart in return. She thought that if the two kids had a connection, someone like Erin, who was reckless and free-spirited, wouldn’t be able to resist Stella.
But surprisingly, Erin never fell for Stella, even though Karen hinted at him by letting Stella going in and out of his bathroom and room. Karen, who thought her plan was going to fail, happened to see Erin sneaking into Stella’s room late at night.
Karen followed him quietly and opened the door a crack. She saw Erin standing by Stella’s bed, staring at her for a long time. Then suddenly, he leaned in and lightly kissed Stella’s lips. After the kiss, he got startled, as if he had surprised himself.
Seeing Erin’s amorous behavior, Karen knew that half of her plan had succeeded. And in the following times, she even witnessed Erin becoming bolder. He would kiss Stella when she was asleep, and each time the kisses lasted longer than the previous ones, but he never went further.
Karen planned to wait for the day when Erin would make a mistake on his own, but she didn’t expect that before that happened, Thomas got into an argument with Erin’s grandfather because of Erin’s career direction. Karen never imagined that even with Erin’s tarnished reputation, Thomas still hadn’t given up on the idea of making him the heir. When she heard Thomas say that if Erin studied finance, he would let him take over the family business after graduation, she panicked.
She had been planning for so many years not to push Erin to be the heir, but for her own son. Otherwise, once Erin gained power, she would be under Erin’s feet in the Simpson family and her status would be diminished. And who knew, the grown-up Erin, who could manipulate everything, might even try to seek revenge for his mother.
To prevent Erin from gaining power, Karen even thought about drugging him and tempting him to rape Stella. Just then, a boy named Mason happened to bring Stella home. She knew it was a great opportunity.
She quickly guided Stella to like Mason and created. opportunities for them to be alone together, intentionally making Erin jealous. Karen knew that a young guy like Erin, once he became jealous, would inevitably become agitated and might do something foolish.
But Erin was surprisingly tolerant. He saw Mason coming out of Stella’s room several times and chose to turn a blind eye. What could she do? She could only push things further. When they were about to graduate from high school, she started openly and subtly urging Mason to confess his feelings to Stella.
At that time, Mason had a crush on Stella but was afraid that she didn’t like him. Karen said that if Stella didn’t like him, she would have rejected him long ago. It was just that Stella was shy. In fact, it was Karen who advised Stella not to reject Mason, but how that. He really thought that if Stella didn’t reject him, it meant she liked him. He even took Karen’s advice and confessed to Stella on a cruise ship.
When Mason took Stella onto the ship, Karen found Erin and told him that Mason was going to confess to Stella. Then they would sail around the world together. Erin was still holding back at that time. To push him further, Karen smiled at Erin and said, “I wonder if Stella will get pregnant after spending two months together. If Stella gets pregnant, she’ll marry Mason.” This made Erin furious and his face turned pale. He started cursing Stella, calling her shameless, and went crazy looking for someone.
Karen wasn’t sure if the infuriated Erin would personally attack Stella or send someone to do it. But based on her understanding of Erin, she knew he would choose the latter. Because Erin had both hatred and some liking for Stella, although he probably wasn’t aware of the liking. So the hatred he had for Stella would outweigh.
And she guessed right. That idiot Erin actually thought that Stella was going to be with another man. He believed that a woman like Stella couldn’t live without a man, so he sent a group of people to scare her. But because of this, he unintentionally helped Karen.
To make sure those people succeeded, Karen had someone injure the caretaker who had raised Erin and then tricked the caretaker into calling Erin, asking him to come back and save him. The caretaker, holding his head covered in blood, quickly called Erin, who was skilled in medicine…
Erin probably never knew that this was Karen’s plan. But whether he knew or not, every time Karen thought about this coincidental event, she couldn’t help but laugh. How could someone be so foolish?
As she reminisced about the past, the smile that she tried to hide was all too visible to Stella. Stella had a vague inkling that whether it was during their childhood when she encouraged her to get close to Erin, or as they grew older when she manipulated her into falling for Erin, it was all part of Karen’s plan. Even the later harm inflicted upon her, which she blamed on Erin, was just because Karen knew that Thomas wanted Erin to be the heir…
She was ultimately just a pawn in Karen’s hands…
Yet, the person who treated her as a pawn was still holding her hand and shifting the blame onto others.
“Stella, no matter when it started, you have to know that it was Erin who provoked me first. From the moment I stepped into the picture, he constantly insulted me and even called me a homewrecker in private. If you want to blame someone, blame him.”
Stella curled her lips in a bitter smile and suddenly burst into laughter.
“Aren’t you the homewrecker?”
With tears in her eyes, she stared at her unfamiliar aunt.
“In order to escape the identity of a small-town girl, you climbed into Thomas’s bed, knowing full well that he was married. Erin saw you wearing his mother’s clothes, fooling around with his father in his mother’s room. He hated you for that. And what’s more, you forcefully moved into the Simpson family, driving his mother crazy to the point where she jumped off a building. Who else should he blame if not you?”
These things were what Stella had heard from others as she grew older, and even though her worldview had been greatly shaken at the time, she still chose to believe Karen’s explanations.
After all, Karen’s excuse was that she had no power or influence, and she couldn’t escape from someone as powerful as Thomas.
But now, Stella realized that Karen was truly talented. She could turn black into white. At that time, she was even grateful to her aunt..
If the harm Erin caused her was a score of ten thousand, then Karen’s was a hundred thousand. The gentle and kind aunt that she believed in turned out to be a facade… Even the love she showed her was just a lie…
