A Reborn Bride Pearl Emerging from Dust

"Lisette, since you brought it up, we'll just be honest with you," Horatio said, not bothering to sugarcoat it.

"Yeah, we've already moved your stuff into the smaller room. We thought you'd put up a fight, honestly. Didn't expect you to go along with it so easily. That's great!” He nodded, as if this was a perfectly reasonable arrangement.

Valerian chimed in, "From now on, you'll have the small room. Horatio's room will go to Callie. It's not really fair for Horatio to squeeze in there, so you two are swapping."

"Lisette, you're so mature about all this," Monty added, looking at her with what he probably thought was a proud, fatherly smile. "We should've checked with you first, though. You're not upset, are you?"

Lisette just stood there. Upset? Was she even allowed to say she was upset? She wasn't their real daughter. She knew that if she acted out of line, they'd just see her as ungrateful.

She forced a smile, though she felt sick inside. "Of course not. Why would I be upset? It makes sense for Callie to have the bigger room. I'm just grateful you all took me in at all. I mean, I'm adopted, having a small room is no big deal."

She waited, hoping for a flicker of sympathy from any of them. But no one's expression changed.

She hesitated, then pressed on, her voice soft and a little shaky, "Honestly, I'm the adopted one. I probably shouldn't even be living here. If I'm causing problems, maybe I should just move out. I'm sorry, Dad, Horatio, Valerian, I didn't mean to get in the way."

Her eyes dropped to the floor, as if she really felt guilty. "If you'd known it'd be like this, maybe you wouldn't have adopted me. Then things would be better for you and Callie."

She looked at Callie, her voice

almost a whisper. "I'm sorry, Callie. This is really my fault. Don't blame Dad and my brothers for being kind to me. It's just... they felt bad for me because I didn't have a real family."

Lisette kept hammering in the fact that she was adopted, knowing it always made Monty and the boys feel guilty, like they owed her something extra.noveldrama

Usually, Callie would stay quiet, but not this time. Just as Monty and the others were starting to look a little guilty, Callie finally spoke up, voice sharp from her spot on the couch.

"So you think the Jewell family hasn't been good enough to you?" Callie's words cut through the air.

"Why do you keep bringing up being adopted? Haven't we all treated you like family? Or is that still not enough? What do you want us to do, Lisette?"

"We raised you as our own. Even if you can't see us as your real family, you should at least treat us like it. Even blood relatives don't always go this far. You act like nothing we do can ever warm your heart,"

"Seriously, is being adopted your excuse for everything? For anything you want to do, you just blame it on that? It's a pretty convenient excuse, honestly. Because no matter what, you never be a real Jewell by blood."

Callie lounged back, one eyebrow raised, her tone lazy but her eyes sharp as she stared Lisette down.

Lisette's face went pale, stunned by Callie's bluntness.

The rest of the family suddenly seemed to snap out of their guilt, looking at Lisette with new, uneasy eyes.