Reincarnated As the Enemy's Wife: Married the Rival, Bound by Revenge-Chapter 284: Nicholas Made His Move

In the presence of all the reporters, May Worley began to yell wild accusations, paying scant regard to her daughter’s career prospects.

"What do you mean by that, Eva? Is it that you’re rich now and wanna disown your mother and your brother?

"You ... You’re such an ingrate! I was pregnant for ten months before giving birth to you, and now you refuse to acknowledge me as your mother because I’m poor! This is unbelievable..."

May Worley started crying and she told the reporters,

"Look, this is my daughter... She’s rich now, and she doesn’t wanna acknowledge me, boohoo..."

The reports were snapping away, their flashes working frantically. All was confusion.

Things were getting out of control, and even the reporters started denouncing Eva.

"Your mother and your little brother have come a long way to get here. They had a hard job finding you. You don’t have to be grateful, but you can’t be so heartless."

Someone had the moral high ground. "Eva, you should say something sweet to your mother. She’s crying her eyes out."

Someone even said, "You owe your parents your life! Filial piety is the most important of all virtues. Unfilial people are not fit to be deemed human!"

The babble of questioning voices worsened Eva’s headache. She thought, <What’s wrong with these people? I was the one sent to an orphanage, weren’t I?> She had a momentary blackout and nearly fainted. But she knew she must not pass out.

There was no telling what these reporters might put on tomorrow’s newspapers if she lost consciousness at this point in time.

She was terribly panic-stricken when a hand firmly supported her from behind.

Nicholas, clad in a black suit, stood there facing all the reporters, a cold look on his handsome face.

His eyes were icy when he looked at May Worley.

He was not alone. He had brought a dozen bodyguards with him.

The bodyguards immediately separated the reporters from the two of them and the situation was put under control. Everyone was quiet.

Eva looked over her shoulder at Nicholas’s peremptory face, a trifle surprised.

The look on her pretty face froze.

He... How had he come to be here?

And...

She lowered her head and found that Nicholas was holding her hand.

There were so many reporters watching, and yet he was holding her hand...

Didn’t he want to keep their relationship secret?

...

Unsurprisingly, the reporters, after a silence, instantly changed the topic.

"Mr. Brown, may I ask who you are to Miss Loraine?"

"Mr. Brown, are you dating Miss Loraine?"

"Mr. Brown, how long have you been seeing Miss Loraine?"

Eva thought that Nicholas would refuse to answer the questions, but unexpectedly, he answered them all.

"Yes, we’re dating.

"Actually, we’ve been dating for almost two years."

Nicholas’s words sent a ripple of exclamation through the crowd of reporters.

This was sensational news!

"Mr. Brown, congratulations!"

"Mr. Brown..."

Some others wanted to ask him questions, but Nicholas interrupted them, "It’s late. I need to get my girlfriend back home. If you guys have other questions to ask, you’ll have to wait until the news conference of the Brown Group next week. Nicholas made those remarks in haste. Suddenly, the look in his eyes went cold.

"But I don’t wanna see any news irrelevant to the relationship between me and my girlfriend tomorrow. You guys know what I mean?"

He was implying that he didn’t want any of the reporters to write anything about what May Worley did tonight.

Naturally, all the reporters understood.

Though it was a shame not to be able to write about that matter, they felt that they had been properly compensated.

An article about the richest man in Zoravia going public with his relationship with Eva Loraine the musician would be much more worth reading than one about Eva acknowledging a woman as her birth mother!

Thus, Nicholas handled all the reporters with one sentence.

After saying that, Nicholas brought Eva into his car without another word.

Eva had not collected her thoughts yet. Still in shock, she was safely whisked into the car by Nicholas.

Soon, the black Rolls Royce drove off.

...

In the car, Eva was still in bemusement.

Firstly, two of her family members had suddenly reappeared for no reason.

Secondly, Nicholas had suddenly shown up without notice.

She had a vacant look on her face, while Nicholas appeared rather sulky.

The reason why he had given May Worley 300 thousand dollars was because he wanted her to leave Eva alone.

He believed that it was very generous of him to have given May Worley 300 thousand dollars, but unexpectedly, that woman was so greedy and insensible...

She had even dared to bother his girlfriend.

And she had brought a group of reporters with her!

Nicholas was pondering what to do next.

Just then, Eva suddenly asked,

"I thought... you didn’t want to go public with our relationship."

"And when did I say that?"

Eva frowned.

She said seriously, "The other day, when the reporter from a financial newspaper asked you if you had a girlfriend, you said no."

Nicholas explained, "It’s not that I didn’t want to go public with it. I couldn’t.

"If I reveal your identity, it will very likely put you in danger."

"What kind of danger?" she asked.

"Life-threatening danger." 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

Eva’s insides tightened at the words.

But soon, she mumbled,

"That’s what kept you from going public with our relationship?"

So it was not because he was not sure about how he felt about her, but because he was worried that those foes of his father who used to be a gangster might do her harm?

Eva suddenly felt that she had been mistaken about Nicholas all this time.

"What else did you think it was?" Nicholas looked at her wintrily.

His eyes were so unfeeling, but when looking at her, they were glinting with intense ardor.

His gaze of intense ardor made Eva feel guilty.

She should have realized it sooner.

This man was serious about their relationship.

He loved her, so he really didn’t need to go public with their relationship to prove anything.

Now that they had cleared the air, Eva finally felt a sense of relief.

Eva pressed her lips together.

Recalling the expression in Nicholas’s eyes when he’d been looking at May a while ago, Eva felt that he had found out about something sooner than she had, so she asked,

"Those two people back there... Are they really my family?"

Actually, she had an answer in her mind, but she was not a hundred percent sure.

Nicholas kept silent, driving along.

"If you want to ask them in person, I can call them over later."

An hour later. The Brown family’s mansion.

May and Ned were brought to one of the mansions where Nicholas stayed most often when in Hiltonan.

May was staggered the instant she entered the house.

She had never seen such a luxurious house in her whole life, not even on TV.

Each floor of the house covered an area of four to five hundred square feet. Counting the two basements, the residence had six floors in total. Also, there was a big garden outside. It was just one of Nicholas’s mansions.

May and Ned were like two bumpkins in a palace. She made up her mind to ask for more money.

Unsurprisingly, they saw Eva sitting in the middle of the sofa. Except for the babysitter, Eva was the only woman here. May’s attitude instantly became polite. "Eva..."

Having heard Nicholas’s answer and the results of the investigation carried out by his assistant, Eva was almost certain that May was her birth mother.

And Ned was her little brother, who was a few years her junior, but who had not been abandoned.

Eva was somewhat excited.

"Why did you send me to the orphanage? And why have you come back now?" May was somewhat baffled by the first question from Eva. "Why have I come back? Because you are my daughter!"

"You think just because I’m your daughter, I have to grant your every request after your return, despite the fact that you abandoned me when I was little?"

Eva asked, sounding a tad despairing.

She had a sneaking suspicion that her parents didn’t love her that much. Otherwise they wouldn’t have forsaken her.

But she hadn’t bargained on her mother being so shameless.

This woman had not only accepted 300 thousand dollars from Nicholas but also brought a group of reporters with her to coerce her own daughter!

Lips pressed tightly together, trying hard to sound calm, Eva said, "I don’t have much to say, but you need to return the 300 thousand dollars to Nick."

Nicholas might be willing to offer 300,000 dollars to the woman who had given birth to Eva.

But Eva felt that a woman so greedy was not worthy of such a generous offer.

She owed her parents her life, and she would pay it off by herself, but she wanted her mother to return the money to Nicholas. This kind of mother was just unbelievable.

Eva thought disappointedly, "Was she not afraid Nicholas might look down upon her daughter because of that?"

On hearing Eva’s words, May fumed, "What do you mean by that, Eva?"

"I’ll cover my little brother’s medical expenses, and then I’ll no longer be indebted to you for giving birth to me, but first you must return the 300,000 dollars to Nick."

May’s face instantly contorted with anger. "You think you’re so tough now, huh? Although your father and I had no choice but to send you to an orphanage afterward, it doesn’t change the fact that I gave birth to you! In order to give you your life, I was pregnant for ten months, which was quite an ordeal for me! How can you be so ungrateful?"

Now Eva was more convinced that this May woman was not here to be reunited with her daughter.

"You knew I was in that orphanage, but why did you never visit me?

"If you really valued familial bonding as much as you said you did, why did you never show a shred of concern for the daughter you endured ten months’ pregnancy to give birth to?"

Eva’s voice grew colder with her every word.

"I... I..." Words eluded May.

"Besides... " Eva shifted her gaze to Ned standing beside May. "You said you had no choice but to send me to an orphanage, but why did you raise my little brother for so many years?"

This question of Eva’s struck home.

May explained unconvincingly, "We were too poor to raise two children at that time. Your little brother is a boy, and he could work to make money after growing up, but you..."

Eva smiled after hearing May’s reply.

However, her smile was grim.

"So, in your eyes, people raise children only to make sure they have someone to rely on for survival when getting old? Is that it?

"You regard children as tools for making money," Eva said, looking at Ned. "You believe a son could make more money and is more important than a daughter, so you abandoned your daughter.

"And now your son is ill and unable to make money, and you discovered that your daughter seemed to be earning a decent income, which was why you came back here to acknowledge me and get money. Is that what this is about?"

Eva was getting increasingly emotional with her every word.

Having noticed that Eva was losing control of herself, Nicholas promptly had his men chuck May and Ned out.

Eva covered her eyes with her hands, but her tears still rolled down her cheeks uncontrollably.

She was disappointed.

She was completely disappointed.

She had never known that there was a kind of disappointment caused by familial bonding which was so intense and so insufferably painful.

After what felt like hours, Eva was still sitting on the sofa, wordless.

Although she kept telling herself that it was no big deal...

Although they were nominally her birth parents, there was no bonding between them whatsoever.

Familial bonding had never existed in her life.

But she was a normal human being, and she could not feel nothing after her family member hurt her face to face.

At this moment, May’s and those reporters’ words were being replayed in her mind over and over again.

She thought, <Everybody owes their parents their life?

Filial piety is the most important of all virtues?

"Mommy" is crying her eyes out?!

Where were the ones who gave me my life when I was in the orphanage?

Where were they when I wanted to be a filial daughter? What else did I have apart from the high outer walls of the orphanage at that time?>

The deeper Eva thought about it, the worse a whirl her mind was in. Also, her head began to ache dully again.

Finally, Nicholas couldn’t stand it anymore.

He knew very well how she felt.

Because his family had done him harm as well.

His hand, warm and big, rested on Eva’s.

She did not open her eyes, tears streaming down her cheeks, but she knew that it was Nicholas.

Although she was restraining it, Nicholas still perceived the mixed sorrow and anxiety bubbling inside her.

There was manifest heartache in the depths of Nicholas’s eyes.

Slowly and mildly, Eva removed Nicholas’s big hands off her forehead. She expressed her need for some time alone in a roundabout way.

Nicholas was silent for a moment, but eventually he left the sofa in the living room.

Soon, the sound of cooking a meal came from the kitchen.

Half an hour later, the door was pushed open again and with that Nicholas walked inside and put the tray full of dishes gently on the table.

Eva’s sitting position had not changed a bit since Nicholas’s departure. She was wordless, her face clouding over with upset.

Nicholas picked up a plastic spoon, put some food from every one of the dishes onto the spoon and then ladled some soup.

After a while, when the food cooled down somewhat, Nicholas held the spoonful of food to Eva’s lips.

She had been busy all day and hadn’t eaten anything yet.

He was fully aware that she would never eat until she got everything handled. If things kept going like this, it would take a heavy toll on her.

Eva, still having no appetite, did not move.

"Open your mouth," Nicholas said beside Eva’s ear in a deep, low voice.

His voice gradually dissolved Eva’s grief.

She opened her mouth slightly.

"Be careful not to choke on it," Nicholas said briskly.

Then Nicholas put the spoonful of food into Eva’s mouth.

"Does it taste good?" Nicholas asked.

In fact, Eva was not really in the mood for food, but she knew about her instincts, and he was a good cook.

More importantly, he had prepared this specially for her.

He had, degrading his social status, gone to the trouble of cooking so many delicious dishes at this late hour.

He had not only taken care of the reporters but also handled so many things for her.

No matter what, she owed it to him to show him some understanding.

After a while, Eva opened her mouth slightly again.

She wanted another spoonful of food.

Nicholas once again displayed his flair for "building blocks" and securely arranged the delicious foods on the spoon, making them pleasant to the eye.

When he held the spoon to Eva’s mouth again, Eva pushed his hand to his own mouth.

They took turns to eat.

Just like that, tears slowly stopped flowing from Eva’s eyes and the two of them enjoyed a quiet dinner.

...

"Let me show you something," Nicholas said to Eva after dinner.

Eva’s face registered curiosity.

Nicholas walked out and returned moments later with a flight case.

The box was transparent as a capsule.

When Eva saw what was in the box, she suspected that she was hallucinating! A puppy was lying inside, and he opened his eyes.

Nicholas had long since specially had someone bring the puppy back from overseas.

As chance would have it, the puppy was delivered here on this very day.

Originally, he had his assistant keep the puppy in the office, planning to give it to Eva tomorrow, but after seeing what May did, Nicholas had promptly had his

assistant drive the puppy to this mansion.

"Goo..." the puppy let out a soft whimper, staring at Eva.

Eva stood transfixed with incredulity.

It was a puppy!

He was so small. He had probably only just opened his eyes!

Having sensed Eva’s gaze, the puppy excitedly rose to his feet and jumped at Eva repeatedly.

Then the puppy whined three times in a row.

The puppy’s whimper was brief, soft and sounded adorable.

As Nicholas opened the box, the puppy quickly scampered out and, his tail wagging, trotted up to Eva’s foot and began to pounce on it repeatedly.

While pouncing, the puppy rubbed his toothless mouth against Eva’s pant leg.

It was as if he had known Eva for a long time.

Eva looked at the tiny little thing as her brows which had only just unknitted furrowed again.

She thought, <Why is Nicholas offering me a puppy?

Does he want me to have this puppy?

Me? Having a dog?>

She herself was an orphan, and yet he wanted her to take responsibility for this little guy?

Eva’s eyes returned to the puppy trying to pounce on her.

The puppy pounced so hard that his tender hind legs failed to support him and he fell to the ground with a whimper of fear.

Looking at the puppy, Eva thought of herself again.

For as long as she could remember, she had been living on her own. She had practiced piano, left the orphanage, landed a job... And she had never relied on anybody.

But why did this puppy run up to her the instant it got out of the box? "Have you already trained him to acknowledge me as his master?"

Nicholas said, "Miss Loraine, I do not deny that I’m a very powerful man, but do you really think I’m capable of training a puppy too young to do anything but eat?"

Eva, "..."

She silently withdrew her feet and sat in the chair, hugging her knees.

Eva did not know why, but she didn’t immediately scoop up the puppy.

She had never had a pet before and just felt blindsided.

"I can’t keep you," Eva told herself inwardly.

She would have left the room by now were it not Nicholas who was offering her the puppy.

But at this moment, the puppy ran behind the flight case, and then the little thing tried with all his might to push the box.

The box was edged forward inch by inch.

The puppy’s little pads slipped several times and he almost fell to the ground.

But eventually, the puppy pulling out all the stops managed to push the box to the side of Eva.

Using the protruding opponents of the case as footholds, the puppy wobbled on top of the case.

And then, standing on top of the case, the puppy growled at Eva as if to display his determination.

Suddenly, the puppy jumped over the last gap between the case and Eva.

The white puppy slammed itself into Eva’s chest.

Lying in Eva’s embrace, he curled into a ball, his little claws tugging at Eva’s jacket, fearing that Eva might throw him away again.

Eva was momentarily astonished.

Was this dog... some kind of spirit?

He had actually moved a case several times his size and then jumped into her embrace on his own account.

Eva did not speak, but she could not help but put her arms around the puppy’s curled body.

A drop of salty liquid fell onto the puppy’s nose. He stuck out his tongue to lick it, rolled over in Eva’s arms and rubbed his little head against her.

"This dog... What species is he?" she asked in spite of herself.

"Pomeranian," Nicholas replied.

"It’ll weigh 4 to 7 pounds after reaching adulthood. Very small."

"Why does he like me so much?"

"Probably because he’s a male dog," Nicholas said, sounded a little jealous.

Nicholas would have picked a female dog had he known about this beforehand. At that time, he had been told that a female dog was harder to take care of, which was

why he had eventually chosen a male one.

After a long silence, Eva asked,

"Why are you giving me a dog?"

Nicholas walked over, squatted down and stroked the dog’s head.

"You, like me, have never experienced the warmth of familial bonding. I know in my heart of hearts that as things stand, though you’re dating me, you do not trust me completely. But this puppy is different.

"I want it to keep you company, gain your trust and reassure you. At least he’ll be 100 percent loyal to you, because a puppy serves nobody but his master."