Chapter 265: Keep Her for the New Year?
The auntie standing beside Arabella Donovan felt a suffocating anger tighten in her chest, making her want to curse up a storm.
"Holy crap! A minute ago, you said her youngest son hated her and the eldest son because of this, so I assumed he actually paid back the money by scrimping, saving, and working hard. But this is it? *This*?! So what in the world was he so resentful about? This whole family is insane!"
Arabella Donovan was amused by the woman’s outburst. She sighed and said, "For people like them, something like this is just an excuse. He’s not mad about the money; he’s mad that even though he was the favorite, he wasn’t the *absolute* favorite. To someone like that, anything you give him is what he’s owed. But the moment you fail to provide even the smallest thing, he’ll resent you for it."
A small favor creates gratitude, a large one creates resentment. This was a perfect example.
The eldest son was like that, and the youngest was no different. That’s why it was impossible to feel even a shred of sympathy for the situation Mrs. Kohl was in now.
"To pay off a debt that should never have been his, the second son was forced to take on the most grueling, physically demanding jobs. But just when he had almost paid it all off, he had an accident. He had been working around the clock for so long that he was completely exhausted. He accidentally dozed off on the job, and three fingers on his right hand were severed."
"HISS—" ’Talk about kicking a man when he’s down. Misfortune really does single out the miserable.’ ’That poor second son! His life is just too tragic!’
"Originally, with prompt medical treatment, there was a chance they could have been reattached. He might have lost some function, but there was hope. But..."
The crowd held its breath. "But what?"
"But the very family he had sacrificed everything to support refused to spend a single penny on him. They just watched him suffer in agony until he became permanently disabled."
"Pah! You’re not even human!" The auntie in yellow couldn’t stop herself from spitting in Mrs. Kohl’s direction. If it weren’t for Arabella Donovan and the others, she would have marched right over and kicked the woman.
Mrs. Kohl’s eyes darted around. She looked flustered but stubbornly retorted, "I gave him his life, so it’s only right that he give it back to me. Besides, it’s not that we didn’t want to save him. His younger brother was still in college at the time, and we had no money. Where were we supposed to find spare cash to pay for his treatment?"
Hector Donovan and the others were enraged by her words. "You knew how to borrow money for the youngest son’s college education, but when the second son suffers a grievous injury, you suddenly don’t know how to borrow money? The way you act as a mother, and the way the eldest son acts as a brother... it’s truly mind-boggling."
"Besides, he was injured on the job, which means it was a work-related injury. All you had to do was apply for worker’s compensation. In the end, it would have barely cost you anything. This is a deadly case of legal ignorance!"
"They weren’t ignorant," Arabella Donovan said, her eyes turning cold as she listened to her sister’s explanation. "If they had paid for the treatment then, the worker’s compensation they received later would have just reimbursed them."
The crowd was stunned for a moment before the meaning of Arabella Donovan’s words dawned on them.
"They... they didn’t... they weren’t planning to pocket all that money for themselves, were they? They’re completely obsessed with money!"
Arabella Donovan watched her family’s gobsmacked expressions, thinking that they had still underestimated just how low these people could sink.
"They didn’t just want to pocket the money. They wanted to get *more* money. That’s why they deliberately delayed his treatment, allowing him to become permanently disabled. It gave them the perfect excuse to go to his factory and extort an even larger sum."
"Monsters! How can anyone’s heart be that black?" A few of the more hot-headed listeners clenched their fists, looking like they wanted nothing more than to rush forward and give her a savage beating.
Mrs. Kohl’s face went pale. She instinctively took a step back, her voice a weak bluster. "What... what do you think you’re doing? It’s illegal to hit people!"
"Oh, so *now* you know it’s against the law to hit people? Even if today’s laws can’t touch you, a person like you will surely burn in hell when you die!"
Aurora Donovan poked her younger sister and asked curiously, "Did they... succeed in the end?"
"They succeeded, but..." A faint smile finally touched Arabella Donovan’s lips, as if she’d recalled something.
"But?"
"But they pushed things too far, and finally provoked the second son and his girlfriend."
Mrs. Kohl wanted to take every last cent of the compensation—money her second son had paid for with three fingers and a lifetime of disability—and use it all to find a wife for her youngest son, who was about to graduate.
The second son, already despondent over his disability, finally lost all hope in his so-called family. His heart was dead to them.
Meanwhile, his girlfriend, whose heart was already breaking over his ordeal, became absolutely livid. She stormed over to the Kohl family’s home and had a massive fight with Mrs. Kohl and the youngest son.
At the mention of this, Mrs. Kohl started playing the victim. "I raised him for so many years! I fed him, I clothed him! And in the end, that little hussy from outside whispers a few words in his ear, and he completely loses his mind! He turned against me, his own mother, and his own brothers to become our enemy. He’s nothing but an ungrateful, untamable wolf!"
Arabella Donovan’s expression darkened. "It’s true you fed him, clothed him, and gave him life. But that doesn’t give you the right to demand anything and everything from him. No matter what he might have owed you, after giving up his education and his life for your precious eldest and youngest sons, after earning so much money for you, and after losing three of his own fingers—that debt should be paid in full."
"Paid in full? What nonsense! I gave birth to him, I gave him his life! He owes me his lifelong gratitude and obedience."
Hector Donovan scoffed and delivered a scathing remark on the spot: "Did she give birth to a son or a slave?"
Finally realizing that she was the bigger idiot for trying to reason with a moron, Arabella Donovan rolled her eyes, speechless. She said coolly, "He treated you like a mother, but you treated him like a workhorse to be whipped day and night. It serves you right that such a filial son would mercilessly sever all ties with you. You deserved it."
Eloise Donovan and the auntie in yellow beside Arabella Donovan both had their eyes light up, their expressions a mixture of surprise and delight. "Her second son severed ties with her?" they asked in unison.
"A mother like that, who practically wants you dead and only thinks about exploiting her children, sucking them dry... If you don’t cut ties with her, what are you going to do? Keep her around for the holidays?"
The crowd couldn’t agree more, but they still had a question. "But would she and her other two ungrateful sons ever agree to that?"
He was their family’s personal blood bank and ATM, a source of free labor they could exploit for a lifetime.
A real smile finally appeared on Arabella Donovan’s face. "She had no choice but to agree."
As it turned out, after his girlfriend had furiously stormed over and had that huge fight with his mother and younger brother, the Kohl family’s second son finally woke up from decades of emotional abuse. He became determined to sever all ties with them. No matter how Mrs. Kohl and his brothers tried to suppress him, insult him, or guilt-trip him, he wouldn’t change his mind.
He even demanded that, in addition to the worker’s compensation, Mrs. Kohl also give him the money she had extorted from the factory by leveraging his injury.
"And that woman and her two money-grubbing sons actually agreed?"
"Of course not. But the second son had powerful help on his side. They didn’t have a choice but to agree."