His reasoning was fiercely simple: he was seeking justice. He couldn't stand watching Latham use his wealth to bully the teacher he revered.
She had saved him when he had nothing, and he wanted to exact revenge on her
behalf.
Consequently, Fallon managed to avoid any charges relating to the corporate leak.
Furthermore, the moment she arrived at the precinct, she used her phone call to reach out to Cindy, desperately pleading for forgiveness.
Hearing Fallon sobbing hysterically on the other end, Cindy actually agreed to sign a Affidavit of Non-prosecution.
The naive fool even tracked down Claire to discuss it.
"Claire, I know you resent being swapped, but you honestly had a pretty good life with the James family."
"Since you actually benefited from living with them, could you just drop the lawsuit? Let my godmother off the hook for swapping us?"
Claire was genuinely astounded by Cindy's sheer stupidity.
"Why would I ever drop it?" Claire glared at her. "Are you out of your mind? Do you even listen to the garbage coming out of your mouth?"
"Or is it because you also benefited from the swap, so you'd rather pretend none of it happened?"
Claire's words were ruthless and direct.
Cindy looked staggered. "How did I benefit? You know exactly how awful my life was out in the country."
"While you were living like a pampered princess in the James household, what was I doing? I had to cook my own meals every single day..."
Cindy launched into a dramatic litany of her past miseries.
But Claire felt zero pity for her. "That's because you have a theatrical personality.
You're obsessed with attention and completely oblivious."
"Grandma explicitly asked Patti to cook for you, but you stubbornly insisted on doing it yourself."
"Did you think you were proving how independent you were?"
"No. To the rest of us, you just looked like a colossal idiot."
"Cindy, look me in the eye and honestly tell me your life in the country was a nightmare."
Even though Pandora had never
formally declared Cindy as the
future matriarch of their clan,
everyone in the
illage treated her
like royalty.
FindNovel.net
They catered to her every whim when she was a little girl, and as she grew older,
they worshipped the ground she walked on.
Even the local kids would happily split their hard-earned snacks with her.
In reality, Cindy was the absolute center of their universe back then.
It was only when she moved to the city and lost that spotlight that she began
desperately bending over backward to win everyone's approval.
It was also highly likely that Fallon's twisted influence had poisoned her mind.
But no matter how you spun it, Cindy hadn't suffered an ounce of hardship during her childhood.
Sure, it wasn't the luxurious lifestyle of the James family, but it was miles better than if Latham had
discovered she wasn't his biological daughter and chucked her out onto the streets, right?
Octavia's reckless scheme all those years ago had ironically played right into Fallon's hands.
Fallon hadn't possessed the stomach to actually kill the baby, so she kept Cindy alive.
Of course, keeping the kid breathing was also Fallon's ultimate insurance policy.
Otherwise, why else would Cindy be standing here right now, blindly defending her kidnapper?
"You think I lost nothing and somehow won the lottery, but you know damn well I never had any real connection with Latham and Octavia."
"Octavia even tried to murder me when I was just a toddler."
"She knew full well I wasn't her biological child. The fact that I survived at all was pure luck."
It wasn't because Octavia suddenly developed a conscience.
If Claire hadn't been incredibly fortunate, she would have wound up in a tiny coffin years ago.
Who would have demanded justice for a dead toddler?
If Cindy's identity as the true heiress had come to light back then, what would
Pandora have done?
The old woman's son and
daughter-in-law had already vanished without a trace and then
her only remaining granddaughter
would have been murdered.
Claire hadn't been saved by some merciful god-she had been saved by Pandora.