Her Gilded Revenge For Stolen Fate novel Chapter 60

Chapter 60

Even in such a miserable state, Charles was still hopelessly hung up on Celia.

He didn’t want to get Celia involved, so he explained, “Lady Vivian, I come from a humble background and never had the chance to meet Lady Celia before. Celine only ended up with me by chance. It has nothing to do with Lady Celia.”

“Is that so?” Vivian flashed a sly smile, clearly not buying it.

She turned slightly and walked forward with unhurried grace, stopping in front of Celine, whose belly was heavy with child.

Celine’s eyes widened in alarm, and the panic in her heart only grew stronger.

A few days ago, she’d been snatched by some bandits and taken to a hidden estate. At first, she thought she’d ended up in the hands of human traffickers who planned to traffic her far from Aurestus..

To her surprise, however, the servants there never mistreated her. She was taken good care of and even attended to by several older women who served her with great patience.

Celine had no clue who she’d crossed or what they wanted from her, so she spent every day on edge.

Today, a stranger finally appeared at the estate and, without a word, dragged her off to this place.

That only made Celine more terrified. She had clearly heard the unfamiliar maid address the woman before her with

respect.

She thought, ‘Could this disfigured noblewoman be the one behind it all?‘

Vivian noticed how Celine protectively covered her stomach in fear, and it wasn’t hard to figure out what she was thinking.

Naturally, Celine feared that she might harm her and the child she carried.

Back in her previous life, Vivian and Charles had ended up as bitter enemies, but she still had a sense of right and wrong. She would never take her anger out on a pregnant woman or a baby that hadn’t even been born yet.

She blinked, then bent down to pick up the reticule from the floor.

Two swans were stitched on it in fine detail, so vivid that it was obvious someone had put real effort into it.

“Celine, you dropped this,” Vivian said.

Celine simply nodded, her voice barely above a whisper as she thanked Vivian.

When Charles saw this, his face turned deathly pale. He clumsily scrambled to his feet and hurried over to Vivian.

He lunged for the reticule, trying to snatch it from her.

However, Judith blocked him with ease and forced him to the ground.

Judith was a trained assassin who fought fiercely and could easily handle several strong men at once, let alone a frail scholar

like Charles.

Charles howled in pain.

Sylvi napped at Judith, “You’re getting out of line. Let go of him now.”

Judith ignored her completely. As an assassin, she only took orders from her master, and everyone else’s opinion was irrelevant.

Chapter 60

Vivian twirled the reticule between her fingers and crouched down in front of Charles, studying his beaten, bruised face. It only made her feel better.

“Mr. Linden, what are you panicking for?” she asked.

“I’m not,” Charles insisted, trying to sound tough. He’d knocked out a front tooth, and every word came out through the gap, making him look almost comically pathetic.

He stared at Vivian. “Vivian, you’re my cousin. Even if you don’t want to marry me, you shouldn’t push things to such an extreme. Leave some room for mercy, or one day, you’ll have nowhere to stand.”

Vivian sneered. “You’re the one who backed me into a corner. Why should I show you mercy?”

She stood up, flicked some nonexistent dust off the reticule with a mocking gesture, and then opened it with deliberate care.

Inside was a cross, meticulously wrapped.

Vivian had seen this very cross in her previous life.

Back then, Celine flaunted the reticule before Vivian, boasting that although Vivian held the title of first wife, it was she, Celine, who gave birth to the first son and the one Charles truly cared about.

And the so–called proof was this faded cross itself, upon which a single line had been written: [My beloved Cece, may you always be happy and healthy.]

Celine said with pride that her nickname was Cece, a name Charles had personally given her. She also claimed that their son would one day inherit everything that belonged to the Linden family.

Back then, Vivian had already picked up on Charles’s feelings for Celia, but she never confronted him about it.

She couldn’t help but feel sorry for Celine, who was just a substitute, yet she let herself believe his lies so completely that she even gave up her own name.

No one could say for sure whether, when Charles called Celine “Cece,” he was truly thinking of her or of Celia, who’d already fallen for Xavier.

Vivian walked over to Beatrice and Flora, holding out the cross. “Please take a look.”

Beatrice took the cross and glanced at it, her face darkening in an instant.

Flora also saw the line of tiny script.

Sylvia, standing nearby, was sweating bullets. She desperately wanted to know what was wrong with the cross, yet she didn’t

dare ask.

Unlike her, Quentin was much blunter. Quentin strode over to Beatrice, picked up the cross, and studied it closely.

After a moment, his face turned even darker than Beatrice’s.

“How dare you?” Quentin roared. He kicked Charles in the face, as if he wanted to end him right then and there.

He thought, ‘My daughter is noble, stunning, and famous throughout Aurestus, with a future most people could only dream of. Someone like Charles is way out of her league.

At first, Quentin thought Celine was just a coincidence, but after seeing the cross, he immediately understood what Charles

en thinking.

had

Quentin thought, ‘He just thought he didn’t deserve Celia, so he had chosen a shadow of her instead, using the girl as a hollow comfort, but he should never call her Cece.

Chapter 60

If this ever got out, Celia’s name would be dragged through the mud, and her future would be completely destroyed‘

Just imagining it made Quentin angry. Unable to contain his rage, he lashed out with another vicious kick.

Charles was coughing up blood from Quentin’s kicks, looking absolutely miserable, which scared Sylvia out of her mind.

Her composure shattered. She didn’t care about rules anymore and threw herself in front of Charles, crying as she begged, “Your Grace, Charles may have done wrong, but he doesn’t deserve to die for it. Are you going to beat him to death?”

“Move. Your nephew is rotten to the core,” Quentin snapped. He tried to shake Sylvia off, but she wrapped herself around his leg, refusing to let go.

Even though Sylvia was just a concubine, she’d spent all these years living in luxury, enjoying every bit of comfort and respect in Aurea Manor.

This was the first time anyone had seen her this desperate and disheveled.

“Your Grace, Charles is still young. Please, give him another chance. He’ll learn. He won’t mess up again,” Sylvia begged, her voice shaking with desperation.

Flora cut her off with a wave of her hand. “Sylvia, there’s something I don’t understand.”

Sylvia stopped crying and stared at Flora, dazed.

Flora said, “Back when Vivian was slandered and accused of having an affair with Charles, not once did you speak up for her, but now, when His Grace is punishing Charles, you keep jumping in to shield him.

“Is it simply because Charles is a male heir that you are so blatantly biased?”

Sylvia shook her head frantically, tears pouring down nonstop, making her look heartbreakingly pitiful.

However, Flora knew just how cruel she truly was.

Sylvia was a woman who could use her own daughter as a bargaining chip for wealth and status.