"Who are you trying to fool with that classy act? This is more like it. This look actually matches your trashy little soul."
"Do you have any idea what this suit and those jewels you just ruined are worth?"
I looked at the wreckage around me, then calmly took out my phone.
There was a message from Attorney Fox. He was ten minutes away.
That one small move set Maria off. She lunged at me, ripped the phone from my hands, and hurled it into the pool. "Trying to call for backup? Someone gives you an inch and you really start thinking you matter."
The rest of them wore the same mocking expressions.
I lifted my gaze and swept it slowly over every single one of them.
"I already told you that you'd pay ten times over for what you've done. I'm giving you one last chance. Apologize to me and my daughter. Otherwise, in ten minutes, every single person here is going to deeply regret coming to this little gathering."
Finally, I fixed my stare on the teacher who had watched the entire thing without lifting a finger.
"This is exactly how you stood by when my daughter was being tormented at school, isn't it?"
Ursula scoffed.
"Playing the victim? When you were busy destroying someone else's family, did you ever stop to think that Owen is only six years old?"
"Someone like you has no right to point fingers at anyone."
With the teacher leading the charge, the other parents grew bolder, some even clapping in agreement.
"The teacher's already spoken. What are you still doing here, making a scene? Does anyone here actually want their kid in the same school as some illegitimate child?"
"Throw them both out! Let everybody see what happens when you wreck a family!"
Maria toyed with the gemstone necklace she'd just snatched, her tone dripping with arrogance.
"Hear that? It's not just me. Everyone here is disgusted by you. A pair of low-class trash like you and your daughter belong in a basement where no one ever has to see you. You should never even dream of holding your heads up again."
Their words kept getting uglier.
Carly was trembling in my arms.
Even Owen, standing off to the side, had a grin spreading wider and wider across his chubby face.
Ursula saw her opening and hurried over to Maria.