The Second Life of a Discarded Heiress novel Chapter 624

The little girl couldn’t tell if the dried meat tasted good or not—at that moment, all she cared about was filling her empty stomach. She devoured the last piece of sausage, not letting a single morsel go to waste.

With something in her belly at last, she started to feel drowsy. Curling up tightly, she drifted off into a deep, contented sleep.

When dawn broke and the woman of the house came out, she found the string of sausage gone, while Citrine was still fast asleep.

Fuming, the woman stormed off and returned with a bucket of icy water, dumping it straight over the sleeping child.

“Citrine! Get up, you little brat!”

In the freezing winter, the shock of the cold water jolted young Citrine awake, her small body shivering uncontrollably.

Hilda’s gaze suddenly fixed on the soaked, trembling child. Her expression changed in an instant.

Citrine?

This little one was Citrine?

Right then, Hilda could have slapped her former self. How could she not have recognized her own daughter? How could she have ever thought her girl was scheming or unlovable?

Memories of last night’s beating and the bruises on her daughter’s small body filled Hilda with a murderous rage—she wanted nothing more than to tear apart the man who’d struck her, and the woman now standing in front of her.

But she was nothing more than a bystander, a silent witness trapped in her own consciousness, powerless to intervene. All she could do was watch as her daughter was abused for the simple crime of stealing a string of sausage because she was starving.

Hilda’s eyes burned with unshed tears.

The woman raised a thin wooden rod and brought it down hard on Citrine’s back.

“Ungrateful brat! If you ever steal sausage again, I swear I’ll beat you within an inch of your life!”

Hilda’s fury was so intense her whole body ached. She would have killed that cruel woman if she could.

Suddenly, more images flooded her mind, impossible to push away. She was forced to watch them all.

For hours, Hilda’s mind raced through Citrine’s entire life, right up until her twenty-eighth birthday—when, as if someone had pressed pause, everything stopped.