Chapter 1

My daughter died, and her death was tragic. The last phone call came on the tenth day. I was busy with a project at the company, completely overwhelmed. I was waiting for the bonus to be released so I could take the whole family for a trip. I still remember her voice on the phone, soft like a kitten's meow. "Mom, I scored a hundred percent, top of my class. Can you come home early?" Though it was a moment of joy, there was a tinge of grievance in her voice.

However, my husband Charles's angry words snapped me to attention. "You have the nerve to take credit for this? Weren't you just seventh in the class last time? How did you jump to the first? You must have cheated on the test! How will you manage when you grow up with such vanity? I don't want a lying daughter like you!" Emily frantically tried to explain, "I've been working hard and studying all the time after class..." But before she could finish, Charles hung up the phone with a slap.

My expression darkened instantly. My daughter was not lying. I had once promised her that if she ranked first, I would take her to the north to see the snow. She had been waiting for a long time. As I hurried to finish my work and rush home, it wasn't my daughter's lovely smiling face that I was greeted with. Instead, I was summoned to the hospital's morgue. Inside the cold morgue, my legs gave way, and I felt as though all strength was drained from my body.

This morning, before parting, Emily had her hair in a ponytail, bouncing around waiting for me to return. Now, her body lay indistinguishably mangled, quietly resting, the extent of her suffering before death unknown. Time seemed to pause as I stared wide-eyed, clutching her cold little hand, only to feel hot tears streaming down my cheeks, each drop heavily hitting the floor.

Seeing the doctor cover my daughter with a white sheet, I staggered against the wall outside, disoriented. After a while, I regained some composure. Shaking, I pulled out my phone to call Charles. About half an hour later, he finally answered.

Amidst a loud background noise, Charles barked, "Did you deal with Emily? Did she complain to you again? Without discipline, she'd get too arrogant, always bullying Michelle because she's a few months older. She really needed a lesson!"

Michelle was a schoolmate one year junior to Emily and also the daughter of Charles's first love, Faith MacDonald. Not long after graduating from high school, Faith had married and moved far away. It had seemed that their paths would never cross again, yet by sheer chance at the train station, she hailed Charles's taxi. Subsequently, she found various pretexts for Charles to drive Michelle to dance classes and to take weekend road trips to various tourist spots.

I tried to intervene but was silenced with a retort, "This is my job. If you treat every client as an enemy, how will I make a living? Petty women don't live long. You should be careful!"

Every weekend, Emily, burdened with a heavy backpack, traveled alone for over two hours on the subway to and from her tutoring classes. I urged him to pay more attention to our daughter, but he retorted angrily, "Emily isn't a delicate princess. Why pamper her? Kids need to toughen up to become sensible."

Charles always believed in teaching his daughter the value of hardship, yet he excessively doted on his first love's daughter, rushing her to the hospital for even minor injuries, fearful that any delay might leave her with a scar.

But now, with his daughter barely cold in the morgue, he continued to frolic with Faith and her daughter, as close as if they were his own family. In a hoarse voice filled with fury, I roared over the phone, "I don't care where you are. Come back immediately. Why did you abandon Emily on the highway midway?"

"Don't you realize she's always been insecure, sensitive, and afraid of being abandoned?"

"Do you think the whole world should revolve around you, Heather? Isn't our daughter the one who keeps threatening to end her life? Well, tell her. If she's so determined, then go jump off a building now! Does she have the guts? If she dies, it saves me years of trouble raising a child!"