The Tyrannical Wolf King's Contract Bride-Chapter 11: The Adopted Daughter’s Youthful Worries
Lila’s POV
"Forget it... Jasper, let’s go home." I took the hand Jasper offered me. His palm was searing hot, a steady anchor for my crumbling world.
We turned and left. No one dared to stop us.
Once we were out of the banquet hall, the night wind hit me, and I realized I was trembling all over. Jasper didn’t say a word. He just bundled me into the car and ordered the driver, "Back to Moon Hidden Villa. And step on it."
It was silent inside the car.
I kept my head down, staring at the hem of my dress on my knees as tears fell one after another, impossible to stop.
He didn’t speak. He just pulled out a handkerchief—dark gray, matching the shawl he’d given me—and gently pressed it to my face to wipe my tears.
"Don’t cry." His voice was terribly hoarse. "You deserve to be treated better."
I choked out, "Why did you come? Didn’t you say you had a meeting with the Elder Council tonight?"
"Compared to the elders," he paused, his fingers gently brushing a stray strand of hair from my cheek, "your tears are more important."
My head snapped up to look at him.
His gaze was impossibly deep, churning with emotions I couldn’t decipher, but there was no pity among them.
My breath caught in my throat.
Outside the window, the city lights blurred and receded.
Back at Moon Hidden Villa, the butler immediately came to greet us. His expression changed drastically when he saw my swollen face. Jasper commanded in a low voice, "Get an ice pack. And some soothing ointment."
He applied the ice pack to my face himself, his touch as light as a feather.
"Does it hurt?" he asked.
I shook my head and suddenly grabbed his wrist. "Jasper... thank you for coming."
He was silent for a few seconds before suddenly asking, "And if I hadn’t come? What would you have done?"
I lowered my head. "I don’t know. Maybe... I would have thought I deserved it. After all, I’ve never been anyone’s first choice."
"Lila." He cupped my face, forcing me to look him in the eye. "Why do you still care so much about Caleb?"
I didn’t want to explain. Or rather, I couldn’t find the words to dissect memories that were already etched into my very bones. They belonged only to that ten-year-old girl, covered in wounds.
So, I closed my eyes and let my thoughts sink into that gray, deep sea.
—
「That year, winter came especially early.」
After my parents were gone, everything at home changed. The familiar furniture was hauled away, the landscapes my mother had painted were taken off the walls, and even the teddy bear that had been by my bedside for five years disappeared. My uncle stood in the middle of the living room, a cigarette dangling from his lips, sizing me up as if I were trash. "Little girl, stop crying. It’s useless. Your parents left a mountain of debt, and the bank is about to repossess this house. As for me, I’ve been kind enough to find a place for you to go."
That "place" was Saint Mary’s Welfare Institute on the east side of the city.
The institute’s iron gates were covered in rust, groaning shrilly when pushed open. The yard was barren, with only a few sallow, emaciated children squatting on the ground, playing with pebbles. The air was thick with a nauseating mixture of disinfectant and mildew.
I was assigned to an eight-person dorm. The beds were bunk beds, and the bedding was thin, hard, and reeked of dampness. No one welcomed me. No one paid me any mind. I was just the new, silent "outsider" who could be bullied at any time.
For the first few days, they only stole my food. The congee in the cafeteria was already so watery you could see your reflection in it, yet they would still scoop out more than half from my bowl. I didn’t dare fight back. I could only huddle in a corner, swallowing the remaining broth in tiny sips.
Later, they started tearing up my notebooks. That was the only thing I could hold onto that connected me to my old, normal life. On the pages, I drew my mother’s face, the flowers on our balcony, the time my father drove me to the seaside. But they tore all those pages to shreds, threw them in the muddy water, and stomped them to a pulp.
"An unwanted little bastard thinks she’s worthy of drawing?" The leader, a boy named Tommy who was three years older than me, had a scar on his face and a particularly menacing grin.
That afternoon, I hid a piece of chocolate a nun had secretly slipped me. It was the first sweet thing I had tasted in a week. I wrapped it in a handkerchief and tucked it under my pillow, planning to eat it that night. But Tommy found it anyway.
They dragged me behind the abandoned boiler room in the backyard. The area was piled high with rusty pipes and coal slag—dank, cold, and the most secluded corner of the institute. Tommy grabbed a handful of my hair and forced my head up. "Hand it over! Or I’ll throw you into the boiler!"
I bit my lip hard and shook my head. That piece of chocolate was my last connection to my old world.
"Fine, have it your way!" He shoved me hard.
The back of my head slammed hard against a protruding iron pipe. My vision went black as a warm liquid trickled down my neck. The taste of blood filled my mouth. I collapsed to the ground, my ears ringing, able to hear nothing but their triumphant, mocking laughter.
"Look, she’s bleeding! How pathetic!"
"Serves her right! Who told her to act so innocent!"
"Hit her! Beat her until she cries!"
Fists and feet rained down on me. I curled into a ball, shielding my head with my arms as tears mixed with blood and soaked into my collar. In that moment, I truly thought I was going to die. Die in this unknown corner, like a speck of dust, silent and unnoticed.
Just as my consciousness began to fade, the sound of hurried footsteps grew closer.
"Stop!"
A boy’s clear voice, laced with anger, cut through the chaos.
I managed to pry open one swollen eye. Through my blurred vision, I saw a boy in a private school uniform burst in. He wasn’t particularly tall, but he moved with incredible speed, like an enraged wolf cub, lunging straight at Tommy and knocking him to the ground.
It was Caleb.
I later learned that Mr. and Mrs. Goodrich had already finalized the adoption papers and had come to pick me up that day. But they had gone to see the director first, and Caleb, too impatient to wait, had run all over the grounds looking for me.
When he fought, he was like a completely different person. He didn’t waste time with words; he just shielded me with his body, facing down a group of kids bigger than him with a look in his eyes so fierce it was like he wanted to eat them alive. He took a few punches, his lip was split, and his school uniform was torn, but he didn’t retreat a single step.
The chaos only ended when one of the institute’s teachers heard the commotion and rushed over.
After the crowd dispersed, he immediately turned and knelt in front of me. He was breathing hard, his forehead covered in sweat, but the look he gave me was incredibly gentle. He took out a neatly folded handkerchief—dark blue, with a small "C.G." embroidered on the bottom right corner—and carefully wiped the blood from my mouth and forehead.
His movements were light, as if he were afraid of hurting me. After he finished, he cupped my face and said earnestly, "Don’t be afraid. From now on, I’ll be your older brother. I’ll always protect you."
In that moment, the light in his eyes illuminated my entire dark world.
From that day on, he truly became my guardian angel.
He waited for me at the school gate every morning and was always there on time after school let out. He chased away the classmates who mocked me for being a "foster girl" and patiently taught me the math problems I couldn’t understand.
On rainy days, he would tilt the entire umbrella toward me, letting his own shoulder get soaked. On nights when I woke up from a nightmare, all I had to do was softly call out, "Caleb," and he would instantly appear outside my door, saying through it, "I’m here, Lila. Go back to sleep."
And now, I’m just "someone else" to Caleb.
I opened my eyes, realizing that at some point, my face had become soaked with tears. The sting from the slap on my cheek was still a dull ache, but the old wound in my heart hurt with a much sharper clarity.
Through my blurry, tear-filled eyes, I realized that Jasper was kneeling before me.
