The Billionaire Ex-Wife and the Beggar He Became novel Chapter 359

In her trembling hand, Helga held a dozen yellowed photographs. Her voice, choked with emotion, could barely form a complete sentence. "I wanted to show you… these old photos… so you would know… you would know I had proof. But I… I never had the chance…"

Helga sobbed, her heart breaking with a lifetime of injustice.

Winona and Mia's eyes reddened with tears.

"For so many years, I collected scrap at your doorstep, wandering around your house, just hoping that you, you old fool, would see that I had proof all along. I knew this proof wouldn't put you in jail, so I waited for another chance to get my revenge!"

Looking at the old photographs in Helga's hand, Old Mr. Shepherd and Old Mrs. Shepherd crumpled to the floor, too ashamed to even lift their heads.

The photos were faded and yellowed with age, but anyone could see that one of the well-dressed young women in her twenties was Old Mrs. Shepherd, and the other, a thin, plainly dressed woman tending to a stove, was a young Helga.

"You old fool!" Helga looked at Old Mr. Shepherd with cold, sad eyes. "You were never in Perkins Creek, so you didn't know what was happening in the village! All you knew was that you went there to escape the troubles of the time. But you didn't know that a photographer was also hiding out in Perkins Creek. He stayed there for several years."

"In those three years, he photographed every scene he could in the village. And when a fashionable, well-dressed woman from the city showed up, he naturally captured every moment."

"In those six months, this old mistress, this shameless, vile creature, came to Perkins Creek to spy on me four or five times. And because she was so well-dressed, the photographer captured her on camera every time."

"The photographer thought she was a relative of mine, too afraid to come home because of the political climate, so he gave me the photos."

"I was too far along to have an abortion; it had to be an induced labor. But I was so thin, and so distressed by what you had done, that I hemorrhaged. It left me unable to ever have children again. In those days, who would marry a barren woman?"

"You old parasite, you coward! My family saved you! I know a college graduate like you looked down on me, but if you looked down on me, why did you insist on marrying me? You already had this old mistress on the side, so why did you make me serve your father, your mother, your sister?"

"My family saved your life, and in return, you used me up, wrung me dry, and then destroyed my ability to ever have children. What did I ever do to you? Did I desecrate your ancestors' graves that you would harm me so?"

"And you! You old whore!" For the first time in her life, Helga raised her hand and slapped Old Mrs. Shepherd across the face. "You go on about being an old married couple! About being a college graduate from the old days! Is this what college-educated women do? Steal other people's husbands?"