Too Late She Already Married Mr. Right (Sophia) novel Chapter 157

She’d never forget those nights when she was too afraid to go home after getting beaten by her adoptive father–Sierra would always find her, take her in, and let her spend the night in a warm bed.

Derek felt so sorry for her that he even thought about adopting her, but her adoptive parents always made things tough for him, throwing up roadblocks whenever he tried to help.

No matter how ugly things got between the adults, they never let her get caught in the crossfire.

The Smith family was probably one of the few who ever showed her any real warmth when she was young.

Annabelle reached out and put an arm around her shoulders, leaning her head gently against Sophia’s. “Sophie, if my parents and I had moved here back then, we probably would’ve met a lot sooner.”

Sophia smiled gently. “It’s never too late.”

Sierra came out of the house, clutching a loudly squawking rooster. Sophia stood up and walked over, ready to help.

“Let me give you a hand, Sierra,” Sophia offered.

“No, no, you’ll get blood all over your nice clothes. Just relax with Annabelle,” Sierra quickly waved her off.

Sophia realized Sierra was about to kill the chicken and didn’t want her getting splattered with blood.

Sophia stood off to the side, watching as Sierra made a swift motion with the knife. Blood spurted from the rooster’s neck, and it slowly stopped struggling.

Sierra caught the blood in a bowl, and once the blood stopped flowing, she carried the rooster off to pluck its feathers.

Watching Sierra’s swift and practiced hands, Annabelle shivered, feeling a cold tingle at her own neck.

“Sierra is a real expert at this,” Annabelle said.

Sophia laughed. “Out here in the countryside, we always butcher our own chickens and ducks. If you’re not quick and clean about it, the poor animals just end up suffering more.”

Sophia remembered the first time she tried to kill a duck as a kid. Even after its head was twisted and it was completely bald, it somehow managed to leap right out of the bucket and dash around the yard.

Annabelle listened to her story, picturing the scene in her mind–it was both hilarious and kind of brutal.

Sierra showed up with a bucket of boiling water, tossed the rooster in to loosen the feathers, then yanked it out a minute later. She waited until the water cooled down a bit, then dunked the chicken in again.

As she plucked the feathers, she glanced over at the two girls. “Sophie, have you gone back to see your adoptive parents yet?”

“Not yet. I came to Ginkgo Town for something else,” Sophia replied.

Sierra nodded. “After the way they treated you back then, I can totally understand why you wouldn’t want to see them. But what brings you to Ginkgo Town?”

“I came to pay my respects to my teacher and his wife, and, actually, I wanted to ask you something else, too,” Sophia said.

Sierra looked confused. “What do you want to know?”

“Do you remember Charles Evans and his family?” Sophia asked.

Sierra thought for a while before it clicked. “Oh, you mean your birth father? Sure, I remember him! But back then, he wasn’t called Charles–everyone around here knew him as ‘Brant“.”

Charles and Sierra were from the same generation, so even after all these years, she still remembered plenty about him.

Annabelle muttered under her breath, “Brant? More like a brat.”

“Yeah, Sierra,” Sophia replied.

“He was always up to no good, stealing things and causing trouble. But his older brother was a genuinely decent person–five years older, and he went out to work early just to help pay for Brant’s schooling,” Sierra said.

Sophia and Annabelle exchanged a look.

“Charles actually had an older brother?” Sophia asked, surprised.

Sierra said, “That’s right, the Evans family had two sons. The elder one was upright and kind–hearted. When famine struck and the family was barely surviving, he went off to the city for work.

“Word was he started out as a laborer, eventually made it as a contractor, earned a tidy sum, and even snagged himself a girlfriend.

“Later on, the whole Evans family moved to the city and never came back. It wasn’t until more than twenty years ago that Brant returned with his brother’s ashes and scattered them in the river just outside the town.”

Sophia was floored. ‘Charles had an older brother? No way…‘

“But why can’t we find any record of his brother in the official registry?” Sophia asked, completely baffled.