Vera Xavier nodded. Zachary Preston thought for a moment and said, "Rona, tomorrow, go and return the betrothal gifts from the Kane family..."
Rona Langdon immediately flew into a rage, cutting him off. "Absolutely not!"
She had always been stingy. Once something was in her hands, trying to get it back was like asking for her life!
Zachary Preston slammed his palm on the table. "And why not? Even if Vera didn't grow up with us, she's still our daughter! She doesn't want to get married, so are you planning to force her?!"
It was the first time Zachary Preston had ever gotten this angry. Rona Langdon's arrogance deflated somewhat, but she still argued, "She's the one who agreed to the marriage in the first place, and now she's backing out. Marriage is a serious matter! It's not something she can just decide to do or not do on a whim!"
"I never said I wanted to get married," Vera Xavier piped up meekly from the side.
Rona Langdon immediately started yelling, "What do you mean, you never said you wanted to get married? You little brat, you dare to lie..."
Her tirade lost some of its conviction as she said this. It seemed Vera Xavier really *hadn't* ever said she wanted to get married. Rona had orchestrated the whole thing herself without ever actually asking for Vera's opinion.
She was puzzled. 'Vera Xavier used to be such a pushover, someone I could mold however I wanted. How did she get so bold all of a sudden? Could her previous meekness have all been an act?'
Seeing the situation turning, Cara Preston immediately chimed in to support her mother. "Sister, you may not have said you *wanted* to get married, but all this time Mom was planning the wedding, you never said you *didn't* want to get married either!"
'She couldn't wait for Vera Xavier to get married off and leave. Then, she would be the sole young lady of the Preston family again. She hated the very sight of Vera Xavier!'
With tears welling in her eyes, Vera Xavier looked at Zachary Preston and said, "Dad, Mom is always like this whenever I try to talk to her. I'm afraid she'll hit me!"
Because she was afraid of being hit, she didn't dare to express her true feelings. That was why she had never voiced her unwillingness to marry Wesley Kane.
'She knew clearly that in the Preston family, Zachary Preston was the only one who was truly good to her.'
Rona Langdon had hidden the fact that the children were swapped from Zachary Preston back then, so he had no idea that Vera Xavier was not his biological daughter.
Seeing Vera Xavier's pitiful, cowering posture and then Rona Langdon's ferocious expression, Zachary Preston frowned. "Rona, no matter what, Vera is our daughter."
Fury erupted in Rona Langdon's eyes. "I wish I'd never given birth to her! I'm not calling off the marriage with the Kane family. She's going over to their house tomorrow, and I never want to see her again!"
With that, she stormed upstairs.
Cara Preston said, "Dad, I'll go try to calm Mom down!" and followed her upstairs.
Vera Xavier blinked. 'Cara probably isn't going upstairs to calm Rona Langdon down at all,' she thought. 'She's going up there to add fuel to the fire.'
She said softly, "Dad, please give me one more chance. I'll study hard and stop causing trouble. When you get older, I promise I'll take good care of you."
These weren't just words to appease Zachary Preston; she meant them from the bottom of her heart.
In both her past life and this one, Zachary Preston had always been good to her. In her past life, he had stood up for her several times at critical moments. But, instigated by Cara Preston, she had always felt that Zachary Preston treated her poorly, so their father-daughter relationship had been merely lukewarm.
In her previous life, she had done things that disappointed Zachary Preston, and by the time she died, the two of them had already drifted far apart.