Reborn With a Money-Making System: Ruined Actress to Nation's Treasure-Chapter 156: Arguing Like Cats

"Helcia, do you realize you just did something extremely stupid?!"

As soon as I stepped out of the courtroom with my husband, Madeline suddenly blocked my path and dragged me to the side. She looked furious, so furious that I swore I could almost see flames shooting out of her eyes.

To answer her, I simply shrugged. "What stupid thing?" I said casually. "Sending your mother to prison? She deserved it."

Madeline’s face filled in anger. She suddenly reached out, grabbed a chunk of my hair, and yanked me toward her. "Do you even realize that having a criminal in the family will ruin our image in the entertainment industry?!"

I narrowed my eyes, shocked that she was more worried about her reputation than her mother’s life falling apart.

Oh, poor Addison.

Her husband threw her away so easily, and her precious daughter didn’t even care about her well-being. Instead, she only cared about her own reputation.

"’Our’ image?" I raised an eyebrow. "Why would my image be ruined too? I’m the victim here."

Madeline opened her mouth, but before she could speak, Lando suddenly stood up from his wheelchair and grabbed her wrist.

"Madeline, take your hands off my wife," he warned, his voice surprisingly sharp. "Or you’ll face consequences you won’t like."

Madeline’s eyes widened. She stared at Lando from head to toe. "You can walk?! What the hell... were you just pretending to be crippled?!"

The moment the last word left her mouth, I grabbed a handful of her hair. "Crippled, my ass! Is your English really stuck at kindergarten level? Is that why you’re using that pathetic word?!"

Our mini–hair war immediately caught the attention of everyone around us. Within seconds, two security guards rushed over, frowning as they saw us literally pulling each other’s hair like angry cats.

"Hey! Don’t fight here!" one guard scolded. "There are more hearings after this. Don’t make a scene."

The guards tried to move closer, but Lando blocked their way. "It’s alright. We’re not going to take this any further."

He forcibly removed Madeline’s hand from my hair and gently pulled me behind him. Then he straightened his back. "The only reason Mrs. Davenport is in prison," Lando said coldly, "is because she’s finally paying for what she did to my wife."

"The same thing will happen to you if you don’t behave yourself," Lando warned her. "Your position is already very bad right now, so don’t act carelessly before you end up regretting it."

Madeline gritted her teeth, her eyes shaking with rage as she glared at us. "You losers... if it weren’t for your stepmothers’ mercy, both of you would’ve been dumped at an orphanage from the beginning!"

I took one step forward and chuckled. "Honestly? I’d rather grow up in an orphanage than under your family’s ’care.’"

I mean, what’s so bad about an orphanage? I grew up in an orphanage, and even though sometimes I got punished for being too noisy, at least they still made sure I had a warm meal and a warm blanket at night.

Meanwhile, Helcia, who lived in the Davenport household, was only allowed to eat leftovers. And if the heater in her room broke, neither Gideon nor Addison would send anyone to fix it for her.

In the end, during winter, Helcia ended up sleeping in the living room more often than in her own bedroom. She also had to wake up earlier than anyone else in the house because if they caught her sleeping there, they would kick her and yell at her for "dirtying" the couch.

That poor girl. I truly hope she’s sleeping on the softest cushions and using the warmest blanket in heaven.

Since the security guards kept glancing at us, I decided to give the final blow. "Don’t act so high and mighty, Madeline. You never know when someone might pull your feet down to the ground."

In other words: if she didn’t shut up, I would release every bullying video she ever made toward Helcia.

Well, I didn’t want to keep them forever in my pocket. I only saved them because I didn’t want my debut series to start with a messy family scandal.

Without waiting for Madeline’s comeback, I guided my husband back into his wheelchair and walked away before the guards tried to disperse us again.

When I glanced back, Madeline stomped her feet like a toddler throwing a tantrum and looked seconds away from throwing her phone at me.

But she probably knew that doing something like that would only make her situation worse.

"Husband, you should stop walking without your crutches," I warned him as I pushed his wheelchair. "I don’t want you hurting your legs."

Lando looked up to see my face. "It’s not like I was running a marathon. I just took a few steps. Besides... my legs have actually been getting better lately, so you don’t have to worry too much."

I stopped walking for a moment and clapped my hands happily. "Really? Your legs are getting better? Does that mean you might walk normally someday?"

Lando nodded hesitantly before looking away. "Probably." He added, "But maybe I won’t let my family know about that."

Yeah, that was probably for the best. His family would definitely try to force him back into the wheelchair if they knew he could walk fine without any support.

"Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me," I said with a wide grin.

I pushed his wheelchair again, this time faster, because I still needed to go to Green Leaf’s office for the script reading.

If I didn’t have any schedule today, I would definitely take Lando to a nice restaurant to celebrate my victory.

"What time will you be home?" he asked once we got into the car.

I thought for a moment before saying, "I’m not sure... maybe around 6 or 7 p.m. This is our last script reading, after all." I asked, "Why?"

"Send me a message when you get home," Lando said. "I’ll come pick you up."

===

I walked into the Green Leaf building with a great mood, already excited about seeing my husband again tonight.

But... the moment I stepped into the script reading room, my mood instantly soured. Why? Because I saw the face of the one person I never wanted to see in this world—Kai Brixton.

He had arrived earlier than me and was sitting right next to the producer, Eric. Actually, it seemed like everyone else had already arrived before I got there, since I was about fifteen minutes late.

"Helcia, you’re late." Kai was the first one to talk to me. He smiled, but like I’ve said before, I really hated that creepy smile of his. "I heard from Eric that you were in court today. Was it a divorce hearing?"

Oh, this bastard. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

There are so many reasons a person might go to court, but of course, that was the first thing he thought of. Even without him saying it directly, I knew he would be thrilled if his brother’s marriage fell apart.

"No, I’m still your sister-in-law, and probably will be until the day I see your body in a coffin," I said with a light laugh. "Don’t take it too seriously, I’m joking." Then I quickly added a little lie, "It was just a small, meaningless hearing. I accidentally parked my car where I shouldn’t have."

Kai narrowed his eyes a little. Clearly, he already knew the real reason I went to court was to send my mother to jail.

Well, I expected that. I was sure this news would spread sooner or later.

But as long as it hasn’t spread yet, I absolutely won’t be the one to say it out loud.

"You should be careful with that," Kai warned me in a soft voice. "Maybe it seems trivial now, but once you become famous, the media will use even your smallest mistakes as a weapon. Your husband should’ve taught you that."

I frowned slightly, and I noticed some other people doing the same. Maybe it was because the way he said it sounded like he was looking down on me, and... honestly, it even felt a little misogynistic.

Eric finally tried to smooth things over by pretending to cough. "Alright, since Helcia is here, we can start our script reading for today."

Everyone shuffled their papers and adjusted their seats. The room quickly became quiet, but I could still feel Kai’s eyes on me from time to time, like a fly buzzing around my head.

"Mr. Brixton is here to supervise our work," Eric began. "Don’t be nervous, he didn’t come here to comment on your acting."

But honestly, why would the president of Brix Entertainment supervise a small drama like this? He should be supervising big projects, not a simple high school romance drama!

I glanced at Kai from the corner of my eye. He sat there with perfect posture, arms crossed, looking like he was doing something incredibly important... when in reality, he was supervising teenagers falling in love on screen.

What a waste of a CEO’s time.

Eric clapped his hands lightly. "Alright, let’s start with scene three."