I remained silent. It was a habit I’d developed in prison—silence was safer than words. Seeing my lack of reaction, his anger faltered, as though he didn’t know where else to direct it.
An awkward tension filled the air, broken only by the loud growling of my stomach. It betrayed me, exposing the fact that I hadn’t eaten anything since my release.
Mrs. Bolton’s eyes flashed with disdain as she spoke, her words thinly veiled in mockery. “Amelia, we assumed you’d eaten outside since you were gone so long. We didn’t save you a plate. There are some leftovers in the kitchen. Why don’t you make do with those?”
Moments later, the nanny brought out a bowl of cold rice and a dish that looked like a haphazard mix of scraps. She placed it on the table with an indifferent expression, as though feeding a stray dog.
I stared at the rice for a moment, my chest tightening. It had been so long since I’d seen clean, untouched white rice. In prison, rice wasn’t food—it was a weapon of humiliation, spat on or thrown to the floor for me to scavenge. Eating slowly meant eating nothing at all.
Driven by hunger, I sat at the table and began eating ravenously, shoveling food into my mouth as though it might vanish at any second.
“Look at yourself, Amelia,” Gilbert sneered, his tone laced with contempt. “Do you even remember what it means to be a lady?”
I paused briefly, my hand trembling. The words stung, but I swallowed them down along with the rice. The truth was clear, I wasn’t a lady anymore. I wasn’t the noble daughter of the Byrd family. I wasn’t anything but the murderer everyone believed me to be.
Nobility couldn’t fill an empty stomach. I didn’t need their approval—I just needed to survive, to live for my father.
I ate until my stomach felt like it would burst. The pain was unbearable, and I clutched my midsection, rushing to the bathroom. Moments later, I was hunched over the sink, retching violently.
“So disgusting.” Irene wrinkled her nose as she glanced at the mess I had just vomited. Her tone was sharp, her expression filled with disdain.
She had never endured the darkness of prison, never known the depths of hunger or the value of survival. She couldn’t possibly understand how precious life was to me now. Every breath, every moment, was something I’d clawed my way back for.
The life she so effortlessly enjoyed now—the comfort, the warmth, the love—it should have been mine.