Araceli POV
I glanced at Raphael.
He looked at my daughter with mixed emotions in his eyes.
I frowned slightly.
He turned around, put his hands in the pockets of his pants, and walked out the door.
Essel ran to me. I stopped and looked down at her.
She gently took Valeria's small hand and gently asked, "Valeria, can I be friends with you? I'll help you with your wound, okay?"
Valeria froze for a moment and withdrew her hand.
I looked at Valeria and said patiently, "Valeria, Essel is a sweet little girl just like you, and she has eyes as beautiful as yours. You two are going to be great friends. Baby, will you let Essel be your friend?"
Valeria hesitated and nodded her head.
I was a little shocked. Valeria could hear me, but she rarely responded to me.
I suppressed my inner ecstasy and said to Essel, "Let's go."
Essel turned her head to look at Raphael, who didn't say anything, so she took my hand and went inside with me.
Raphael lit a cigarette. The smoke enveloped his face, so I couldn't see his expression.
The guests left. Now, the villa was quiet.
I gave Valeria a bath. Her body had no injuries except for mud.
Essel was blow-drying Valeria's hair.
I saw a cut on Essel's hand and asked her, "Essel, did you hurt your hand? Why didn't you tell me? Come with me. We need to disinfect your wound first."
I took Essel's hand and walked toward my room.
Essel shook her head. "No, Ms. Chancey. I'm good. Valeria's hair is not dry yet. I'll blow dry her hair first."
Essel was very considerate. She may look reckless, but she was actually careful and considerate.
Raphael stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame, watching us.
I stared at him warily, but Valeria suddenly got up, ran over, and wrapped her arms around his thighs.
"Hug."
She looked up at Raphael.
His eyes softened a lot, and he leaned down to pick up Valeria.
I even saw him smile.
Suddenly, I remembered something.
Where did Krish go?
What was that thing he just put in his pocket?
I frowned slightly.
I pulled out my phone and saw that the trending topics were all about Silver Fang and Eclipse.
"Eclipse's Araceli Chancey is back!"
"Is Araceli dead or not? What's the truth?"
"The scandals of one of the top 10 richest families in New York, Eclipse."
"Who owns 30% of Eclipse Group's shares, 'Araceli Chancey' or 'Melany Chancey'?"
...
I stared at the posts and smiled.
People on the Internet started posting boycotts of Eclipse Group, and Eclipse's stock price dropped a lot.
I looked up and saw my father, Zackary Chancey, on the TV, giving a press conference.
He was so quick to react.
Zackary looked haggard. However, I was most shocked that his PR team decided to hold a press conference so quickly to clarify the matter. Could he have actually prepared for this?
He coughed a little and said into the microphone, "Araceli is my eldest daughter. Five years ago, she made a big mistake and greatly damaged the reputation of our family. I grounded her to get her to think this through, but I didn't expect her to light a fire and try to burn everyone at Eclipse. Many of us were injured in the fire. To save her, I rushed into the fire and nearly got burned to death. But that's all behind us now.
"Now, Araceli is back. We at Eclipse don't know anything. If I had known Araceli was alive, I would have thrown an even bigger welcome party for her.
"Araceli, come back. There were some misunderstandings between us, but we are family after all. I'm your father, so how could I possibly hurt you? I hereby announce that 30% of Eclipse Group's shares still belong to Araceli. When she comes back, I will transfer the shares to her name."
At once, the netizens began to discuss it wildly again.
I opened the comment section and saw that everyone was touched by Zackary's words. They said that Zackary was a wonderful father and I was a crazy and spoiled girl.
I sneered, staring at the TV, not saying anything.
Zackary was shameless.
I took out my cell phone.
Melany must not have known that I had secretly recorded everything that happened at that time on Creaty from the moment she met with me.
Creaty was an artificial intelligence app, so I didn't need to do anything, and it could automatically connect to nearby security cameras when I was in danger.
This feature was very powerful, but also very dangerous. In fact, I hadn't perfected it yet and was just trying it out. What I didn't expect was that Melany would actually bring people to kill me.
I sneered. This just came in handy.
I walked to the bedroom and saw Krish sitting in front of the computer. His fingers were tapping away at the keyboard.
"Krish, can you find Creaty's stored video data from yesterday?"
Krish nodded, and his fingers tapped on the keyboard. Soon, a video was downloaded by him.
He clicked on the video. As the video began to play, his eyes immediately widened.
He frowned and clenched his fists after seeing me surrounded by a group of people.
"Krish, it's okay." I hugged him. "I'm fine. You don't have to worry about me."
"Mom, you need to be more careful from now on."
I knew Krish had taken on more responsibility than other children growing up. He was worried about me because he didn't want to lose me.
I patted him gently on the back and said, "I will. I promise you."
Krish nodded and gently took my hand.
He uploaded the video to my phone.
I sneered. Since Zachary shamelessly said those words, I would use this recording to show everyone how hypocritical he was!