After 12 years, he returns as a millionaire to humiliate his ex-girlfriend, but when he sees his daughters and the dilapidated house, his world crumbles.
Chapter 1: The Return of the Victor
The sleek black Bentley Continental GT glided smoothly along the dusty red dirt road of Jefferson County. Its presence was like a spaceship landing on a desolate planet.
Mark Sterling, 34, CEO of Sterling Real Estate, adjusted his Tom Ford sunglasses. He looked out the window, a half-smile of contempt playing on his lips. Twelve years ago, he had left this godforsaken town on a Greyhound bus with only $50 in his pocket and a broken heart.
Sarah—the woman he loved more than life itself—had thrown his clothes out into the yard one rainy night.
“You’re penniless, Mark. You have no future. I need a man who can provide for me, not some delusional dreamer.”
That statement had fueled his heart for over a decade. It transformed him from a gentle young man into a shark in the business world. He seized numerous projects, leveling slums to build skyscrapers.
And today, he returned to execute the sweetest deal: buying back the land where Sarah lived to build a shopping mall. He would personally deliver the eviction notice to her. He wanted to see the remorse in her eyes when she knew that the poor boy from years ago now held the power of life and death over her home.
The car stopped in front of a dilapidated wooden house, nestled among tall weeds.
The rickety eaves, with peeling paint revealing rotten, gray wood underneath. A few window panes were nailed together to ward off the wind.
Mark got out of the car. His handcrafted Italian leather shoes were instantly stained red with dust. He frowned, brushed off the dust, and climbed the creaky steps.
He knocked on the door. Three distinct knocks.
There was no answer. Mark knocked harder. The flimsy wooden door rattled violently.
“Open the door, Sarah! I know you’re in there! Don’t hide anymore!” Mark shouted, his voice echoing with self-satisfaction.
The door creaked open with a jarring sound.
A woman emerged.
Mark froze.
It was Sarah, but it wasn’t Sarah. The girl with the golden hair and bright eyes in his memory had vanished. Standing before him was a thin, gaunt woman, looking much older than her 34 years. Her hair was hastily tied back, revealing strands of gray. She wore a faded, oversized T-shirt and ripped jeans.
But those eyes… those blue eyes still looked at him, not with regret, but with utter weariness and a hint of fear.
“Mark?” Sarah whispered, her voice hoarse. “What… what are you doing here?”
“Visiting my ex,” Mark sneered, leaning against a dilapidated pillar. “And to inform you of something. My company bought the land from the bank this morning. You’ve been three years late on your land taxes, Sarah.”
He pulled a yellow envelope from his vest pocket.
“An eviction order. You have 30 days. But if you kneel and beg me, I might give you another week to clean up this mess.”
Mark waited. He waited for her to cry. He waited for her to say, “I was wrong, Mark. I regret leaving you.”
But Sarah didn’t look at the eviction order. She stared at the Bentley, then at his expensive suit. A strange, sad smile appeared on her lips.
“You did it, Mark. You really are rich.”
“Yes. Thanks to you,” Mark said sarcastically. “Thanks to you kicking me out, I now know how important money is. So? Where’s the rich man you chose to replace me? Did he leave you living in this pigsty?”
Sarah remained silent. She gripped the door frame tightly.
“There’s no man,” she said softly.
“Oh? So he dumped you? Or is he dead?” Mark laughed loudly. “Karma comes early.”
Suddenly, a loud noise erupted from inside the house. The clanging of metal against metal.
“Mom! Help me!”
A child’s desperate voice rang out.
Sarah’s face changed color. She spun around, forgetting Mark’s presence, and rushed inside.
“Lily! Rose! Mom’s coming right now!”
Mark was stunned. Mom?
Curiosity and jealousy flared up. She had a child? With that man? He wanted to see the faces of the children of the man who had stolen Sarah from him. He wanted to see how pathetic they were.
Mark followed Sarah into the house.
Chapter 2: Darkness in the House
Inside the house was a thousand times worse than outside. There was nothing of value. The floor was bare. The smell of disinfectant, mold, and cheap food mingled together, creating a suffocating atmosphere.
But what stunned Mark wasn’t the poverty.
In the middle of the living room, where there should have been a sofa and television, were two old hospital beds.
And on them lay two little girls.
Twins.
They were about 11 or 12 years old. So thin they were skin and bones. Their heads were bald, their pale skin showing prominent purple veins. Around them were a tangle of wires, connected to old dialysis machines and oxygen tanks that whirred.
One of the two children – Lily – had just knocked over the medicine tray. Sarah was kneeling down, trying to comfort her.
She picked up the scattered pills from the dirty floor.
“It’s okay, honey, Mommy’s here. Don’t cry, you’ll have trouble breathing,” Sarah said, her voice trembling but gentle.
Mark stood frozen in the doorway. His throat tightened.
The other child – Rose – turned to look at him. Big, round, sunken eyes.
Ash-gray eyes.
Mark’s eyes.
Mark’s world crumbled.
He didn’t need a DNA test. He didn’t need to ask. Instinct, blood, and his own reflection in the children’s eyes spoke volumes.
They were his children.
Twelve years. These twins were eleven. The timing perfectly matched.
“Sarah…” Mark exclaimed, his voice breaking.
Sarah turned, standing in front of the two children like a mother hen protecting her chicks from a hawk.
“Get out, Mark,” she said, tears beginning to stream down her smudged cheeks. “You’ve seen what you wanted to see. We’re pathetic. We’re starving. You’ve won. Now get out!”
“Why?” Mark stepped forward, his legs trembling. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you leave me while pregnant with my child?”
Sarah laughed, a bitter laugh like shattering glass.
“Tell you? What for? Twelve years ago you were a college dropout, drowning in debt. You couldn’t even support yourself. If I told you I was pregnant, what would you do? You’d drop out, become a laborer, and we’d both die in this poverty?”
“But you said you loved someone else! You said you needed money!”
“I NEED money!” Sarah screamed. “But not for me! For them!”
She pointed to the two frightened children on the bed.
“They have severe, inherited thalassemia. Doctors discovered it while they were still in the womb. The treatment costs are enormous. Medications, blood transfusions, bone marrow transplants… Millions of dollars!”
Mark recoiled, bumping into the crumbling wall.
“What did you do?” he whispered.
Sarah lowered her head, her shoulders trembling.
“Your father… Richard Sterling.”
His father’s name struck him like a bolt of lightning. Richard, the domineering, wealthy, yet cruel father who had disowned Mark for choosing art over business.
“He came to me right after I found out I was pregnant,” Sarah recounted, tears streaming down her face. “He knew. He made a deal. He would pay all the medical expenses for the two children, on one condition: You had to leave me. You had to make me hate you, so I would have the motivation to return to the business world, to become the worthy heir to the Sterling family.”
“He said, ‘If you love it, let it go. Let it become an eagle. If you keep it with this pregnant belly and this pile of debt and illness, it will just be a rotting factory chicken in a coop.'”
Mark felt his chest being torn apart.
“So… your startup capital… $100,000 from an ‘anonymous investor’…”
“It’s my father,” Sarah nodded. “That’s the price he paid for your departure.”
“And them?” Mark pointed to the two children. “Why are they in this state? My father promised to pay their hospital bills, didn’t he?”
Sarah looked up, her eyes filled with hatred.
“Your father died five years ago, Mark. And as soon as he died, his stepmother cut off the secret trust he set up for the children. She said they were illegitimate, with no rights. For the past five years… I’ve sold everything. I sold my house, my car, worked three jobs at once. But the medication… it’s too expensive. Insurance refused to cover it because it’s a congenital condition.”
She looked around the dilapidated house.
“This house is a mess because I don’t have the money to fix it. Every penny I earn goes into those machines to keep their hearts beating. I tried to contact you, but your secretary blocked all calls. She said you were forbidden from mentioning my name.”
Chapter 3: The Downfall of a Millionaire
Mark collapsed onto the filthy floor. His expensive Tom Ford suit was stained with dust, but he didn’t care.
He had spent twelve years nurturing his hatred. He had built an empire on the bitterness that Sarah had left him for money. He wanted to come back and trample on her, to prove her wrong.
But the truth was, she had sacrificed her life, her honor, and her happiness so he could have what he had today. She single-handedly raised two sick children, enduring extreme poverty to protect his future.
He was a millionaire. He had hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank. He ate dinners that cost as much as a month’s worth of his children’s medication. Meanwhile, his children lay here, gasping for breath in a crumbling house, waiting for a miracle that he himself was about to snatch away.
Lily, the older child, took off her oxygen mask. She looked at Mark with her gray eyes, just like his.
“Who are you?” she asked weakly. “Are you here to evict us?”
Mark’s heart shattered into a thousand pieces. He crawled to the bed and grasped his daughter’s thin, cold hand.
“No,” Mark cried, tears streaming down the worn sheets. “He didn’t kick us out. He… he’s Dad.”
Sarah stood there, sobbing uncontrollably. The wall of strength she had built over the past twelve years had crumbled.
Rose, the other child, smiled weakly. “Mom said Dad is leaving.”
“Dad, you’re working to earn money to buy medicine for us, right?”
Mark nodded frantically, his throat choked with emotion, unable to speak. He looked around the house. At the moldy walls, the empty refrigerator, the woman he loved now worn out like a ghost.
He pulled out his phone. His hands trembled so much he almost dropped it.
He called his assistant.
“Cancel the deportation order. Immediately,” Mark yelled into the phone. “And call a medical helicopter. Deploy the best doctors from Atlanta Children’s Hospital here. Right now!”
“But sir, we’re in a meeting…”
“I said do it now! I don’t care how much it costs! 10 million, 100 million, I’ll pay for it all!” “Just save my child!”
He threw the phone to the floor. He turned to Sarah and hugged her tightly.
“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry, Sarah… I’m the biggest bastard in the world…”
Sarah didn’t push him away. She rested her head on his shoulder, pouring out all the humiliation and burdens of the past years.
Chapter Ending
One year later.
The dilapidated plot of land on the outskirts of Birmingham didn’t have a shopping mall. Instead, a modern children’s hospital called “Lily & Rose Center” was built, providing free treatment for children with terminal illnesses.
In the new, sun-drenched villa, Lily and Rose were running and playing in the garden. Thanks to bone marrow transplants and treatment with the most advanced protocols, their health had miraculously recovered.
Mark sat on the porch, watching his wife and children. He was no longer the arrogant, cold billionaire of the past. He had sold some of his shares and withdrawn from the business world to dedicate all his time to his family.
He understood. That the tallest building he ever constructed was not as great as keeping Sarah’s smile and his children alive.
Twelve years ago, he thought he had lost everything.
Today, he realizes he has found it all again, right in the place he once intended to flatten.
The world of the arrogant millionaire crumbled that day, giving way to the world of a true father and husband, reborn from the ashes of regret.
