After I Returned The Real Heiress Everyone Regretted Letting Me Go

how many times she refreshed the screen or reopened the application, the date never changed. Four years. She had returned four years before everything fell apart, yet her mind stubbornl

ated software reminding her once again that this truly belonged to another time. Katherine ignored the growing knot in her chest and immedi

the leadership of the Stan family, while others discussed upcoming investment projects and charity partnerships. Katheri

was no

t her No photographs of Soron standing be

ned back slowly. Of course there

d over her before another name f

an

ard and typed the nam

a Joh

ine opened another tab and sear

ard

cial magazines called him one of the country's most influential businessmen. News outlets praised the Hart Foundation's latest

d the line repeated i

Hart's only daughte

me impossible to read. Only daughter. If Joanna truly was the Hart

erha

e thought sent another

f them taking on an entirely different meaning. Soron's distant expression during the final weeks of their engagement. The reporters accusing her of steali

bably begun falling apart l

after four years. Friends she had long forgotten appeared online as though nothing tragic had ever happened. Birthdays, p

typed Joanna Johnson into

, glanced at the photograph, and closed it again. Another. Then another. Nearly twenty minutes passed before her thumb stopped over a profile

han hope prompte

life like so many others. Most of the photographs showed ordinary moments, a cup of instant noodles

hout thinking until an older phot

on a rusted swing they were around 9 or 10, both wearing oversized hand-me-down clothes with scraped knees and

ediately. It was herself. Slowly, almost fearfully, her eyes shift

car above

herine's lips before she eve

room fell com

haned children. There they were sitting beneath a tree making paper flowers because they couldn't afford toys. There they were wrapped beneath the sam

wished she had never found It had b

g a stuffed rabbit someone had bought for her that morning.

Jojo. She wasn't wa

with such force that tears i

uld come back. She remembered tellin

he back window of the car while Jojo grew smaller and sma

ine as she covered her mouth

a." All Katherine remembered was t

who had spent those same thirteen years searching for their real daughter without ever realizing she was still waiting where they had left her. Katherin

she looked once more at the photograph of the tw

ng as they brushed across Jojo's face on the scre

at once. Now, looking back, it felt less like fate had been cruel and more like fate had finally corrected a mistake. Joanna had lost her parents, her home, and the life she shou

eyes, unable to

brushing her thumb across Jojo's fa

t the resolve in her h

turn eve

ver the quiet hospi

years with their daughter, nor would she continue living a life that had never belonged to her. Before the eng

ould be the one