Chapter 208
Chapter 208
Madison quickly looked away. She felt a little embarrassed with how long she had sneaked a look at Jason just now.
She smiled politely and rocked Charlie in her arms. "He's not heavy. I used to do weight training for work. I can still carry Charlie."
Charlie hugged Madison tightly because of her rocking motion. However, his heart ached for her. "Aunt Madison, put me down. I can walk on my own. I'm already five years old. You don't have to carry me all the time."
His aunt had already suffered a lot outside. Now that she was home, she should be protected by them. Even if he was young, he could not bully her. Charlie refused to let Madison continue carrying him and struggled to be put down.
Madison was afraid that Charlie would fall, so she quickly and carefully set him down.
Jason watched the entire process in silence, his thin lips pursed tightly. He stared at Madison's scrawny arms. It was hard to imagine her doing weight training just to make a living when she was younger. It was not until Madison coaxed Charlie and held his soft hand that Jason spoke slowly, "If you encounter any difficulties in the future, you can tell me."
Madison was stunned. She thought that she had misheard. She still did not dare to get close to Jason. She did not expect him to take the initiative to say such words to her with his cold personality. Immediately, a bright smile appeared on Madison's beautiful face. "Okay. Thank you, Jason!"
Jason nodded.
*****
Time passed. The villa became livelier with so many people staying over at night. Soon, as everyone headed off to bed, they turned off the lights and the house quietened down. Only a dim yellow light in the corridor was on.
In the middle of her sleep, Madison felt a small head burrow into her arms. Because of her experience abroad, Madison woke up almost instantly.
Though Madison did not turn on the lights, she could vaguely see the shape of the person in the dark. Her vigilance faded.
She yawned and held Charlie in her arms, inhaling his unique milky fragrance. She mumbled, "Charlie, did you not sleep well? Why did you come over to me?"
"I can't sleep alone." Charlie's voice was exceptionally clear.
Madison chuckled but did not say anything.
John said that Charlie slept alone at home and that he was not happy to have someone to accompany him, but Charlie claimed he could not sleep alone today. However, Madison did not mind. With a fragrant, soft, and cute child in her arms, she would sleep even better.
Charlie also stretched out his short arms and hugged Madison. He spoke in a low voice, "Aunt Madison, you smell like Mommy. I miss my Mommy very much. And thank you for this afternoon. I was very upset but I felt so much better after you said I can cry. I like you very much, Aunt Madison."
Madison's drowsiness gradually dissipated as she listened to these quiet words. She lowered her gaze and waited for her eyes to adapt to the dark before looking at her little nephew kindly and lovingly. "Charlie, I like you very much, too." She kissed Charlie's forehead and said in a gentle voice, "Can you tell me why you were hiding today? Did someone bully you?"
In the afternoon, Madison was so focused on letting Charlie vent his emotions that she forgot to ask about the cause.
As soon as she finished, Madison felt Charlie stiffen in her arms. She patted Charlie's back and coaxed him gently, "It's fine if you don't want to say it, but you only have to remember that you are a child who is doted on and loved. In the future, no matter who bullies you, you can say it. No kid in our family has to swallow his anger or be afraid of trouble!" Although Madison's voice was very soft, it was incomparably solemn.
Charlie burrowed into Madison's arms and whispered, "It's Aunt Cybil. She bullied me..."
"Cybil Watson?" Madison thought of the woman she had met at the Daves family's residence today. "How did she bully you?"
Charlie bit his lip and looked conflicted.
Charlie was probably afraid of trouble, or perhaps Cybil said something to the child that made him afraid to repeat it.
Madison patiently coaxed, "Don't be afraid, Charlie. You're one of us. That annoying Aunt Cybil is not. She is just a relative of ours. Why should we be afraid of her, right? As long as you didn't do anything wrong, we will stand up for you."
Charlie felt a lump in his throat. No one had ever said these words to him.
Since he could remember, he did not have a mother and his father was always very busy. Charlie was either brought up by servants or sent to his grandmother. His grandmother was very good to him, but she had never said these words to him.
As for Aunt Cybil...
Charlie sniffed and hugged Madison tightly. "She said that I was a bastard. When she married my father, she would get him to cast me aside! She even found me annoying and kept looking at her phone... She called me names. Every time she saw me, she would do that. She would say that I was abandoned at the Daves family's door by my mother. It was because Dad and Grandma were kind-hearted that they brought me in and kept me. She said that I don't belong to the Daves family at all...'
In the end, Charlie felt extremely aggrieved and cried. "Aunt Madison, I won't be abandoned, right? I'm not a bastard, right?"
Madison was shocked and heartbroken after hearing that. She could not imagine why Cybil would say such a thing to a child.
Not to mention that Charlie was brought back to the Daves family after a paternity test, even if it was someone else who was abandoned at the door and taken in by their kind-hearted family, Cybil should speak that way in front of a child!
Wasn't that woman a cousin of the Daves family? How dare she have designs on John? Cybil was too much! Madison felt angry and disgusted.
However, what was more important now was to appease Charlie's emotions. She did not expect such a young child to have to face such remarks more than once.
Charlie cried in her arms until he was out of breath. Madison's face was filled with worry as she gently patted his back. "Of course, you're not. Your name is Charlie Daves. You belong to our family and you are a member of our family. How can you be an unwanted, let alone be the bastard that Cybil mentioned? Don't listen to her nonsense in the future, understand?"Material © NôvelDrama.Org.
Madison felt suffocated at the thought of those words. From her nephew's perspective, he would feel even worse.
Madison had also been called a bastard, as well as being unwanted. After Sally came back, that was what was said about her every day.
Sometimes they said it so much she thought that way too. Madison felt like she had been abandoned by her family and the world. Fortunately, she wasn't.
Madison could not believe that the same words were used on Charlie. Charlie's last name was Daves and they had done a paternity test. How could Cybil dare to treat him like that?