Revenge Is A Family Affair

Ever since the Kensingtons biological daughter returned to the estate, she made it her mission to orchestrate my downfall.

First, it was the jewelry her parents bought hermysteriously lost, then miraculously discovered in my bedroom. Then, it was the severe allergic reaction to the luxury skincare I had given her. She would stand there, her face inflamed, whispering that she had no intention of stealing my boyfriends, begging me to stop trying to ruin her face.

And finally, it culminated in this: she deliberately sliced her own arm with a letter opener, sank to her knees, pale and trembling, and accused me of trying to kill her. She demanded that our parents make a choice. Only one daughter could stay.

I was exhausted by the relentless, chaotic noise of it all.

If my adoptive parents were too paralyzed by optics to handle this toxic girl, then fine. I would simply get new parents.

After all, the mayor of my biological familys hometown had already promised that the second I came home, they would commission a bronze plaque in the town square just for me.

"Mom, Dad, why are you always taking her side? Im your actual flesh and blood!"

Mia clutched the bleeding cut on her forearm, her face a mask of absolute tragedy. The accusation in her eyes was heavy, suffocating.

Richard and Caroline Kensington stared at the blood seeping through Mias fingers. Deep creases formed between my adoptive parents' brows, but their lips remained pressed in a tight, helpless line.

I was the one who finally broke the silence. I calmly bent down, picked up the silver letter opener from the Persian rug, and held it out to her.

Mia instantly scrambled backward, her eyes widening in manufactured terror. "Blair, what are you doing?! Are you trying to stab me again? Do you think just because Mom and Dad favor you, you can get away with murder?"

I looked at her the way one might look at a piece of gum stuck to the bottom of a shoe. "Obviously," I said, a slow, provocative smile spreading across my face. "If they didn't favor the daughter they actually raised, why would they favor a latecomer like you?"

The hatred in Mias eyes darkened, turning venomous.

I just smiled. Go ahead and hate me, I thought. There was a distinct, sharp pleasure in watching her seethedespising me, yet entirely powerless to defeat me.

Mia had hated me from the moment she discovered she was the true Kensington heiress. She had taken a Greyhound bus straight to our gated driveway in Connecticut, demanded a DNA test, and shattered the reality I had known for eighteen years.

It happened on the exact same day I had brought home the first-place trophy for the National Math Olympiad. Richard and Caroline had initially dismissed her as a con artist. It took police intervention for them to finally agree to the test.

The results confirmed it. She was the real Kensington. I, of course, was the imposter.

But they didn't send me away.

The investigation revealed it was a hospital clerical errora exhausted nurse, two swapped bassinets in the dead of night. No malice, no kidnapping. I was innocent. More importantly, I was exceptional.

I was the masterpiece Richard and Caroline had meticulously curated for eighteen years. I was their pride, their flawless investment. They were entirely unwilling to give me up. Especially not when I had just secured an early-admission full ride to MIT. If they sent me packing, my future glory would no longer belong to the Kensington name.

From that moment on, Mias hatred for me solidified into an obsession.

My parents, to their credit, were drowning in guilt. They felt they had failed Mia, horrified that they hadn't even possessed the parental instinct to recognize their own child. In the beginning, they desperately tried to overcompensate. Their logic was simple: if a girl with absolutely no Kensington blood could be molded into a genius under their roof, then their actualbiological daughter would surely be extraordinary.

But the longer they lived with Mia, the more they had to swallow a bitter pill. Mia possessed a certain cunning, a street-level manipulative streak, but absolutely no vision. Even her attempts to frame me were painfully amateurish.

High society was already whispering about the return of the lost Kensington heiress. Expectations were sky-high. My parents were living in a constant state of low-grade panic, practically hiding Mia from the country club circuit. It was like holding a worthless, plunging stock while everyone around you congratulated you on a windfall; they couldn't explain the truth without dying of embarrassment.

So, they begged me to keep the peace. To tolerate her. To ensure no humiliating scandals leaked out of the estate.

But my patience had officially expired.

Mias first attempt to frame me involved a custom gold Cartier Love bracelet.

Caroline had taken her shopping and bought it as a welcome gift. Mia treated it like the Holy Grail. She had clearly never owned anything of real value before. Consequently, she made a point of casually dragging her wrist across my line of sight at every conceivable opportunity.

She had noticed I rarely wore jewelry around the house, and in her mind, that equated to my parents neglecting me. When I completely ignored her glittering wrist, my message was clear: I don't care about your jewelry, get out of my space.

But Mia misread the room. She thought I was masking my crushing jealousy. She had no idea that I had an entire velvet-lined vault of similar piecesbirthday and Christmas gifts accumulated over eighteen years from my parents and grandparents.

So, when she rushed down the mahogany staircase the next morning, sobbing that her bracelet had vanished, Richard and Caroline froze.

"Mom, Dad," Mia wept, her eyes shimmering with perfectly timed tears. "That bracelet was the first real gift you ever gave me. II can't bear that it's gone. Could you please help me find it?"

My parents exchanged a grim look. I simply leaned against the marble kitchen island, crossing my arms, ready for the show.

After they had torn through Mias bedroom and found nothing, she quietly suggested they search Martas quarters.

Marta, our housekeeper, was visibly stunned. "Mr. and Mrs. Kensington," she stammered, her hands trembling against her apron. "I have worked in this house for fifteen years. I practically raised Blair. I would never steal from this family!"

Besides the sheer insult of the accusation, Marta wore a thick, solid gold bangle of her own on her wrist. My parents paid her an exorbitant salary, and her family had just sold a massive plot of real estate in Queens. She didn't need to steal Mias trinket.

I stepped up, my voice cutting through the tension like glass. "Mia, Marta wouldn't touch your bracelet. You were practically shoving it in my face all day yesterday. I highly suggest you trace your own steps before you start accusing the people who keep this house running."

Mias lower lip quivered. "Blair, why are you so defensive? Is it because Mom and Dad bought me gold and didn't buy you anything? I just want my bracelet back. It doesn't mean they love me more than you. You really don't need to be so insecure."

I stared at her. Insecure? Where on earth was she getting this script?

Marta, refusing to let me take the heat, swallowed her pride. Though her face was tight with humiliation, she agreed to let Mia search her room.

I rested a hand on Martas shoulder, my voice softening. "Don't let it get to you, Marta. When summer break hits, I'm taking you on a vacation to Europe. Just you and me."

Marta let out a breathless, appreciative laugh. "Thank you, sweetheart."

Mias jaw clenched. She had likely never heard of an employer taking a housekeeper on a luxury vacation. But in our world, loyalty was rewarded.

Predictably, Mia found nothing in Martas quarters. But she accomplished one thing: Marta would never look at her with an ounce of warmth again.

"Did you find what you were looking for, miss?" Marta asked, her voice entirely devoid of emotion.

Mia rubbed her red eyes. "I guess it isn't in here..."

"Apologize to Marta," Richard ordered, his voice echoing like a whip crack down the hallway.

Mia bit her lip, looking at my father as if he had just slapped her. Marta, despising Mia but refusing to let my father lose face, started to wave it off.

Before she could, I spoke up. "Marta, on behalf of my little sister, I apologize. When we go abroad, you can pick out whatever you want. My treat."

Marta smiled warmly. "You're too good to me, Blair."

Mia looked like she was choking on ash. Her entire goal had been to assert dominance, to remind Marta who the realblood of the house was. But Marta gave me everything she possessed, and gave Mia nothing. In Mia's mind, because she was the biological daughter, the staff should instinctively bow to her.

She just couldn't comprehend why the world wasn't rearranging itself to fit her narrative.

"Blair, why do you constantly undermine me?" Mia asked later, catching me in the hall. "I just wanted to check her room. You didn't need to buy her affection just to humiliate me. I know Marta favors you, and she hates me. But like I said, I'm just here to join the family. I never wanted to steal Mom and Dad's love from you. Why don't you just give the bracelet back?"

I blinked.

Oh. So that was the endgame. Smear the housekeeper, and when that failed, pivot the accusation to me. I almost admired the sheer audacity of it. I couldn't wait to see how she planned to pull this off.

Marta had been present for Mias accusation. She immediately turned to my parents, appalled.

"Mr. Kensington, Mrs. Kensington, I swear to you, I treat both girls exactly the same! The only difference in this house is that Mrs. Kensington designed a highly specific, nutrient-dense meal plan for Blair to support her late-night studying. Those supplements aren't suited for Mia's dietary needs, so I cook for them separately. That is all!"

Caroline closed her eyes, rubbing her temples. "Marta is right. That was my doing. Marta treats you both fairly. Mia, please stop this nonsense. Ill have a nutritionist draft a new menu for you tomorrow."

I raised an eyebrow. Given Mias absolute reliance on processed junk food and heavy meats, a Kensington-approved organic nutritional plan was going to be her own personal hell.

A tear slipped down Mias cheek, splashing onto the floor. "Mom, I know you don't believe me. Marta wouldn't know any better, maybe she just doesn't know Blairs true character. Blair, I know you stared at my bracelet all day. It means the world to me. Please, just give it back."

I let out a harsh, incredulous laugh. "It might mean the world to you, but it's utterly useless to me. What would I even do with it?"

My private academy strictly prohibited flashy jewelry. All my pieces were locked in the velvet display cases in my walk-in.

Mias crying escalated into a theatrical, breathless sob. Out of everything she had brought into this house, her weeping was what I despised most. She cried as if the universe owed her a cosmic debt.

"Blair, please! Just let me look in your room. Mom, Dad, I'm begging you. That bracelet is everything to me."

But this time, Richard didn't indulge her.

"It is a piece of metal, Mia," he snapped, his voice hard. "Your mother will take you to Fifth Avenue tomorrow and buy you two more. The Kensingtons do not tear each other apart over pocket change."

But Mia was relentless. "Dad, to you it's just money. To me, it's a symbol of your love! I can't just replace it. And I don't want to waste your money when I haven't earned it. Please, let me check. If it's not in Blairs room, I will get on my knees and apologize, and I'll never bring it up again."

Richards frown deepened. He had raised me. He knew the architecture of my character. Furthermore, he deeply despised people who fixated on trivial amounts of money. To him, Mia's hyper-fixation on a single bracelet was aggressively lower-class.

I stood off to the side, enjoying the theater. I wanted to see how far she would push it.

She turned her tear-streaked face to me. "Blair, I know Mom and Dad adore you. You shouldn't disappoint them like this. Or... are you refusing to let me search because the bracelet is already in there?"

I almost laughed out loud.

"What are you afraid of, Blair? Why won't you let me look? Are you guilty?" Mia pushed, stepping closer.

I let a lazy smile touch my lips. I was one hundred percent certain she had already planted the bracelet in my room.

"Fine," I said smoothly. "Mom, Dad, since shes so desperate to see my room, let her."

I pushed open my bedroom door and gestured inside, playing the gracious host.

My parents looked sick with stress, but Mia was entirely oblivious. She had been dying to get inside my bedroom since she arrived. The moment she had moved in, she had demanded the primary suite, but my parents had firmly placed her in a guest wing.

She stepped inside, her eyes darting over the silk drapes and original artwork. Then, she spotted the discreet paneled door leading to my walk-in closet.

She pushed it open, and I watched the color drain completely from her face.

The closet was practically a boutique. Rows of current-season designer garments, handbags that cost more than a luxury car, and an illuminated glass display island in the center. Every single item in that room could have bought her precious bracelet ten times over.

And as for the bracelet itself? She stared through the glass case and saw an identical Cartier Love bracelet resting on a velvet pillow.

Except, she knew the one she had planted was hidden somewhere else entirely.