Chapter 2

I raised my glass, acting touched. "Wow, seeing how good and caring you all are, I must be truly blessed.

"You brought home such great partners. Your father's watching from above, and I bet he's grinning ear to ear."

As I spoke, I even dabbed at my eyes, thinking of how much I went through in my last life.

Seeing this, the four of them finally let out a sigh of relief and started acting more at ease.

"Isabelle and Charles didn't give me a heads-up you'd be coming, so I didn't have anything fancy prepared. I'll just go with something simple and traditional," I said.

I handed each of them a thick stack of money.

They were surprised at first, pretended to turn it down, but in the end, their partners made sure the money ended up in their pockets.

I smiled, "We don't really keep much cash at home now, so I just give you 3,000 dollars each. I wish you all a lasting, happy relationship. Once you're married, whatever's in this house is yours."

I hoped that they'd stay glued together for life and not mess up anyone else's future.

Eric and Jessica looked genuinely hopeful about their future, but my children were obviously not impressed.

"Mom, is that all you're giving Jessie for her first visit? That's not even enough for a bag. You've got a whole collection of Hermès upstairs. Why not let her pick one out?" Charles muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Yeah, Mom, my monthly allowance is way more than that. I don't even need extra. Why not just give Eric that custom-made gold statue as a gift?" Isabelle chimed in, trying her best to look cute.

I almost couldn't keep a straight face. My children had never known hardship, so they had no idea what things really cost. They just expect me to hand out hundreds of thousands.

Did they really think money just grew on trees in this house?

I was burning up inside, but I kept my smile and said, "I've already used those bags. It wouldn't be right to give Jessie a used bag. Tomorrow, I'll have the boutique make her a custom one. Is crocodile leather her thing?"

Jessica tried to keep her cool, but her eyes couldn't hide the excitement as she nodded like crazy.

"That gold statue? It's only 150,000 dollars. But it's my personal good luck charm, so it's not something I can just give away. I didn't have anything prepared today. Tomorrow, I'll have someone whip up something for Eric instead," I said.

But Eric waved me off. "Ms. Chapman, don't bother. We aren't interested in all these material things. Please, don't embarrass me with such stuff."

Isabelle looked at Eric with stars in her eyes. "Mom, I've told you. I just love how he won't bend for money."

I nearly spat out my water.

Seemed that he was a pro-level freeloader who acted like he was above it all.

I gave him a round of applause.

"Good for you, young man. Izzy sure has an eye for people. But proper etiquette can't be skipped. I'll have it all arranged for you tomorrow. If you really don't want it, Izzy can just hold onto it for you," I said.

Jessica kept tugging at Charles, but when he still didn't get the hint, she spoke up to cover for him.

"Ms. Chapman, honestly, I don't really care about the bag. I just like Charles. He's reliable, kind, and he's not afraid of hard work."

He'd been living in luxury his whole life. What kind of hard work could he possibly experience?

The toughest thing he'd ever faced was probably getting wrecked in a video game.

She was probably just into that innocent, clueless rich kid vibe.