A Man with Nerves of Steel (Joseph Hart) novel Chapter 8

Chapter 8

“This ingrate has the nerve to make outrageous demands of us to scam us out of our money! Let me kill him!” Bernard was still furious. He pushed Cora away to hit Joseph, but Joseph blocked his attacks.

Helen didn’t hear the whole story, but she still hurried over to break them up.

“Enough of this! Haven’t you all made enough of a scene?” Cora shouted.

It cracked like a whip through the room, making Bernard freeze mid-swing. She grabbed Joseph’s arm to drag him outside, but he shook her off.

He said, “We’re putting everything on the table today, and then we’re getting a divorce.”

He turned to Helen and held out the paternity test results. “Look at this, Mom. Natalie isn’t mine, which means Cora cheated on me. I can’t live like this anymore.”

Helen didn’t need reading glasses yet. She clearly saw the conclusion in the report. She turned to Bernard. “What on earth is going on?”

He snapped, “That ingrate forged this report to push for a divorce, but his actual goal is to get his hands on our family’s money. Cora, repeat what you just told me. He demanded 1.6 billion dollars from you, right?”

Helen immediately fixed Joseph with a murderous glare when she heard that. “You’re definitely in the wrong here, Joseph.”

“What do you mean, ‘forged’? If you don’t believe it, we can redo the paternity test! I can tell you with absolute certainty the result won’t change. You’ll just be wasting your time because Natalie isn’t my daughter!” Joseph spat.

He stared straight at Cora. “I didn’t expect you to be so big a coward that you don’t even dare own up to the things you’ve done. Not only that, but you’re also pinning it on me and saying I’m after your money. I also told you afterward that I don’t want a single cent from you. All I want is a divorce. Why didn’t you repeat that part?”

Bernard snorted. “He’s just an ungrateful leech. He hid his true colors for over ten years, and he can’t keep his grubby little hands to himself anymore. Don’t indulge him, Cora. Even if you do go through with the divorce, he’s not getting a single thing-not one cent of the Lowell family’s money goes to him!”

“What are you talking about, Dad? I’m not getting divorced.” Cora remained calm, as if everything was firmly under her control. “Once he calms down and stops acting crazy, I’ll make him apologize to you.”

Helen, however, picked up the torn halves of the paternity report and put them together. She said in confusion, “Cora, Joseph’s not stupid. He wouldn’t go as far as forging something like this. He wouldn’t dare try to blackmail us with a fake test. I trust your character, but… maybe you should do a test yourself, just to be sure.”

Bernard agreed. “Your mom’s right. Go get tested. Show that ungrateful bastard how wrong he is. I was having such a good day, and he had to show up and ruin everything…”

“I haven’t done anything out of line, nor have I betrayed Joseph. Natalie is Joseph’s daughter. He’s just going through a phase and won’t be like this for long. I can handle this, okay? You guys don’t have to get involved.”

Cora was confident and composed. After reassuring Bernard and Helen, she headed out to go after Joseph.