Chapter 3

After the family reunion dinner, I got an internship at the Ginger family's charity foundation. It was not because of my family, but because of Norma's recommendation.

The foundation was soliciting plans for mobile study rooms in mountainous areas. I worked late for seven nights, sketching out how an old bus could be unfolded into a classroom.

The seats and tables could fold up, the roof could collect rainwater, and there were spaces reserved for storing books in the corners.

I had not pulled these ideas out of thin air.

The orphanage was drafty in winter. As eighteen of us children crowded around one table, I thought about how great it would be if the classroom could come to us rather than the other way around.

Millie turned on the projector before me on the day we were to submit our drafts.

Her proposal was the same as mine when it came to the classroom's structure and color scheme.

She covered her mouth, shocked. "Joey, why did you copy my work?"

My file was created two hours later than hers.

Greyson's expression immediately turned grim.

"Millie has been doing charity work for six years. You've only been at the foundation for a few days. Just because you suffered during your childhood doesn't mean you can use your hardship as an excuse to steal others' things and make yourself look good."

I pushed the computer towards him. "Check the cloud records."

"The evidence is right here. What's there to check?"

Greyson withdrew my entry from the selection himself and ordered my proposal to be deleted. "Apologize to Millie in the internal group chat. The Ginger family finds such stolen honors extremely disgraceful."

The moment I hit delete, his phone began to ring incessantly with dozens of calls.

A new product proposal that Ginger Group had spent six months preparing was being accused of plagiarism by a competitor.

The accuser produced ten highly similar original drafts, all of which predated Ginger Group's own work.

Greyson rushed back to the office and spent three hours hunched over his computer trying to explain himself.

No one was willing to look at his backend system logs.

The board stripped him of his position as project lead and demanded he issue a public apology via a company-wide email.

When he returned home that evening, his tie was crooked, and his eyes were bloodshot. "My team and I built that proposal from the ground up. Why won't they even check?"

I was in the kitchen making pasta. I did not even look up.

"Funny. That's exactly what I was wondering."

Greyson froze in the doorway.

After a long silence, he reopened my laptop and began combing through the cloud activity logs.

At 2:17 AM, he found it: Millie had logged into my account using our home network. She had downloaded the original drafts and disabled automatic synchronization, deliberately ensuring that my files would show a later creation timestamp.

The moment the evidence came to light, Greyson's workplace called.

The person who actually leaked the proposal was caught, and his position was restored.

Millie turned deathly pale, then burst into tears. "I was just trying to help Joey polish her work and sent the wrong file by mistake! I never imagined it would turn out like this."

My mother instinctively tried to speak up for her.

For the first time, Greyson cut her off. "Does sending the wrong file require you to disable the synchronization feature?"

Millie fell completely silent.

In front of everyone at the foundation, Greyson reinstated my eligibility for the competition and sent out a follow-up email to set the record straight. "I wrongly accused you."

Holding the plate of pasta that had long since gone cold, I looked at him flatly.

"My background may not be very respectable, but I earned the money for my own tuition and drafted that proposal myself. You don't have to like me, but don't use my poverty as grounds to convict me."

In the end, my mobile study room project won.

The foundation director asked me what reward I wanted.

I declined the cash prize. Instead, I requested that the procurement accounts for every bus built using my design be made public.

"People who have known poverty aren't necessarily greedier. They just better understand what kind of urgent needs a single dollar can address."

Standing outside the door, Greyson heard me and remained there for a long time, unable to bring himself to enter.

On the day the first vehicle arrived, Millie was nowhere to be seen. Her door stayed shut all day.

When she finally emerged, she had reverted to being the well-behaved, sensible heiress of the Ginger family.

However, I knew she would leave no room for anyone to claim they had failed to investigate.