My Son’s Bully Was His Old Flame’s Son Chapter 05

My Son’s Bully Was His Old Flame’s Son Chapter 05

The moment the words left my mouth, the entire courtroom fell into a strange, stifling silence.

Even Joseph, always composed, always untouchable, showed the first crack in his façade. A faint line of fatigue split through his expression.

“Plaintiff, what are you trying to do?”

My voice stayed calm. “I believe my attorney made it clear enough.”

“Your Honor, we move to implead a third party as the primary liable entity based on newly discovered evidence of collusion. If not, we cannot provide the evidence.”

The blunt, unmistakable threat unsettled Joseph. It also sent a wave of murmurs rippling through the audience. Online, the livestream chat exploded, calling me a liar and a manipulator.

[She’s still pretending at this point?] She obviously has no evidence. Changing the defendant is just a stalling tactic. Absolutely shameless!

[Hurry up and apologize to the victim! Using your own kid as a shield… how vicious can you be?]

[Another desperate wife playing the victim card to ruin a good man’s career.]

I stared at the comments, my expression steady. Years of humiliation had already worn down my ability to feel pain.

Compared to Carl lying in the ICU, to ten years in an empty marriage…
this was nothing.

Julia suddenly stood. She donned a mask of fragile innocence, her
voice pitched at a frequency designed to trigger the jury’s protective
instincts.

“Mrs. Sterling, I know you’re upset. Carl was hurt, so it’s natural you
blame me… blame Trent…”

“You don’t have to apologize to me. I can understand. But Trent is
innocent. He’s just a little boy. He cries every night saying he’s scared,
that he can’t sleep…”

“Please, just have Carl say sorry. Let’s end this. We promise we’ll
never bother you again.”

Her manufactured kindness made my stomach churn. From the
judge’s bench, Joseph’s tone dropped into an uncompromising
command.

“Sierra, enough. Stop using pointless tactics. Cooperate with the
court and stop wasting everyone’s time.”

I lifted my head and met his cold gaze, my lips curling in a faint, icy
smile.

He had always been like this.

Forever perched on some moral high ground, condemning me, while conveniently ignoring that he was the one who had abandoned fairness from the very beginning.

“Cooperate? Mr. Sterling, aren’t you the one who prides himself on being impartial and self-disciplined?”

“Then why, from the start of this hearing, have you only accused me of being uncooperative and pushed me to admit fault?”

“My son was beaten until he suffered intracranial bleeding and a fractured rib, clinging to life in the pediatric ICU while you sat in chambers, sanitizing the records.”

“Yet you allow a fabricated video to paint him as the aggressor. And that doesn’t bother you? When Trent first bullied Carl, you claimed there wasn’t enough evidence and delayed the trial.”

“When Trent hit him again, slapping him and forcing him to kneel, you still called it ‘kids being kids.’ That’s your definition of fairness?!”

My voice wasn’t loud, but it carried clearly across the courtroom.

Joseph’s face turned ashen. His lips moved, but no words came out. For the first time, he was speechless in front of me.

For the first time, someone publicly tore apart his hypocrisy and double standards. A low thrum of unease vibrated through the gallery. The optics were shifting, and Joseph knew it.

Even the livestream comments, once overwhelmingly hostile, started to shift.

[She… actually makes sense. Mr. Sterling really has been siding with Julia this whole time.]

[And Carl was seriously injured. Something doesn’t add up.]

Sensing his moment, Mr. Collins stepped forward and declared in a firm, ringing voice.

“Your Honor, we formally renew our request to change the defendant!”

“If the court rejects this request, then the evidence presented today cannot restore the full truth of the case, nor can it prove the injuries sustained by my client and her child.”

“Therefore, we will motion to postpone the trial on the grounds of insufficient evidence, until all evidence is complete.”

His statement crashed through the courtroom like a slap. A loud, uncompromising slap, right across Joseph’s face.

He never imagined that I would take the tactic he used so many times and use it against him.