Chapter 570

Hearing his threatening tone, Maria shivered.
As soon as Mr. Temple left, Maria gritted her teeth and lunged at Natalie.
Natalie was ready. She dodged aside and slapped Maria across the face.
“You dare hit me! How dare you?”
“Maria, I won’t let you bully me anymore! This is just the beginning. You’d better be prepared!”
“You owe me all of this!”
“I’ve already paid you back! More than enough! I don’t owe you anything anymore!”
For the past six years, with Hamilton’s backing, Maria had grown accustomed to being arrogant and domineering with everyone. There was no way she would tolerate being slapped. Gritting her teeth, she lunged at Natalie again.
This time, Natalie couldn’t dodge. Maria tackled her onto the sofa and slapped her hard. Natalie tried to get up, but she was no match for Maria’s strength.
Maria narrowed her eyes. “It seems the lesson Hamilton taught you wasn’t enough. Next time, I’ll have to use something much stronger!”
“So you were the one who hired someone to take those misleading photos of me and Dylan, post them online, and stir up the public to attack us!”
“And I was the one who told Hamilton, adding plenty of extra details to spice it up!” Maria said smugly.
“I’ve already left the industry. Why won’t you just leave me alone?”
“If you were dead, I’d never have to think about you again!”
“You were the one who cheated with my husband first! I only hit you because I couldn’t stand it!”
“So what? Can you prove it? Who would believe you?”
“You’re despicable!”
Maria grabbed a handful of Natalie’s hair and raised her other hand to strike again.
Just then, Joyce appeared at the door.
“Ms. Scott, Natalie… what’s going on?”
With someone else present, Maria had to restrain herself. She shot Natalie a venomous glare, stood up, brushed off her clothes, and walked toward the door. As she passed Joyce, she gave her a warning look before leaving.
Once Maria was gone, Joyce hurried in to help Natalie up.
“Natalie, are you okay?”
Natalie felt a stinging pain in her calf. She looked down and saw a long, bloody gash.
“I have a first-aid kit in my room. Let me bandage that for you.”
But Natalie was more concerned about something else.
She grabbed Joyce’s wrist, looking at her anxiously.
Joyce quickly pulled out her phone. “Don’t worry, I recorded everything!”
Hearing that, Natalie finally let out a sigh of relief.
Tonight, she had deliberately taken the bait, provoked a fight, and allowed Maria to overpower her, all to get her to say those very words.
But this wasn’t enough. If she was going to make a move, she had to take Maria down for good.
Natalie stayed at the hotel that night and went back to visit the set the next day.
She arrived just as Maria was
filming a scene where she falls into the water. They had already done over ten takes. When Maria climbed out of the pool, she was utterly exhausted. The water was cold despite it being early summer, and her face was pale from being submerged for so long.
But even so, Mr. Temple still yelled, “Cut!”
“Maria, what’s wrong with you? It’s a
simple falling-in-the-water scene, how can you not get it right? Either your expression is too stiff, your posture is wrong, or there’s just no grace to it. Didn’t you graduate from a professional acting school? With this level of skill? If I’d known your acting was this terrible, I would never have cast you!”
Mr. Temple pointed a finger in Maria’s face and berated her, showing her no mercy.
“What are you standing there for? Get back in the water and stay there! Wait for my cue to climb out!”
It was obvious Mr. Temple was tormenting Maria on purpose.