Savvy Son-in-law

CHAPTER 04

If there was anyone more shameless than pigs, it was Shawn’s wife, Elizabeth. Shamelessness ran in her blood was what Benjamin believed.

Her family would spend around 100 days every year in the Sterling family, and the rest of the days, Elizabeth would regularly travel to and fro using Sterling’s money. She didn’t have any job, not that she tried to get one in the first place.

She was so dependent on her husband for her lavish lifestyle of attending yacht shows and tennis tournaments all around the world. Still, she had no respect for Selena even though Shawn loved his mother more than anything else. Maybe, that was exactly why she couldn’t bring herself to respect Selena because she wanted Shawn to respect and love her the most first.

She would always try to put fights between Veronica and her mother and would enjoy the show from the side. However, she received the most entertainment from a single person. And that was the only son-in-law of the Sterling family.

“Benjamin! Where are you?” Elizabeth’s screams echoed in the villa. She was so loud, she even scared the birds nesting in the trees growing on the lawn. “Benj-fucking-min! I’m calling you! Get your ass over here this instant!”

Benjamin came running down from his room. “What’s wrong, sister?”

Elizabeth slapped him hard. “Who is your sister? Call me Madam Elizabeth, you uneducated brute,” she threw her shoes in his face. “Did you forget that it’s Monday? Polish my shoes first, and then iron my clothes. After that you take care of others’ shoes.” She didn’t even look at him before she walked away, still blowing steam through her nose.

It was still five o’clock, so it was quite obvious that this woman purposely disturbed his sleep. Benjamin could tell why she looked down on him so much. It was because she thought he was uneducated.

“This woman…” he was holding his anger back. “She’s much older than me, yet I’m addressing her as sister, but she has a problem with that. Maybe I should call her Aunt next time. That fits her better.”

It took Benjamin two full hours to iron the clothes and polish the shoes of a dozen people. Selena then came and gave him a new pair of dresses and told him to refresh them, saying that she needed to attend a film festival the coming day.

As the kids went to school, Lisa came up to Benjamin and took some money from him. She treated him like he was some money-minting machine. She always came to him if she needed pocket money before going to school. Though his salary was being hogged by Selena every other week, he gave Lisa the money he received as tips. Sometimes, the tips he would receive would be higher than his weekly salary itself.

Lisa was Elizabeth’s daughter, but both of them treated Benjamin in completely different bad ways.

As Benjamin was climbing the stairs and heading to his room, a couple of maids that were sitting by the stairs and relaxing saw him and snickered among themselves. One of those two joined work only the previous day, yet she was already laughing at Benjamin.

“Is he the one?”

“Yeah. He’s the one everyone calls the unpaid maid.”

“He has to respect them even when they mistreat him. He’s pretty much a slave.”

“Indeed. He should keep his wife and in-laws happy even if they don’t keep him happy.”

The maids at the villa all called Benjamin the Unpaid Maid. It was a humiliating title as the title of a maid wasn’t supposed to be given to a man. And to add to that humiliation, even the butlers called him by that title more often than not.

Just then, someone entered the villa, but the maids were too lazy to receive them. So one of the maids, the older one, Kathy, snapped her fingers and called for Benjamin. “Hey, UM. We have a guest.”

Benjamin stopped and exhaled audibly before turning and climbing down to the stairs to receive the guest who came to share details about some of their garden products. This wasn’t the first time the maids made him attend to all the boring guests that wouldn’t benefit them in any way.

Even though he would listen to the maids and do their work, they would still taunt him on each and everything he did. Because he was good-looking, they would mock him for his average height and the fact that they earn more as maids than he earned as a pizza delivery guy. The maids would get any dresses that go unused by Selena, or other females of the house, and they would sell these dresses outside and earn a lot more than their salary. On the contrary, Benjamin wasn’t even allowed to buy the clothes he wanted.

Benjamin even cooked when the maids told him to. He wanted his wife to taste his cooking, but whatever he cooked, she didn’t like it. Every time he entered the kitchen for anything, the chefs would tell him to clean the kitchen.

No matter what part of the villa he went to at any time of the day, every worker would give their work to him. It had become a common thing in the past eight months or so.

Benjamin wasn’t a fool. He knew that Selena had told the workers to put Benjamin through hell so he would run away and never show his face to her daughter again. However, Benjamin never once scolded or fought back against the workers for pushing their work onto him. He was just hoping his wife would take notice of his goodness and have a change of heart.

He didn’t care about any adults in the Sterling family except for his wife. Everything he did was for her.

He wanted to do a lot of things for her, like buying her good food and clothes and what not. However, with Rebecca being a fashion designer, she never let him buy clothes. Her ego was just so big she never liked what others suggested when it came to clothing. As for eating, she was not a good eater, either.

As he was talking to the guest, his wife came downstairs at 9:30 and said, “Let’s go.” Those were the words he had been waiting to hear since morning. He apologized to the guest for having to leave and told him the maids would take care of him before Benjamin accompanied his wife and brought the car to the main door. He sat there in the driver’s seat and expectantly looked at her.

She raised one of her brows. “That steering isn’t something you can handle, Benjamin.”

“But, my love…” Benjamin pouted a bit, but that didn’t work. In fact, it made her squint her eyes. He sighed and got into the back seat. She sat in the driver’s seat and drove off.

Everyday, Rebecca would drop him off at the pizza hut and then pick him up in the evening sharply at 5:30. He found it hard to tell if she was doing this to put a tight leash on his freedom, or because she cared for him a teeny little bit.

If he talked too much, she would get angry, so he chose his words before speaking, “Can’t we both stay at a different house? One that’s closer to both of our working places?”

This was the first time Benjamin posed such a question, so she was a little taken by surprise. Where did he get the courage to ask such a question? She briefly wondered. Though she wouldn’t answer any troublesome questions in general, she replied this time saying, “It may be relaxing for you if you stay away from the villa, but not for me. That’s the house I grew up in. And I’m not leaving that anytime soon.” She didn’t sound convincing when saying that as she had other plans.

“Thought so,” Benjamin muttered in disappointment.

“What?” her brows contradicted.

“Nothing. I was saying your thoughts are understandable. I feel great for having such a caring and understanding wife.”

“Save your energy for the job,” she said. “And don’t you dare tell anyone that I’m your wife. To strangers, we’re just friends.”

“I know,” he looked dull as he replied. How could she be so cold when he was trying to get closer to her? There was probably nothing harder for him than to lie to others that she wasn’t his wife.

“Kathy said you didn’t eat last night. Why?”

“Ah, my stomach wasn’t well.”

“Should I make an appointment with my doctor?”

“T-There’s no need. I’m feeling okay now.”

“Well, I’ve already made an appointment, so we’re going in the evening.”

“O-Okay,” he said. (When you’ve already made an appointment, why bother asking me now?)

Soon, after the Porsche left the villa, a new courier arrived. One of the butlers named Oliver with a butcher’s physique received it. After looking at the ‘from’ address, which only had the name ‘King’ on it, he was puzzled for a second, but after seeing the ‘to’ address written on the envelope, he grinned, for the courier was sent for Benjamin. “Keke, for the Unpaid Maid?” He concealed it under his shirt and made sure no one saw him, and he paced toward the dorms in the north-west.