My Family Pushed Wolf Culture; I Became Alpha, They Regretted It

1: 1

The day the Hensons, one of the richest families in the country, brought me home as their reclaimed daughter, my mother laid it out plainly.

"Only someone good enough deserves a place in the Henson family register. This family runs on wolf-pack culture. Blood has nothing to do with it."

So at the company she always kept her distance, calling me a poor relative who'd come to the Hensons looking for a foothold.

To win back the name that was mine.

I worked myself half to death. More than once, business dinners left me with alcohol poisoning that nearly killed me.

On sheer stubbornness, in three months I pushed a project's annual revenue past a hundred million.

Then came the Thanksgiving staff dinner, and I saw the extra empty seat at the executives' table.

I was quietly thrilled, thinking I'd finally earned enough for them to agree to announce who I really was.

Instead I watched my mother reach out, take the fake heiress Zoe Henson's hand, and settle her into that seat first.

"You sit beside us every year to eat with us, and today's no different."

The staff nearby couldn't help murmuring to each other.

"Looks like a dinner, but really it's a signal for who's going to inherit the group."

"Nonsense. Everyone knows the company has it in writing, ability decides who rises, not connections."

"Ha, you think that's fake? I overheard the boss's wife myself. In the family register and the notarized line for future heir, she registered Miss Zoe's name a long time ago."

I stood there for a moment, watching the two of them, so close there was no gap between them.

Then I turned and called the rival firm.

"I'll accept the VP offer. On the condition that the promotion terms are open and transparent."

Since you like keeping me on the outside, then have it your way.

But you should know, a wolf cub bites.

...

I turned and walked back into the banquet just as the ceremony reached the toasts.

By company rule, any employee who met the performance bar had the right to eat with the bosses.

A shareholder saw me come in and broke into a wide smile.

"Little Fox here is one of our biggest heroes. Come on, make room, we have to drink together later."

Before my parents beside him could say a word,

Zoe took a sip of tea, looked at me, and let a troubled expression cross that sweet face.

"Might not work. There's really no room here."

I looked at the challenge and the hostility in her eyes and said nothing.

It was the shareholder who pointed to the obviously empty space beside my parents and laughed that Zoe was such a joker.

A gap a yard wide. How could a single chair not fit?

But she waved a hand, and the butler beside her immediately lifted a Pomeranian onto the table.

Zoe rubbed the dog's head and stuck her tongue out at me, playful.

"Sorry, Xixi counts as part of the Henson family too."

"For a family dinner like this, she absolutely has to be here. Miss Fox, please find another table."

The moment she said it, everyone's expression shifted, just slightly.

Set aside my status as a poor relation. I was still the company's top salesperson.

And here I was, humiliated to my face, ranked below a dog.

The dozens of eyes on me suddenly held a trace of pity.

But my parents, right there within arm's reach, pretended not to notice, chatting and laughing, letting Zoe's stunt stand.

For the sake of appearances, I wasn't even fit to carry the Henson name.

How could I ever expect them to stand up for me.

I gave a small, self-mocking tug of my lips.

In everyone else's eyes, I was the poor relation clinging to the Hensons. What they didn't know was that I was the family's real daughter.

Years ago, traffickers slipped into the hospital to steal and sell baby boys, and I got switched by accident and left behind on the outside.

My adoptive parents treated me wonderfully, but when I heard my birth parents had come looking for me,

my heart still jumped.

Because the love that runs through blood can't be replaced by anything.

So even when my parents admitted they'd adopted a child to take my place, that the family bowed to wolf-pack culture,

that on my first night home I had no right to a room and slept in the storage room in the attic,

I still took it gladly.

After all, more than twenty years of being ground down by the world had taught me every side of life, that whatever you want, you have to fight for yourself.

So I threw everything I had into fighting for it.

After joining the company, I clawed my way from the bottom up to where I stood now.

Those deals were signed one at a time, walking the streets in hundred-degree heat, dodging security guards trying to run me off.

They were bought with groveling, begging partners for a chance, hauling in case after case of beer and drinking from morning till night.

And none of it counted for anything against Zoe's one weightless tear and a little pouting.

She said she was hot, so a chauffeured, air-conditioned van was always on standby for her. She sulked when her numbers fell short, so my parents pulled every string to win the partners over for her.

So she could close deals in comfort, never once out in the wind and rain.

Me, though. When I collapsed from heatstroke chasing a deal and came out of the ER asking for one little fan, they refused me with cold faces.

The reason: "Wolf-pack culture. Only the weak need extra help."

And I'd foolishly convinced myself that if I just did well enough, if I lived by wolf-pack culture and became strong, I could become part of this family.

But now, watching the cozy little family of three in front of me,

watching Zoe's plate piled high with shrimp my father had peeled by hand,

watching my mother, unable to hold out against her pouting and playing pitiful, carefully picking the scallions out of the chicken soup for her,

it hit me all at once.

The so-called wolf-pack culture only ever bound one person. "Me."

I glanced at my phone and saw the rival firm's message with my start date.

I opened the email and started drafting my resignation.

If there's no room in Henson territory for a wolf like me, then I might as well try my luck somewhere wider.