I stepped closer.
“I’ve seen the photographs.”
His eyes flickered toward Elena.
“I’ve seen the bank records.”
Another glance.
“I’ve seen your son’s face.”
He looked away.
There it was.
The silence.
The first honest thing he’d given either of us all day.
Still…
He tried.
“You don’t understand.”
“No.”
I nodded slowly.
“I understand perfectly.”
He rubbed both hands across his face.
“I was trying to protect everyone.”
Elena stood.
“Protect?”
Her voice trembled with years of buried disappointment.
“Lucas waited seven years for you to attend school events because you kept saying nobody could know he existed.”
She took another step.
“You promised we’d be a real family.”
He looked helplessly between us.
“I was going to fix everything.”
“When?”
I asked quietly.
“When Noah graduated?”
“When Lucas turned eighteen?”
“When I found the missing money?”
“When exactly?”
He couldn’t answer.
Because there wasn’t one.
He had never planned to tell the truth.
He had only planned not to get caught.
I slowly slipped my wedding ring off my finger.
For years, that ring had represented trust.
Commitment.
NEXT PAGE
