“And how Dad always insisted she stay? How she was constantly around whenever Mom wasn’t well?”
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“Grief makes people hold on,” I said, though my voice lacked certainty.
“Or conceal things.”
I shook my head. “No. If you’re suggesting what I think you are—”
“I’m telling you exactly what Mom wrote,” he said. “Dad had been involved with someone else through much of their marriage. And when she finally pieced everything together… that person wasn’t a stranger.”
My head spun. “Her sister.”
“There’s more,” Robert cut in. “There’s a child—one everyone believed belonged to someone else.”
“What are you saying?”
Robert glanced back toward the reception. At the smiling guests. At our father.
“I’m saying,” he whispered, “this wedding didn’t begin after Mom died.”
I opened my mouth, but he raised a hand. “Not here. We need privacy. And time. Because once I tell you what’s in that letter…”
He pressed the envelope into my hand.
“…you’ll understand that Mom knew she was being betrayed while she was dying.”
Behind us, the music swelled.
Someone lit sparklers.
My hands began to tremble as I felt the weight of the paper—heavy with the truth that was about to shatter everything.
I don’t remember deciding it. We simply didn’t speak. Life continued just a few steps away, while mine split open. We slipped into a small side room. Empty chairs. A coat rack. A window cracked open for air. Robert shut the door.
“Sit,” he said.
I sat. My legs barely held me. Robert stood in front of me, holding the envelope as if it were dangerous.
“Promise me something first,” he said.
“What?”
“Promise you won’t interrupt. Not until I’m finished.”
I nodded. He broke the seal. The paper inside was carefully folded, the handwriting neat and achingly familiar.
“It starts like a farewell,” Robert said softly. “She wrote it knowing she wouldn’t be there to explain.”
He took a steadying breath and began to read.
“My sweet children. If you’re reading this, then my fears were true. And it also means I didn’t live long enough to protect you myself.”
I clamped a hand over my mouth.
“I didn’t tell you while I was alive because I didn’t want my final months consumed by conflict. I was already exhausted. I was already in pain. I wanted my last days to be filled with love, not spent exposing betrayals.”
My chest tightened.
“I found out by accident. Messages I wasn’t supposed to see. Dates that didn’t line up. Money that moved quietly, carefully, as if someone believed I would never notice.”
My hands started to shake.
