Chapter 10 - what my mother chose
I had asked that question before in one form or another.
Never so directly.
What exactly do you think I had?
The answer mattered because it had lived underneath everything between my sister and me—every swallowed insult, every family holiday bent around her moods, every moment my mother asked me to be the bigger person because Beatatrice was more fragile, more emotional, more likely to shatter.
My mother sank into one of Damon’s dining chairs like her legs no longer trusted her.
“A father who looked at you and saw himself,” she said quietly.
I blinked.
That was not the answer I expected.
“My father loved both of us.”
“Yes,” she said quickly. “He did. But you were easier for him. Calmer. Steadier. He trusted you. And Beatatrice…” Her voice trailed off.
“Beatatrice what?”
“She always felt second.”
The old family story. The ancient permission slip. My sister hurt people because she hurt. Therefore we must all be gentle with the knife.
I looked at her and felt something inside me finally settle—not into peace, but into certainty.
“No,” I said. “Beatatrice wasn’t second. She was protected. There’s a difference.”
My mother’s eyes filled again.
Andre stayed silent. Damon stared out the window with both hands braced on the counter. Even Elena remained near the fireplace, still as a witness.
I stepped closer to my mother.
“You taught her that wanting something badly enough excused taking it,” I said. “You taught her that tears could erase damage. You taught me that speaking up made me cruel and taught her that hurting me made her delicate.”
“Jodie—”
“No. You don’t get to reduce this to sister jealousy. She announced her fake future using my stolen name at my baby shower while hiding a paternity scam from her husband. This isn’t a wound from childhood. This is character.”
My mother started crying harder.
I didn’t stop.
“Do you know what hurts most?” I asked. “Not the shower. Not even the lie. It’s that you watched her build this whole mess and still expected me to carry the moral burden for exposing it.”
No one moved.
I could see Beatatrice on the couch from the corner of my eye, one hand pressed against her stomach, face pale and strangely empty. For the first time since I’d known her, she didn’t seem interested in interrupting. Maybe she finally understood that some performances are over whether the actor agrees or not.
Damon turned back into the room.
“My attorney can arrange a noninvasive prenatal paternity test,” he said. “I want it done immediately.”
Beatatrice’s head lifted. “I don’t consent.”
He nodded once. “Then you can explain that refusal to a judge when I file emergency motions regarding trust exposure and fraud.”
Her eyes widened.
Elena spoke quietly. “Take the test, Beatatrice. At this point denial is just extra humiliation.”
Beatatrice laughed weakly. “Easy for you to say.”
“Yes,” Elena replied. “I’m not the one who built my future on a forged baby.”
That shut everyone up.
Before I left, I turned back to Beatatrice.
“Did you ever intend to tell Damon the truth?”
She looked at me for a long time.
Then she said, “Not until the money cleared.”
There was my answer.
Cold.
Plain.
Undeniable.
I didn’t say another word.
I walked out of Damon’s house with Andre beside me and Cory texting me every five minutes for updates. I thought I had reached the limit of what could be broken in a weekend.
I was wrong.
Because when I got home, there was a voicemail from my doctor’s office asking me to call back about my latest bloodwork.
May you like
And when I returned the call, the nurse’s first sentence was:
“We need to talk about your stress levels immediately.”
