Leonard turned to look at her. “What?” Rebecca’s expression didn’t change, but her jaw tensed. How funny. The prince didn’t know the whole story. “Your mom hid things from you too,” I told Leonard. “Seems it’s a family tradition.” “Shut up.” “Did she tell you Matthew wanted to acknowledge me?” Leonard went completely still. Rebecca was faster. “Lies.”
Robert opened a drawer, pulled out a simple copy, and placed it on the table. “Draft of acknowledgment. Dated six months ago. Matthew’s preliminary signature.”Leonard took the paper. He read it. His face went from mockery to fear. “Mom…” “That holds no validity,” Rebecca said. “Not yet,” Robert answered. “But it serves to ask questions. And there are very curious judges out there when a sick man changes doctors right after trying to acknowledge a daughter.” Rebecca looked at me then as if she were finally seeing me. Not as a poor girl. Not as a mistake. As a threat.
“You don’t know who you’re messing with.” “Yes I do,” I said. “With the woman who was terrified of a seamstress for eighteen years.” The slap came fast. I didn’t see it coming. My face, my ear, my pride all burned. Leonard took a step back, surprised. Robert shouted her name. The guards shifted. But I didn’t fall. I brought my hand to my cheek and looked at her. Then I smiled. Because up in the corner of the office, there was a camera. Rebecca saw it too. Too late. Robert spoke with deadly calm. “Thank you. That makes things much easier.” Rebecca’s face cracked for just a second. Then she regained control, picked up her folder, and walked toward the door.
“You have forty-eight hours to accept the offer,” she told me. “After that, you’re going to find out that blood is useless when you don’t have the last name.”
Before leaving, she leaned in toward me. “And tell Thomas I still remember him.”
The door closed. I went cold. “Thomas?” I whispered.
Robert didn’t look at me. And that was my first warning.
“Why did she say that?” The lawyer stayed silent. “Robert.”
He took a deep breath, like someone who knows he’s about to break another life. “Because Thomas didn’t just marry your mom to protect her.”
I felt all my exhaustion vanish at once. “What are you saying?”
Robert opened the metal box again and pulled out an old photo. My mom, young. Thomas, young. Matthew behind them. And Rebecca in the center, with a hand resting on Thomas’s shoulder. Too close. Too familiar.
On the back of the photo, a date was written. One year before I was born. Robert handed it to me.
“Before working for Matthew, Thomas worked for Rebecca.”
My cell phone buzzed right at that moment. It was a text from Thomas. “Sophia, don’t come back home. There are things your mom didn’t let me tell you.”
Below it came a photo. The front door of our house was open. And in the living room, sitting like a queen among my mom’s old furniture, was Rebecca Sterling.
