Mom smirked. “He loves her, not you. Let him go with the house and money.”
I signed the divorce papers. He can have her. But the house and money are mine.
My mother didn’t even blink when she told me to hand over my husband. She just sliced her steak. I looked around the table. My father was staring at his wine glass, refusing to meet my eyes. My sister Brenda was glowing, her hand resting protectively over a slight bump in her belly that I hadn’t noticed until ten seconds ago. And Greg, my husband of ten years—the man who had kissed me goodbye this morning and told me he loved me—was holding Brenda’s other hand.
“Excuse me,” I whispered. My voice sounded small, pathetic. It was the voice of the little girl who used to apologize for existing in this house.
Greg finally looked at me. His eyes weren’t filled with guilt; they were filled with defiance. “Valerie, please don’t make a scene,” he said, his tone condescending—the way one speaks to a hysterical child. “We didn’t want to tell you like this, but we couldn’t hide it anymore. Brenda is four months along. We’re in love.”
I felt the blood drain from my face. “Four months? You’ve been sleeping with my sister for four months?”
“Longer,” Brenda chimed in. She smirked, a tiny, cruel curling of her lips that I knew so well. “Whatever, Val. The timeline doesn’t matter. What matters is that we are a family now. A real family. Something you obviously couldn’t give him.”
That was done. It was a direct shot at our fertility struggles, the years of negative tests, the nights I cried in Greg’s arms while he whispered that it didn’t matter, that we were enough. It was all a lie.
I looked at my mother, Joyce. Surely, she would be outraged. Surely, she would slap Greg across the face and throw him out. But she just took a sip of her wine and sighed. “Valerie, look at the facts. You are a career woman. You are always traveling, always obsessed with your company. You are strong. You can survive on your own. But Brenda… she’s delicate. She needs a provider. And this baby, this is my grandchild, my flesh and blood.”
“I am your flesh and blood, too!” I snapped, my voice rising. “He is my husband!”
“Technically,” my father, Harold, grunted. He finally looked up. “But the marriage is effectively over, isn’t it? You two have been drifting apart. We all see it. Greg is happy with Brenda. Look at them.”
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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