Page 181 of Broken Destiny
Tears streamed down her face.
“When your accident happened… when Jeremy returned… when the girls were kidnapped…” She pressed a trembling hand against her mouth. “It confirmed every fear I already had. I was certain that she might use that connection against us if she ever discovered who her father was… that she might expose what happened or try to force us into paying for something we could never admit publicly.”
“You mean every lie you convinced yourself to believe,” Sophia snapped.
My mother looked shattered.
“Her father had asked for money once,” she continued, her hands trembling as she clasped them together. “HR directed him to me after the accident, and he came to my office desperate and pleading for help. When I refused, he accepted the decision quietly, but the situation stayed with me. I knew how easily financial desperation could turn into resentment… into lawsuits… into revenge.”
My jaw clenched as heat surged through my chest.
“And the DNA test?” I asked. “The surveillance? The investigations?”
“I needed proof,” she whispered helplessly. “Something to justify what I felt. I saw her background and her past, and I convinced myself history was repeating itself.”
Her voice cracked harder.
“You were my son, Caleb. Mine to protect. I became so consumed with protecting you that I stopped seeing what I was doing to her. And every time I looked at her, I saw risk. I saw someone who could pull you into instability, scandal, and pain. I convinced myself she wanted your money, your name, your security… because I couldn’t understand why someone like her would fit into this family otherwise.”
My father exhaled slowly. His expression was grim, his shoulders tense in a way I had rarely seen before.
“You judged that girl because of her father,” he said quietly, looking directly at my mother. “A man who was desperate to live after an accident that happened in our own company.” His jaw ticked. “Jiya didn’t even know him. Yet you condemned her for his life… as if his misfortune was written into her existence. And because she didn’t come from the kind of world you imagined for Caleb.”
“I told myself I was protecting Caleb from being used.” Her voice broke completely. “But somewhere along the way, I stopped seeing her as a person.”
Tears streamed down her face.
“I saw her as a threat and everything I didn’t want for my son.”
“She loved me,” I said hoarsely. “And I punished her for it.”
The room fell silent again.
Then suddenly, running footsteps thundered down the hallway.
The children burst into the dining room laughing breathlessly.
My mother wiped her tears quickly, trying to compose herself.
“We’re thirsty,” Adam said, his voice breathless. “We came in for a drink.”
“Are you guys watching a movie?” Malaika asked, pointing at the laptop screen.
“No, honey,” Simon replied gently. “The adults are talking right now. Why don’t you go to the kitchen and get a drink from there?”
Malaika leaned forward, squinting at the screen.
Then her face lit up.
“I know her!”
Every muscle in my body locked.
Simon frowned. “Sweetheart?—”
“No, Daddy!” she insisted, pointing toward the screen. “That’s the lady from the hospital!”
The air seemed to vanish from the room.
