Chapter 3

I walked over and gently hugged him, my voice painfully hoarse.

"Dad." I closed my eyes and forced all the pain down. "Mom's having an affair."

Dad went rigid. He stood frozen for a moment, then braced himself against the table and slowly sat down. He stared at me blankly, as if he couldn't understand what I'd just said.

I didn't hide anything from him. I told him everything about my stolen enrollment record from beginning to end.

With every word, more color drained from his face.

By the time I finished, he covered his mouth as tears streamed down his face, his shoulders trembling uncontrollably.

"How... how could this happen?" he muttered, his voice filled with pain and disbelief. "Conor, you spent this past year preparing to retake the exam because of them? Because they stole your score and lied to you about failing?"

I nodded, and the tears I'd been holding back finally fell.

"Yes, Dad. I didn't fail. I got into Briarwood. Mom gave my enrollment record to her illegitimate son. Cassidy knew about it too. She's been lying to me this whole time."

"Cassidy..." Dad broke down even harder. "When you were kids, she fell through the ice, and you jumped in without a second thought to save her. You were only eight. You nearly died yourself...

"How could she do this to you? How could she?"

My chest tightened. I remembered that day.

It had been the dead of winter. Cassidy had been fooling around when she fell through the ice, and I'd jumped in after her without thinking. I nearly went into shock from the cold and spent an entire week in the hospital.

After that, she always said I'd saved her life. She said she'd love me forever.

Was this what she'd meant by "love"? Giving my future to Mom's illegitimate son?

Dad sighed and began telling me about things that had happened even earlier.

Grandpa had doted on his son. He'd personally put up the money for Mom to start her company and helped her get established.

But as soon as Grandpa died three years ago, Mom changed. Claiming the company was struggling, she stopped contributing to the household expenses.

Then she pressured Dad to give up his entire social life and focus solely on being a stay-at-home husband, leaving him without even a little spending money of his own.

Dad hadn't wanted me to worry, so he'd kept it from me. He'd secretly taken odd jobs to help cover our expenses.

It wasn't that he'd never noticed anything strange about Mom: coming home late, guarding her phone constantly, and growing more irritable by the day.

He'd assumed it was work stress, maybe even a temporary flirtation. He'd never imagined she'd had an illegitimate son all along, much less that she'd conspired with outsiders to destroy my future.

I helped Dad sit down and showed him Gavin's posts.

His life was dazzling in the worst possible way. Designer watches, limited-edition sneakers, expensive restaurants, trips around the world…

Mom showered him with money, yet she was so stingy with her own husband and son that she wouldn't even buy us a carton of milk.

Dad and I had been living on canned soup and toast, unable to justify even buying new clothes.

Meanwhile, she was spending our family's money to treat another boy like a prince.

The more Dad saw, the more determined his expression became. He wiped away his tears and took my hand. His palm was cold, but his grip was firm.

"Conor, I'm divorcing her. I have to. We can't keep putting up with this. If we do, they'll only keep taking more from us."

I tightened my hand around his and lowered my voice.

"Divorce her, yes. But we can't let them know what we've discovered yet. They stole my enrollment record. They stole the assets Grandpa left behind. They stole our lives. We can't let them get away with it this easily."