Chapter 5: The Marriage Was a Lie

“Tell me what your family did to my father, Adrian, because I will not carry your child while living beside a man who knows the truth about my father’s death.”

Adrian stood before me with his phone in his hand, his expression tense as though he was searching for a way to explain something he had spent years trying to bury.

For the first time since our marriage began, I was no longer afraid of losing him; I was afraid that the man I had loved for most of my life had helped destroy my family.

“Sit down, Elena,” he said quietly.

“I don’t want to sit down. I want answers.”

He glanced toward the bedroom door before lowering his voice. “Your father worked for my grandfather. He was the chief accountant at Blackwell Holdings, and he discovered that money was being moved through accounts that didn’t exist on the company’s official records.”

I stared at him, remembering the old photograph my mother kept in a drawer, the one showing my father standing beside a building he had once called his second home.

“He was an accountant,” I whispered. “He never told us anything about that.”

“Because he was afraid.”

“Afraid of your family?”

Adrian nodded slowly. “He collected evidence and planned to take it to the authorities. Before he could, the documents disappeared, and he was accused of stealing millions from the company.”

My throat tightened as memories came rushing back: men arriving at our house, my mother crying behind a locked bedroom door, and the shame I had carried at school when other children called my father a criminal.

“He was innocent,” I said, my voice breaking.

“I believe he was.”

“You believe he was?” I repeated. “You have the power to investigate anything you want, yet you allowed me to grow up believing my father had died with a criminal’s name.”

Adrian looked away, and his silence told me that there was more he was not saying.

“Why did you marry me?”

He took a slow breath. “My grandfather left instructions concerning your family. He believed your father had hidden something before he died, something that could expose what happened at the company. When I learned who you were, I thought marrying you might help me discover the truth.”

The room seemed to grow smaller around me.

“So you chose me because of my father?”

“At first, yes.”

I stepped back as though he had struck me.

For three years, I had tried to become the wife he wanted, convincing myself that if I loved him enough, he would eventually love me in return. I had defended him when my friends questioned our marriage, endured his absences, and celebrated the smallest kindness as though it were proof that my patience was finally paying off.

All that time, he had been investigating me.

“Did you ever love me?” I asked.

His eyes met mine, and for a moment, I thought he might finally tell me something honest.

“I didn’t expect to develop feelings for you.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

He said nothing.

I laughed softly, though tears were already slipping down my cheeks. “You know what hurts most? I would have helped you find the truth if you had simply asked me. Instead, you made me your wife and let me believe our marriage was a chance to build something real.”

“Elena—”

“No. You don’t get to say my name as though that makes this easier.”

I wiped my face and reached for my handbag.

Adrian moved toward me. “Where are you going?”

“To my mother’s house.”

“You’re pregnant. You shouldn’t travel tonight.”

I looked at him, stunned by his sudden concern.

“You were ready to end our marriage yesterday, but now you want to decide where I can go?”

“I’m trying to protect you.”

“From whom, Adrian? Your family, Victoria, or yourself?”

His phone rang before he could answer.

He checked the screen, and his expression changed when he saw the caller’s name.

“It’s my investigator,” he said. “I need to take this.”

“Of course you do.”

He answered, turning away from me, but the caller’s urgent voice carried across the room.

“Sir, we’ve located the original hospital file. The child Victoria claimed to have lost was transferred under a different name. There’s also a document attached to the record.”

Adrian’s shoulders stiffened.

“What document?”

“A letter signed by Daniel Hayes, dated three days before his death.”

My breath caught.

Adrian slowly turned toward me, and I knew from his expression that whatever came next would change everything.

“Read it,” he ordered.

The investigator hesitated before speaking.

“Mr. Hayes wrote that if anything happened to him, the child must be kept away from the Blackwell family. He also named the person responsible for protecting the child.”

“Who?” Adrian demanded.

The answer came through the phone, clear enough for both of us to hear.

“Elena Hayes.”

I stared at the man I had married, unable to understand how my father could have left instructions concerning a child I had never known existed.

Then the investigator added one final detail.

“Sir, there’s something else. The child’s birth certificate lists Elena’s mother as the biological mother.”

My handbag slipped from my fingers and landed on the floor.

My mother had never told me she had another child.

And if the records were genuine, the secret my husband had been chasing for three years was not simply about his family’s past.

It was about my family, too.