All Chapters of Daddy by deception - My ex husband's fake heirs: Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

The proposal did not arrive with an audience or a spectacle.It arrived on a quiet Sunday evening in Cathrene’s apartment, after Amara had spent the afternoon with them and been driven home to her grandmother for the night. The remains of an ordinary dinner were still on the counter. The balcony doors were open to the cooler air. Benjamin had been unusually quiet for the last part of the meal, not distant, only thoughtful in a way Cathrene had learned to recognize as him arranging something carefully in his mind.She was rinsing a plate when he said her name.“Cathrene.”She turned off the water and dried her hands. He was standing near the table, not close enough to crowd her, the soft light from the lamp catching the seriousness in his face.“I want to say something properly,” he began. “I’ve thought about the timing. About Amara. About the fact that your divorce isn’t fully finalized on paper yet. About all the reasons a careful person might wait.” He paused. “I don’t want to wait

Gregory did not contact Cathrene’s stepfamily himself. He was too careful for that.Instead, he allowed the information to travel through a channel that would never be traced back to a single conversation in his parents’ dining room. Vivian Thornton, once supplied with the essential details — the divorce, the speed of Cathrene’s recovery, the existence of a man with a child — required very little encouragement. She had always considered Cathrene’s side of the family useful when they reinforced hierarchy and inconvenient when they did not. A former daughter-in-law who appeared to be thriving too quickly was, in Vivian’s view, a social imbalance that ought to be corrected by her own people.Within a week, the news had landed where Gregory intended.---Cathrene’s stepmother, Mrs. Adele Senghor, received the information over tea with a woman she had known for years through charity committees. The conversation began with polite inquiries and ended with a carefully framed remark:“Of cou

The second confrontation did not wait for a formal invitation.Two days after the sitting-room ambush, Marianne and Celeste arrived at Cathrene’s apartment unannounced. She opened the door to find them standing in the hallway like a verdict, polished and tightly coiled. For a moment she considered closing the door again. Instead she stepped aside and let them in.They did not sit.Marianne’s gaze moved over the apartment with quick, dismissive assessment — the modest furniture, the single plant, the absence of anything that looked like old Thornton money. Celeste’s attention stopped on Cathrene’s left hand. The ring was simple, but it was enough.“So it’s true,” Celeste said. “You’re engaged.”Cathrene closed the door. “I am.”“To the widower,” Marianne added. “The one with the child.”“His name is Benjamin.”Celeste let out a short, incredulous breath. “Of course you defend him. You’ve always been gifted at rearranging facts until they look like principles.”Cathrene remained standin

Benjamin told her the next evening.He did not bury it under small talk or wait for a more convenient hour. He came to her apartment after Amara was with her grandmother, stood in the kitchen while Cathrene poured water neither of them would drink, and said simply, “Your step-sister Marianne came to the site yesterday.”Cathrene’s hand stilled on the glass. “What did she want?”“To warn me off.”He watched the knowledge land in her face — first disbelief, then the grim recognition that of course they would escalate, of course they would not stop at confronting her alone. She set the glass down carefully.“What did she say?”Benjamin did not soften it. “That you were complicated. That the divorce was barely finished. That your marriage failed because you could not give Gregory a child. That I should leave before I inherited a second failure that was never mine.”The silence that followed was sharp enough to hurt. Cathrene turned away toward the window, arms folded tightly across her mi

The decision did not arrive in a single dramatic hour. It settled over the next two days like sediment finding its final level.Cathrene went to work. She answered emails. She sat through a strategy meeting in which she spoke clearly and precisely while the private noise of the week continued underneath every sentence. On the surface she remained intact. Underneath, she was sorting what could still be salvaged from the people who had raised her alongside resentment, and what had to be released for good.By Thursday evening she knew.She asked Benjamin to come over after Amara was asleep. He arrived without questions, kissed her temple, and waited until she was ready to speak. They sat at the small table with the balcony door open to the cooler night air. For a while neither of them rushed the silence.“I’ve been thinking about sides,” Cathrene said eventually. “All my life there were sides I was expected to manage. My family’s side. Gregory’s family’s side. The marriage’s side. Even