“You will never understand what it feels like to be nothing to the person who was supposed to protect you,” I say, each word scraping my throat.“Your father madepromiseshe never kept. I lost my mother because of those promises. You losing your husband, who choseme, doesn’t compare. I never forced Colin into anything. Hechoseme.”
She looks at me like I’m the evil witch in her story. Like she’s trying to make sense of it, even as every part of her pulls away from me.
For a fleeting second, there’s something in her eyes. Something that looks a little like pity. A little like disbelief.
“I’m sorry for what happened to you as a child,” she says, her voice low. “No one, no little girl, should ever have to live through something like that.” She softens. “What happened to your mother… What you went through. It’s horrible.”
She swallows hard, refusing to look away.
“But that doesn’t absolve you, Maya. Pain doesn’t justify the damage you’ve done. You’re an adult now. You made choices. Selfish, conscious choices that tore apart lives completely unrelated to what my father did.”
She hesitates. “My daughter is almost the same age you were back then. Did you ever stop to think about that?”
Her voice wavers, just for a second.
“And the worst part is,” she continues, “I don’t see even a flicker of remorse in you. Not one.”
It hurts.But beneath the hurt, something hotter begins to simmer.
“You’re twisting everything because you don’t understand,” I say, my voice low, trembling but defiant. “Because it’s easier that way. IloveColin. Maybe it didn’t start like that. Maybe at first it was about revenge. About making your father pay.” I swallow. “But I love him. I do.”
I think about how it all began. Ten months ago, one click changed everything.
I was drunk, drowning in memories on the anniversary of my mother’s death. I hadn’t allowed that in years.
I opened Facebook.I typed his name.
There he was.Philip.
A public profile. Like someone who has nothing to hide.
Smiling, his arm wrapped around his precious daughter and son-in-law. A caption drenched in love and gratitude. Laughing emojis. Hearts everywhere. Everyone talking about how beautiful their family was.
How happy.
Pictures of trips, birthdays, grandkids. That perfect life he’d built on top of lies and deceit.People praising how good he looked, how kind time had been to him. Smiles in every picture… no trace of the man who left my mother to die alone.
No sign of what he did.
That was the moment anger and grief stopped being just pain. It became a plan.
At first it was a stupid game.
It would be easy—imply, provoke, be the distraction married men always fall for. Colin wasn’t the first. I’d done this before.
And I never regretted the fallout.
I’d seduce him, get the proof, and send everything to his wife. The texts. The pictures. The videos. The humiliation laid bare. And of course, I’d include the photos of her father with my mother, so she could see exactly what kind of men both her father and her husband really were.
I wanted Philip to watch his perfect little family collapse and realize how easy it was to tear the curtain away.
It wasn’t hard to get into Montgomery & Clifford when new positions opened up. My internship at an investment bank and my academic record spoke for themselves. I didn’t need anyone’s help.
Then Colin happened.
He wasn’t what I expected. He wasn’t easy. He wasn’t blind.
He looked at me in a way that disarmed me—like he saw right through every layer I’d built.
