“Too late,” Lynn snapped. Her voice was harsh, sharp. Nina felt goosebumps run down her arms.“You should’ve talked twenty years ago. I have nothing to hear from either of you now.”
Nina stepped forward. Her breath stumbled. Guilt twisted inside her like a blade.
“I’m sorry…”
“Really?” Lynn turned abruptly. Her eyes flashed like a trapped animal's.“Well, I’m sorry I ended up witha lying mother and father! You,” she jabbed her finger at Jasper “you told me she was dead. Looks like we’ve got a miracle today—my mother has risen from the grave!”
Jasper opened his mouth to speak, but Lynn cut him off:
“You watched me suffer. You knew how badly I wanted a mother. How I looked at other kids in daycare and school. How I hoped… And she was here. Alive. In the same city. Close enough to touch. And none of you thought I deserved to know!”
Nina couldn’t hold it in. Her voice broke.
“I… I was a different person back then. My father hated Jasper, and Jasper’s family hated me…” She began improvising, relying on the same story Jasper had fed Vivian once. Lynn couldn’t learn the truth—not this truth. She could hate Nina if she had to, but not Jasper. He’d raised her, loved her, protected her. And Nina… let her bear the anger herself.“I was engaged to someone else… and we… thought it would be better this way. Lynn, please, I—”
““Better?” Lynn’s voice cracked with disbelief. “You decided what my life should look like. And you,” she turned her burning gaze on Nina, “did you ever want to see me? To even know how I was doing? Not once, Nina? You weren’t curious what your daughter looked like, if she was okay? Or did you two secretly exchange pictures of me?”
She let out a laugh—short, fractured, frightening.
Nina had no answer.
If she could turn back time, she wouldn’t have left Lynn. She would’ve been stronger. She would’ve embraced her child instead of letting her birth be overshadowed by trauma.
She stayed silent, gulping down air as if drowning in it. Tears burned in her throat.
“You could have! Once! Just once!” Lynn nearly shouted.“You could’ve come in secret. Told me you loved me. So I’d know I had a mother. But you didn’t even try.”
“I couldn’t…” Nina whispered hoarsely.“I was too weak back then. I lived by my father’s rules. And he…”
“He what?! Chained you to a radiator?” Lynn screamed.“What excuse is there for a mother who abandons her child?! You didn’t even try to see if I was alive or happy! Did you hate me that much?!”
Nina lowered her gaze.
Jasper stepped forward.
“That’s not true. Things were complicated. Your mother was engaged at the time. Our families were at war with each other. No one would’ve accepted a child from that situation. You know why your grandfather and I barely spoke for years. When Nina got pregnant, a decision was made to leave you with my family to give you stability. We were too young—”
“You were both cowards,” Lynn shot back coldly.
“We tried to protect you.”
“From what?” she shouted.“The truth? You’re both liars. And your version is soaked in lies. I don’t believe a word. All of this sounds like a cover-up. What am I supposed to believe? That the best father I’ve ever had was a rapist? Or that my mother is a heartless woman who gave her child away and never cared enough to look for her?”
She stopped, breathing hard.
“In any case, I don’t want to see either of you.”
Lynn stormed out, slamming the door shut.
“Lynn!” Jasper called after her, but he didn’t follow.
Silence fell.
Nina slowly sank onto the edge of a chair. Her lips trembled. She barely breathed. Then the tears came—quiet, broken, impossible to stop.
Jasper came over. Sat beside her. Wrapped his arms around her. She didn’t pull away—instead, she leaned into him, sobbing even harder.
“What happens now?” she whispered through her tears, seeking comfort from the man she’d hated for half her life and believed to be a monster.
