Chapter 24: The Price Of Love

My fingers were shaking as I clicked through the files on the USB drive. I expected to see old photos from France twenty-five years ago. But when the first image popped up on the screen, I gasped. It was my mother, Susan. She was sitting in a small, old cafe. She looked happy. But the man sitting across from her wasn't my father, Thomas. It was Arthur Vance.

The dates at the bottom of the photo were from 2001 to 2015.

"No," I whispered. My heart was beating hard. "This can't be right."

I opened a document file. It was a list of bank payments. Every month, for twenty-five years, a large amount of money was sent from a private Vance account to a hidden account in my mother’s name.

The door to the room opens.

"Serena, honey? I brought you some clean clothes from home."

It was my mother’s voice. She sounded so normal, so sweet.

Lily didn’t bother acknowledging her presence before walking out of the room.

I turned the laptop screen towards her. My mother stood there, holding a small bag. Her eyes on the screen. The bag slipped from her hand and dropped to the floor. Her face went from pink to white in a second.

"Mom," I said, "who is this man in the pictures with you? And why has he been giving you money over the years?"

My mother didn't move. She looked shocked. "Serena, I... I don't know what that is. Someone is trying to trick you.”

"Don't lie to me!" I screamed. My own voice scared me. "These aren't fake! Look at the dates!.”

My father stood up from the corner. He walked over to the bed and looked at the screen. He covered his eyes with his hands and began to cry.

"Susan," he whispered. "You told me it was over. You told me France was a mistake that ended years ago."

My mother looked at my father and then back at me. She tried to put on her "mother" face again. She tried to smile, but it looked fake. "Thomas, Serena, please. Arthur was a powerful man. He wouldn't let me go. He said if I didn't see him, he would expose the affair.”

"Lily says Eleanor was his daughter. Is that why he was sending you money? Or was he paying you because I'm his daughter too?"

"No!" my mother shouted. "You are Thomas’s daughter! I swear on my life!"

"Then why did you keep seeing him?" I asked. "Why did you take his money for twenty-five years? You let my father work two jobs at the garage while you had a secret fortune in the bank! You lied to everyone!"

My mother sank into the chair by the door. "I did it for you girls," she cried. "Arthur loved me. He never loved Lily. He wanted a family with me.”

"You mean you couldn't say no to the money," I said coldly.

"It wasn't just money!" she cried. "He was the love of my life, Serena! Thomas is a good man, but Arthur made me feel alive. I tried to stay away, but every time he called, I went to him. He was sure that you might be his, too. He wanted to change his will for you."

I felt sick. I looked at the photos again. My mother looked so happy with the man who was Edward’s father. While Edward was growing up in a cold house with a mean mother, my mother was meeting Arthur in secret. He gave her the love he didn't give his own son.

The door opened again. Edward walked in. He stopped when he saw my mother crying and the laptop open. He looked at me, then at the screen. He saw the photos. He saw his father, the man he missed every day, smiling at my mother in a way he had never smiled at Lily.

Edward didn't say a word. He walked over to the laptop and closed it.

"Edward, I can explain," my mother said.

"Get out," Edward said. His voice was low, but it was the scariest thing I had ever heard.

"Edward, please, I am Serena’s mother—"

"I said get out!" Edward shouted. He pointed at the door. "If you are not out of this room in five seconds, I will have the guards throw you out of this hospital. And if I ever see you near my wife again, I will make sure you spend the rest of your life in jail.”

My mother grabbed her bag and ran out of the room, crying. My father looked at me with tears in his eyes.

"I'm sorry, Serena," he said softly. "I really didn't know it was still happening." He followed her out, looking like a man who had lost everything.

The room was silent for a long time. Edward stood by the window, his back to me.

"Edward?" I whispered.

He turned around. His eyes were red. "All those years," he said. "I thought he was working. I thought he was busy with the company. But he was with her."

"I didn't know, Edward. I swear," I said.

"I know you didn't," he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. He looked very tired. "But this changes everything. If Louise has those letters and those photos, she won't just stop until she destroys everything. She will tell the board that I am not fit to lead because I married the daughter of my father's lover."

"But am I his daughter?" I asked. "That’s the only thing that matters right now."

Edward nodded. He looked at the door. "The doctor is here."

A man in a white coat walked in. He looked very serious. He held a small medical kit. He didn't look like the normal hospital staff. He looked like someone Edward had paid a lot of money to be there.

"Mr. Vance, Mrs. Vance," the doctor said. "I have the DNA kits. We will do a test to see if you are siblings.”

I looked at the cotton swab in the doctor’s hand. This little piece of cotton held my whole future. If the test said yes, Edward and I were over. Our baby would be a mistake. Our love would be a crime.

"Do it," I said, opening my mouth.

The doctor rubbed the swab inside my cheek. Then he did the same to Edward. He placed the swabs into small plastic tubes and put labels on them.

"How long?" Edward asked.

"I will take these to my private lab," the doctor said. "Because this is a top case, I will have the results in forty-eight hours."

The doctor left. The room felt colder than before. Edward sat next to me and took my hand. His hand was cold, but he held mine tightly.

"Forty-eight hours," I whispered.

"Forty-eight hours," Edward said back.

We sat there together in silence, two people stuck in a web of lies that started before we were even born. We just watched the sun move higher in the sky, waiting for a piece of paper to tell us if we were allowed to love each other.