Chapter 203

"You need to open it, Dee."

Yemi’s voice was steady, but I could hear the undercurrent of tension beneath it. He sat across from me at the dining table, his eyes locked onto the envelope resting between us like a bomb waiting to detonate.

I swallowed, my fingers hovering over the paper. My pulse pounded in my ears.

"What if it changes everything?" I whispered.

"Then we face it together," Yemi said without hesitation.

But did he mean that? Would he still look at me the same way after this?

I exhaled sharply and ripped open the envelope. My hands trembled as I pulled out the DNA test results, my eyes darting over the black-and-white text.

And then my breath caught.

"Oh my God."

Yemi was already on his feet, moving beside me. He took the paper from my hands, scanning the results. His expression didn’t change at first. But then his jaw tightened, and his fingers curled around the edge of the document.

"Malik was telling the truth," I murmured.

The words felt foreign in my mouth. Impossible. But there they were, printed in clear, undeniable proof.

Malik was not just my ex-husband.

He was my brother.

I felt like the ground had been ripped out from beneath me. Everything I thought I knew about my past, about my family—it was all a lie.

"Dee..." Yemi’s voice was careful now, like he was afraid I might shatter.

I pressed my fingers to my temples, my thoughts a tangled mess. "How? How could this have been kept from me?"

Malik’s words from the night before echoed in my mind: Someone’s been manipulating you for years.

The truth hit me in waves. My entire marriage to Malik had been orchestrated. I had been married to a man who was my own blood.

"Who did this to me?" I choked out.

"Your mother," Yemi said grimly, pointing to the next section of the document.

And there it was.

The DNA test confirmed it. My mother had lied. She had hidden this secret from me for my entire life. She had let me walk blindly into a marriage with a man she knew was my brother.

My stomach twisted. "She knew."

Yemi didn’t respond. He just placed a hand on my back, grounding me as the weight of the revelation crushed down on me.

I shot up from my chair. "I need to talk to her."

"Dee, wait—"

But I was already moving, my vision blurred with rage and betrayal.

The moment I stepped into my mother’s house, she looked up from the couch, her expression wary. She knew.

"Tell me it’s a lie," I demanded, throwing the papers onto the coffee table in front of her.

She didn’t even glance at them. Her face remained eerily calm. "I was hoping you’d never find out."

"You were hoping?!" My voice cracked. "You let me marry my brother, Mom! How could you do that to me?"

She exhaled, her eyes tired. "It’s not as simple as you think."

I let out a bitter laugh. "Oh, really? Because from where I’m standing, it’s pretty damn simple. You lied. You let me live a lie."

"I was trying to protect you."

I stared at her in disbelief. "Protect me?"

She nodded, folding her hands in her lap. "Your father—your real father—was a dangerous man, Dee. I had to keep you safe. I did what I had to do."

"By letting me marry Malik?" My voice was raw now. "By keeping me in the dark my entire life?"

"I didn’t plan for you to marry him," she admitted, her voice softer now. "That part... that part wasn’t supposed to happen. But once it did, I couldn’t undo it. I thought—" She hesitated, her hands gripping each other tightly. "I thought if you never found out, you could move on."

I took a step back, shaking my head. "You thought I could move on from a lie?"

"I thought you could move on from him," she corrected. "That’s why I supported the divorce. That’s why I never wanted you to look back."

My breath came in ragged pulls. "Who is my real father?"

She hesitated.

"Tell me!"

Her shoulders slumped. "I don’t know his real name. I only knew him as Khalid."

Khalid. The name meant nothing to me, but the way she said it—like it held power over her—sent chills down my spine.

"He was a dangerous man," she continued. "And he never knew about you. If he had..." She trailed off, shaking her head. "It would have destroyed you."

I couldn’t breathe.

Everything was unraveling. My identity. My past.

And then, the front door creaked open behind me.

I turned to find Malik standing there, his eyes locked onto my mother with an expression I couldn’t decipher.

"You lied to both of us," he said, his voice quiet but full of something dangerous.

For the first time, my mother looked shaken.

"Malik, please—"

But he wasn’t listening.

And then, before I could process what was happening, he reached into his jacket—and pulled out a gun.

I gasped, stepping back. "Malik, what are you doing?"

His eyes burned with something dark. "If our father really was a monster, then someone out there knows the truth. And I want answers."

He turned the gun on my mother.

"And I think she has them."