Chapter 3
While they were still going on and on, the restaurant manager walked over and handed me a microphone.
“Since today’s both a birthday party and graduation celebration for your sons, would you like to say a few words as their mother? Maybe share some parenting wisdom?”
I took the mic.
“Thanks everyone for coming to Gabriel and Raphael’s graduation party. Today…”
“Both my sons just got into Harvard today. On a day like this, how could their biological parents not be here?”
I was cut off mid-sentence.
A man and woman walked in hand-in-hand.
I looked up, and even after eighteen years, I immediately recognized my supposedly dead husband Theodore Quinn and his mistress Ava Whitman.
The entire room erupted-everyone started talking at once.
My in-laws, sitting at the head table, saw their “dead” son come back to life but didn’t seem shocked at all. In fact, they were eerily calm.
They even pulled Ava over to sit with them.
Theodore-“dead” for eighteen years-walked straight up to me.
“Harper, you might’ve been a shit wife, but damn, you’re one hell of a babysitter.”
My sons finally snapped out of their shock.
“What is going on?”
S
Theodore pointed at Ava. “She’s your real mom. This woman here? She’s just a dried-up, worthless piece of work who can’t even get pregnant.”
“If this psycho hadn’t threatened to off herself every time I tried to divorce her ass, our family wouldn’t have been torn apart for eighteen fucking
years!”
Before I could say anything, the Quinn family members at the main table started piling on:
“That’s right! Harper’s the one who held onto Theodore like some desperate stalker. That’s why you boys couldn’t be with your real parents…”
“Sure, Harper raised you well, but she’s got a nasty streak.”
“Thank God you’re finally grown up and successful-now your real family can be together!”
My sons looked completely shell-shocked,.
Ava started her waterworks, grabbing both boys’ hands while pulling out her phone:
“I’m your actual mother, sweethearts! I’ve been sending you presents every single year.”
“I even snuck around to watch you after school-I never stopped caring!”
Then she turned to me with fake gratitude.
“Harper, honey, bless your heart for taking such good care of MY babies.”
Theodore wrapped his arm around her, shooting me the most condescending look.
“You’re gonna march your ass down to the courthouse with me tomorrow. Eighteen years is long enough-I’m marrying Ava and giving her what she
Everyone expected me to lose my shit, maybe start screaming.
But facing dozens of Quinn family members and all their hungry stares, I just smiled.
“Absolutely! Let’s do it. Time for your perfect little family of four to be together.”
My words hit like a bomb. Everyone’s jaws just dropped.
Give up the sons I’d busted my ass raising for eighteen years? Just like that?
Even Theodore and Ava looked like they’d seen a ghost.
They’d been ready for tears, begging, maybe some plate-throwing. The last thing they expected was for me to roll over this easily.
Theodore stared at me like I’d completely lost it.
“Are you fucking nuts?”
I met his stare head-on.
‘What? Having second thoughts?”
Ava quickly grabbed Theodore’s arm.
He caught on fast, frantically digging some papers out of his bag like I might change my mind any second.
‘Then sign this right now. After today, those boys are nothing to you. Don’t even think about contacting them.”
I didn’t bother reading a single word-just scrawled my signature at the bottom.
‘Mom? You’re really… you’re just gonna dump us?”
The boys looked absolutely devastated, totally lost as to how I could give up so easily.
Ava snatched up the papers with a victorious smirk.
‘Thanks so much for making this easy, Harper.”
‘Honestly, if you hadn’t been such a good little caretaker, Theo and I never could’ve enjoyed ourselves for so long.”
Looking at my two six-foot-tall sons, Ava was practically glowing with triumph.
‘Well, that’s that. Nothing left for you here-time to go.”
My former father-in-law waved me off like I was some annoying servant.
“Actually, hold up. Now that those papers are signed, I think it’s about time everyone learned what really happened here.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Ava’s smug expression faltered.
I took the deepest breath of my life. Eighteen years of waiting, and it was finally time.
I clapped my hands toward the entrance. “Come in.”
A few seconds later, two figures stepped into the doorway…
