Chapter 8
“I have no idea what you’re talking about!”
The man’s face turned even paler. He coughed a few times, his frail body swaying as if he might collapse at any moment.
I stared at him coldly. “You got divorced because you raped your daughter–in–law. That’s why you were thrown out. That’s why you haven’t dared show your face at home for over 20 years!”
His fists clenched tight, his face flushing red with anger. “She seduced me! Why else would a married woman wear shorts in the middle of summer? She knew there was a man in the house and still dressed so provocatively. If that’s not seduction, what is?!”
Right now, he looked like a rabid dog, furious and powerless.
I pressed on. “You raped Wren and were cast out. When Blake and Lukas died, you never showed up. But now you suddenly appear, pretending you want to help me. What are you really after?”
He coughed again, quickly composing himself before forcing a smile back onto his face. “I’m just worried about you, that’s all. Don’t worry, I’m old now. I couldn’t hurt anyone even if I wanted to. Just think of me as coming here to atone for my sins.”
If I hadn’t seen everything on Lukas’s computer, maybe I really would have believed him.
Without hesitation, I kicked him. He was caught off guard, falling hard onto the pavement, coughing uncontrollably. He struggled several times, but couldn’t manage to get up.
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Chapter 8
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He glared at me with seething rage. “You and that cursed child in your belly brought ruin to my entire family, and now I try to help you, and this is how you repay me?!”
The absurdity of it made me laugh until my eyes filled with tears.
Back then, Lukas’s grandfather–Charles Tilley–was the backbone of the family. After he raped Wren, he wasn’t immediately thrown out. Wren endured it for the sake of the family, swallowing her pain and humiliation.
But Charles only grew bolder, demanding Wren sleep with him again and again.
He made no effort to hide it, so soon enough, everyone in the family knew. A dark cloud settled over the house.
Charles was then suddenly diagnosed with heart disease. The family became too busy scrambling to save him to deal with anything else.
Decades ago, everyone was poor. The whole family depended on Charles’s income. They hated him, but they couldn’t risk letting him die; even Wren forced herself to serve him tea and care for him, despite her disgust.
Two months later, Wren found out she was pregnant. The child was Charles’s.
Wren was hysterical, desperate for an abortion. But at that very moment, Lukas–barely three years old–was hospitalized with pneumonia, and the treatment would cost a fortune.
Charles forced Wren to keep the baby. It wasn’t for the sake of family blood or any love for children.
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Chapter 8
It was because his heart condition was untreatable–he needed a
transplant.
And nothing was a better match than a heart from his own child.
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When Wren learned this, she was driven mad with grief and rage, but Lukas’s illness couldn’t wait. He was burning up with fever, on the verge of dying from pneumonia.
Freya stepped in, tears streaming down her face, and begged Wren to have the baby.
They needed Charles’s money to save Lukas, and they needed Charles alive to keep providing for the family.
After days of turmoil, Wren finally agreed to carry the child. Everyone in the family silently accepted that the baby would be sacrificed the moment it was born.
By some cruel miracle, the child barely survived after receiving Charles’s failing heart.
But no one could bear the shame of that child’s existence, so the baby was abandoned, left to die in a world with no hope of survival.
Eventually, they cast Charles out, and the family collectively agreed to never speak of it again.
Until Freya threw herself against a wall and died, leaving behind a secret that Blake and Wren simply couldn’t face. In the end, they chose death as their only escape.
“You know,” he said, staring at me, “you really do look a lot like Lukas. No doubt about it–you’re my blood.”
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