A slammed fist.
A broken cup.
Something loud enough to match what was happening inside him.
Grant did none of it.
He placed both hands flat on the table.
“What happened after that?”
“She offered money.”
His stomach turned.
“You took it?”
Mara’s eyes flashed.
“No.”
“I wasn’t accusing you.”
“It sounded like you were.”
“You’re right.
I’m sorry.”
That apology softened nothing, but Mara continued.
“I refused.
I told her I wanted you to hear it from me.
She said if I cared about you, I would stop making your father’s final months harder.
She said you had already chosen your family over me.”
Mara touched the ultrasound photograph.
“So I sent this.
Along with a letter.
I wrote everything down because I thought no one could twist it if you read it yourself.”
Grant looked at the image.
“That was the package.”
“Yes.”
“I never saw it.”
“I waited three weeks.
Then I received a letter on Whitmore stationery telling me you wanted no further contact.”
Grant’s face went cold.
“Do you still have it?”
Mara reached deeper into the bag.
She placed a folded sheet inside a clear sleeve on the table.
Grant did not need a forensic examiner to recognize the language.
The phrasing was his mother’s: courteous, final, bloodless.
It claimed Grant had chosen to end the relationship and requested that Mara respect his decision.
His name appeared at the bottom.
Not his signature.
Just his typed name.
“Why didn’t you confront me in person?” he asked, and hated the desperation in the question.
Mara’s eyes filled, but she refused to look away.
“I was twenty-six, pregnant, terrified, and being told by the most powerful person I had ever met that the man I loved considered me a problem his staff should solve.
Then the doctor told me there were four babies.
I stopped trying to win an argument with your family and started trying to keep my children alive.”
Grant’s throat closed.
“Our children.”
Mara’s face hardened.
“We don’t know that yet.”
He nodded immediately.
“You’re right.”
For the first time since sitting down, she seemed surprised by him.
Grant did not reach for the papers.
“Whatever the result is, I won’t take control away from you.
If the boys are mine, I want the truth established properly.
Independent lab.
