Chapter 6 - The Brother Who Had Been Chosen
Lucas walked out of the rehearsal dinner.
Sophie followed him.
I stayed behind.
Part of me wanted to chase him.
That instinct surprised me.
He had been the favorite all our lives.
He had received the opportunities, praise, money, and protection.
But until that night, I did not know how much of it he understood.
Alexander and I found him ten minutes later near the hotel garden.
He was sitting alone on a stone bench.
Sophie stood several yards away, giving him space.
Lucas looked up at me.
“I really thought you gave us the money.”
“I believe you.”
He frowned.
“You do?”
“About the wedding.”
I sat beside him.
“I don’t know what you knew about everything else.”
He rubbed both hands over his face.
“I knew Mom helped with the company.”
“With my trust?”
“No.”
He looked sick.
“She kept telling me it was family investment money.”
“When things got bad last year, she said Dad had moved some retirement funds.”
Alexander remained standing nearby.
Lucas looked at him.
“You probably think I’m an idiot.”
Alexander shook his head.
“I think your mother made sure nobody asked the right questions.”
Lucas gave a humorless laugh.
“She always said Emily didn’t understand money.”
I felt something sharp inside my chest.
“She told me you were the responsible one.”
Lucas looked at me.
For the first time, we saw the same childhood from opposite sides.
“She used to tell me you hated me.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
“That you were jealous.”
“That if I failed, you’d secretly be happy.”
My throat tightened.
“She told me you thought I was stupid.”
Lucas shook his head.
“She told me you thought you were better than me.”
Years of distance suddenly had a translator.
It did not erase what Lucas had done.
It did not excuse the times he laughed with everyone else.
But I finally understood how our mother had kept us separate.
If Lucas and I compared stories, her version of the family might collapse.
Sophie approached us.
Her face was pale but composed.
“Lucas.”
He stood.
She held up her phone.
“I just spoke to my father.”
Lucas looked terrified.
“What did he say?”
“He asked why the catering deposit came from Emily’s account too.”
I stood.
“What?”
Sophie turned to me.
“My parents believed you offered to cover part of the wedding.”
“I didn’t.”
“I know that now.”
She took a slow breath.
“There’s something else.”
She opened her email.
“Your mother sent my parents a message six months ago.”
She handed me the phone.
The subject line read FAMILY CONTRIBUTION.
The message claimed that I had insisted on paying because I regretted being “emotionally absent” from Lucas’s life.
I read it twice.
Then I reached the last paragraph.
My mother had written that I wanted the gift kept private because I was embarrassed by my own past behavior.
She had rewritten our entire history.
She made herself the generous mother.
Lucas the forgiving brother.
And me the guilty daughter buying my way back into the family.
Sophie pointed at the attached document.
“There’s a signed authorization.”
I opened it.
Another signature.
Another forgery.
But this one contained something my mother had missed.
My name was typed as Emily Grace Hale.
The authorization was dated two years before I married Alexander.
Alexander looked at the screen.
May you like
Then at me.
“That mistake may have just proven everything.”
