Chapter 3

I woke up to the smell of medicinal ointment. My back was a canvas of dull aches and sharp stings. Emily was sitting in a chair by my bed, dabbing a cotton ball onto the welts from my father's belt. Her touch was gentle, but it made my skin crawl.

"Don't," I said, my voice raspy. I shifted away from her.

She pulled her hand back as if burned. "I was just trying to help. Your mom said..."

"I don't care what my mom said," I cut her off. I pushed myself up, ignoring the protest from my muscles. "We're going to finish our conversation."

I looked her straight in the eye. "Who is the father of your child, Emily?"

Her face paled. She reverted to her default defense mechanism. Tears welled up, her lower lip trembled. "Ethan, why are you being so cruel? I told you, it's you. It was that night, after the party. We both drank too much."

I was tired of the act. The performance that had fooled me for a lifetime now seemed amateurish and pathetic.

"Stop lying," I said, my voice flat, devoid of the emotion she was trying to provoke. "It's not going to work this time."

I softened my tone, trying a different tactic. I had to know for sure. I had to hear the name from her lips. "Look, I can see you're in some kind of trouble. If you tell me the truth, the whole truth, maybe I can help you. But you have to tell me who he is."

A flicker of hope appeared in her eyes. The idea of me, her reliable old Ethan, fixing her problems was a familiar and comforting thought for her. But the fear was stronger.

"There's nothing to tell," she insisted, shaking her head. "There's no one else."

I sighed. She was going to make this difficult. Fine. If she wouldn't talk, I would have to force her hand.

That night, I didn't sleep. I waited. I knew Daniel. He was arrogant but also a coward. He wouldn't abandon Emily completely, not yet. He would want to see her, to control the situation, to make sure she was holding up her end of the bargain. I gambled that he would try to contact her.

Around 2 a.m., I heard a faint tapping on Emily's window downstairs. She was staying in the guest room. I moved silently from my room, my bare feet making no sound on the wooden floorboards. I crept down the stairs and positioned myself in the dark corner of the living room, which gave me a clear view of the guest room door.

The door opened a crack, and Emily slipped out. She was wearing a robe, her hair messy from sleep. She tiptoed to the back door and unlocked it. A figure slipped inside. It was too dark to see his face clearly, but the man's height and build matched Daniel Sterling's.

They spoke in hushed, urgent whispers. I couldn't make out the words, but the tone was tense. After a few minutes, he handed her a small envelope-money, most likely-and then he was gone, melting back into the night.

Emily locked the door and leaned against it, letting out a shaky breath. She didn't turn on the light. She clutched the envelope and started to cry silently.

I waited until she went back to her room. Then I slipped out the back door myself. I scanned the ground near the window where he had tapped. The grass was damp with dew. And there, half-hidden under a bush, was something small and metallic, glinting in the faint moonlight.

I picked it up. It was a cufflink. A solid silver square with an intricate "DS" engraved on it. Daniel Sterling. I had my proof.

I went back inside and walked straight to the guest room. I didn't knock. I opened the door and flipped on the light.

Emily gasped, scrambling to hide the envelope under her pillow. She saw the cufflink in my hand. All the color drained from her face. She knew she was caught.

"Please, Ethan," she begged, her voice a raw whisper. "Please don't. You don't understand."

"Oh, I think I understand perfectly," I said, my voice dripping with contempt. I tossed the cufflink onto the bed. It landed next to her hand with a soft thud. "Daniel Sterling. A respected art dealer. A man with a bright future. A future that would be destroyed if people found out he got a girl pregnant, especially with that fraud scandal still hanging over his head."

She started to sob, real tears this time, tears of fear and desperation. "He loves me. He's just... he needs time. This would ruin him."

The blind devotion in her voice disgusted me. "He loves you? He loves you so much that he let you ruin my life to save his skin? He sneaks around in the middle of the night to give you hush money while I'm the one getting beaten by my father for his mistake. That's not love, Emily. That's cowardice."

"You don't know him!" she cried.

"I know enough," I said coldly. "There's only one way to fix this. You're going to get rid of it."

Her eyes widened in horror. "What? No. I can't. It's... it's his baby."

"It's a problem," I corrected her. "A problem you created. You need to solve it. Get an abortion. I'll pay for it. I'll even go with you, tell everyone it was a miscarriage. I will take the blame one last time. But you have to end it."

This was my final offer. A path for her to clean up her mess without destroying everyone around her.

She shook her head violently, clutching her stomach. "No! I won't kill my baby! I love him, Ethan. I can't lose this. It's all I have of him."

I stared at her, at the stubborn, selfish set of her jaw. She was willing to sacrifice my future, my family's reputation, my entire life, for a man who hid in the shadows and for a child that would be a living symbol of her deceit.

A profound weariness washed over me. I had offered her a way out, a chance at redemption, and she had refused.

"Fine," I said, my voice hollow. I turned to leave.

"Ethan, wait!" she called out, scrambling off the bed. "The cufflink... please, give it back to me. Don't tell anyone."

I stopped at the door and looked back at her. "I'm not going to do your dirty work for you, Emily."

I reached into my pocket and pulled out my own wallet. I took out a small, folded piece of paper. It was the receipt from the jeweler where I'd bought her engagement ring. I'd been planning to return it. I placed it on the dresser, right next to the silver cufflink.

"Here are your choices," I said, my voice dead. "One is a lie that will ruin my life. The other is the truth that will ruin his. You have until morning to decide which man you're going to destroy."

I walked out and closed the door behind me, leaving her alone with her choices and her consequences.