I stopped.
Douglas whispered, “There’s more.”
I read.
“I did not understand then that choosing pain for another person is not the same as protecting them from pain.”
The words blurred.
I had spent years imagining what I would say if my mother were ever forced to admit what she’d done.
I had imagined shouting.
Accusing.
Demanding.
Instead I sat beside the man I had loved since I was seventeen and listened to the echo of a dead woman’s regret.
The next paragraph was harder.
“I cannot repair what I took from Hannah and Douglas. But there is another truth connecting our families, and I have become increasingly afraid that silence will cause even greater harm.”
I looked up.
“Another truth.”
Lucas nodded.
“That’s when Margaret started asking questions.”
I went back to the letter.
But the next lines were maddeningly vague.
My mother told Margaret to speak with Walter Pierce.
