My mother’s face lost color the second the words left my mouth. The room went impossibly quiet, like the air itself was waiting for an explosion. For a breathless second I thought she would laugh or make some ridiculous, painful little bark to deny it all but instead her lips trembled and the joy that had been in the room for Kelvin’s return shattered like glass. My father looked at me with an unhappy expression as he sighed and ran his fingers through his hair in frustration. "Christy," he called me and the single syllable carried more weight than any armful of words could. "This is not an easy story," he said with a sigh. Mason’s hand closed over mine while my mother reached for my fingers, and tried to interrupt, but I had asked. I needed to know and understand why Kendrick’s mother’s hatred has been aimed at us. "Let’s go to the study," my father said finally, a crease forming between his brows. "Sit close, this might take a while." he said as he walked away and we all followed. The route to his study felt longer than it should. My chest tightened as if someone had wound a rope around my ribs, the memory of her harsh words, the way she had spat "witch" at me, the way Kendrick had chosen me and then been asked by his own mother to pick a side. I needed to know the truth, so I will know what to do next. We sat down by the desk, the study was brightly lit and my father sat on his chair with his hands clasped in front of him. He frowned deeply like he was remembering something painful. " It all happened years ago," he began. "Before any of you were born, there was a woman named Lauretta, that’s Kendrick’s mother as you all know her to be. She loved what she could not have, to her everything was a game. She took interest in me when she noticed that I had no interest in her. She thought if she could break me and make me fall in love with her, she would be victorious and satisfy her massive ego." He breathed out with a disgusted tone. "She wanted my father?" I whispered. "She wanted me the way some people want power," my father continued. " She was relentless without any shame when I refused her. Then I chose your mother and she could not bear it. The humiliation took root and it became hate." he paused to breathe. Mason made a small sound of understanding and his expression was twisted in disgust. "So she went after our mother?" he asked. "She did more than go after her," my father said slowly. " She began to humiliate your mother at every event, she got her thrown out and blacklisted in high end malls, made her lose her job. She even got her friends to bully your mother, they spread rumors about how she was trying to climb the social ladder by clinging to me. She even resorted to more deliberate means" he said with suppressed anger. It seems like remembering the past has awoken his suppressed anger. "Deliberate how?" I asked. He closed his eyes once before telling us. "Your mother was pushed to her breaking point. There was a night she didn’t come home. I found her in the garden, barely breathing due to being poisoned. At first we thought it might be an accident, bad food or something. But the doctors... The doctors said it was deliberate. Someone had fed her something meant to end her." His voice cracked on the last word. I squeezed Mason’s hand until he inhaled sharply when I noticed his furious expression. Thᴇ link to the origɪn of this information rᴇsts ɪn 𝗻𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹✦𝕗𝕚𝕣𝕖✦𝓷𝓮𝓽 "I got Lauretta arrested," my father went on. "There was public outrage and It would have been a clean conviction if not for a force that moved behind the scenes, the Black family’s influence. Kendrick’s grandfather interceded as his precious daughter’s life was at stake. He used what he had, money, connections and lawyers who could slow a case to a halt. The city is full of mercies and bargains for those who own them." he said with a sigh. Mason’s jaw tightened as he asked "He protected her, despite knowing she tried to kill someone?" "He did more than protect, he intervened until the state could not push the charge publicly. We watched as judges changed their tone, partners distanced themselves from the Lancasters, and the Black family’s businesses suffered as he was only focused on saving his daughter, risking everything else. The scandal didn’t vanish and Lauretta’s humiliation was public despite her father pulling numerous strings" he answered with an upset expression. I could feel a slow and cold clarity spread through me as I now understood how bad things were. "So the Black family saved her and she escaped punishment for attempted murder." I murmured. " After going back and forth for months, we had no choice but to drop the case but by then, everyone had suffered both emotionally and mentally. And more than that, the humiliation drove Lauretta to a place dark enough to make her make desperate choices. She attempted to end her life after the shame grew too heavy. She was rescued by her father and then she was sent away. We all thought she was gone for good" my father sighed again while my mother sat expressionlessly on the side, like what he was saying had nothing to do with her. "But she came back," he continued. "She returned six months later with Raymond, and announced their marriage." he said and I frowned. "She said she returned to punish those that had offended her and Raymond was good at cleaning up after her. He was more like a bodyguard than a husband. She started attacking our family. It started with my being demoted in the military, then your mother being poured waste water at an event, then your grandmother being attacked by thugs that led to her death. But we had no evidence to convict her" he said with a frustrated sigh. To think that she did so much and is now playing victim and insulting me Her obsession led to cruelty, cruelty to public shame, shame to leverage, and leverage to a vicious hunger for revenge. "Why our family?" I asked. "Why Lancasters?" I asked again. My father rubbed his temples tiredly. "Visibility,our life is visible and jealousy looks for a target. Lauretta could not bear that your mother had what she wanted. If she could not have me, she would make sure no one else had the light she had been denied. And when you point at a family and smear them, other people help to smear along because it’s easier to cry about somebody else than to look at your own reflection." he said with a hint of disgust in his tone. Mason’s face had gone pale with anger . "So she tried to ruin Mom! She almost killed her, and someone pulled strings to protect her. The Blacks paid for her to be released while the Lancasters—" He didn’t finish as his fist clenched even more tightly. "And then one night, she got into a car accident, and people blamed our family for it, saying we killed her and her body was never found," he said. I felt extremely angry at the fact that our family was still blamed after everything. "She’s back now," my father said with a frown. "And people who can hold grudges like valuables do not forget. They remember slights like a ledger and they spend their lives paying them back. You must be careful." he warned me with a serious expression. My knees felt unsteady, what he was describing wasn’t mere hatred. "Why won’t she just move on? It’s been years already!" I said angrily. What an old witch and she had the guts to point fingers at me. My father’s gaze went soft. "Because it hurt her that the man she wanted married another woman. Because she was terrified of being seen as nothing and because some people’s pride births rage. You can’t reason with that,you can only be careful and sometimes the safest choice is to refuse to be bait." he advised. Mason’s anger seemed to increase by the second as he clenched the armrest. "So what are we supposed to do now?" Mason asked. My father’s answer was blunt, but weary. "You do not make yourself a target or hand them reactions to enjoy. You have to move with care. She will try to lure you onto her stage." He leaned forward after a pause. "We survive this by refusing to fight on her terms." he said with a determined tone. The room felt heavy as beams of knowledge I had wanted actually landed. Every insult Lauretta had thrown at me now made me sick. The hatred was a map traced long before I existed. I felt rage, not just at Lauretta, but at the people in power and influence that let people buy their way out of taking responsibility for their actions. "How do we move forward?" I asked. My father’s breath left him in a tired and almost defeated sigh. He lifted his eyes to each of us, slow and serious, "And we remember that some wounds scar and some do not heal. She came back to make the scar worse. So be careful, Christy and you too Mason. She is back, and she remembers everything." The sentence felt like an order. My chest tightened until it hurt but inside me, something else had shifted. As my father finished, a cold determination settled over me. I would not be the stage on which Lauretta performed her vengeance. But I would also not cower and the thought of hiding that small life away made a hot, righteous anger flare in my chest. My mother’s hand tightened around mine. She looked older than I remembered, as though knowledge of what had happened long ago had added years to her face in a single night. Mason’s chin was set hard. My father’s warning echoed in my head, be careful. She is back, and she remembers everything. I left the study and walked past rooms that had been full of laughter mere hours before, feeling as if the drums of an old war were starting to beat again. The house that had once been a haven felt like a map of traps. The truth was out now; I had asked for it, and there was no taking it back. Lauretta’s hatred had a history, and that history now had my name somewhere written in it. But knowledge is a kind of armor. If she expected me to fold at the sound of her name, she had picked the wrong girl. I would be careful and vigilant. I would protect the life inside me and when the time came, we would meet whatever came with steady feet. My father’s last words before we left the study followed me down the hall like a watchman’s shadow: "She will not let go, she didn’t then, and she won’t now. Remember that and be careful."