Chapter 8

In Sophia's diary, Daniel was her light in dark times.
The biggest part of her life.
She forgot that during that period.
I worked my ass off to help her bounce back.
While she and Daniel had their "best time."
I used all my savings to cover her debts.
I begged suppliers on my knees.
I drank myself sick, landed in the hospital with internal bleeding...
She forgot all of it.
She only remembered Daniel.

And now Daniel was telling the whole world.

The article appeared three days after I left. Someone — Daniel, obviously — had tipped off a gossip blog. The headline read: "Tech CEO's Secret Ex Returns — Fiancé Left at the Altar."

It wasn't entirely accurate. There was no altar. There was barely even a wedding.

But the internet didn't care about accuracy. It cared about drama.

My phone exploded. Friends, old colleagues, distant relatives — everyone wanted the story.

I turned the phone off and went for a run.

Dad's neighborhood was nothing like Seattle. Wide boulevards, old oak trees, the kind of quiet money that didn't need to announce itself. I ran until my lungs burned, until the sweat washed away the anger.

When I got back, Dad was reading the article on his tablet, his expression somewhere between disgust and amusement.

"That boy has no class," he said.

"He never did."

"Your mother called me." Dad set down the tablet. "She heard about the wedding being called off."

My jaw tightened. My mother — the woman who'd abandoned me for another man, for Daniel's father. The woman who'd raised Daniel as her golden child while I scraped by next door.

"What did she want?"

"To tell me it was your fault, naturally. That you were too stubborn, too proud, too difficult. That Sophia deserved better."

"And what did you say?"

Dad smiled. The kind of smile that suggested someone was about to regret making a phone call.

"I told her that my legal team would be very interested in reviewing the divorce settlement she signed twenty years ago. Particularly the clause about the property she claimed was 'solely hers.'"

"Dad."

"She hung up very quickly."

Despite everything, I laughed. It felt strange — the muscles in my face almost didn't remember how.

"Your mother made her choices," Dad said, serious again. "Daniel is her consequence. You are mine. And I'm damn proud of my consequence."

I sat down across from him, the laughter fading into something warmer.

"I want to start at the company," I said. "Tomorrow."

"Are you sure? You just got here. Take some time—"

"I've had ten years of 'taking time.' I need to move forward."

Dad studied me for a long moment. Then he nodded.

"Tomorrow it is. But tonight, we drink."

He pulled out two more glasses of that expensive whiskey.

We drank until midnight, talking about everything except Sophia. Business plans, childhood memories, his favorite restaurants in the city, the time he accidentally set his office on fire trying to make popcorn.

For the first time, I saw my father not as the distant figure who'd left when I was young, but as a man who'd been waiting — patiently, quietly — for his son to come home.