(Jasper’s POV)
The silence that follows my words is thick enough to cut with a knife. James’s face hardens, his jaw working like he’s chewing on something bitter. The old me would have backed down, would have apologized for overstepping.
But I’m not that man anymore. Not after seeing what my cowardice cost me.
“Jasper,” ir’s voice cuts through the tension, soft but firm. “Please. Let’s not fight about this. We’re all just trying to figure out how to move forward.”
She moves between James and me like she’s done a thousand times before, the peacemaker in a family that’s been broken for too long.
“You’re right,” I say, forcing my voice to soften. “I’m sorry. I just… I need you <i>to </i>understand that Scarlett is my priority now. She always should have been.”
The admission tastes like ash in my mouth because it’s true. All those years I spent trying to prove I wasn’t some charity case, trying to show everyone I could stand on my own two feet. And for what? To lose the one person who actually mattered?
“We understand,” ir says quietly. “We all made mistakes four years ago.”
I look at James, waiting for him to agree, to show some remorse for how they treated their own daughter. But his face remains cold, unreadable.
This is the man I once respected, the man whose approval I desperately wanted. The man who funded my education and demanded I marry his daughter in return. I used to think he loved Scarlett, that his conditions were just his way of protecting her.
Now I see the truth. He never saw Scarlett as his real daughter. She was just a ceholder
until Virginia came home.
The realization makes me sick.
“You know what the worst part is?” I say, my voice barely above a whisper. “I kept Virginia’s secret from Scarlett. When we found out Virginia was your biological daughter, she begged me not to tell Scarlett right away. Said she needed time to figure out how to break the news.”
ir’s face crumbles. “Jasper-”
“I thought I was being kind. Protecting Virginia from an awkward situation.” Iugh, but there’s no humor in it. “I was such an j***t. Scarlett deserved to know the truth from her
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husband, not find out from you two in some family meeting.”
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The memory of that day still haunts me. The way Scarlett’s face went white when she realized everyone had been lying to her. The way she looked at me like I was a stranger.
“She trusted me,” I continue, my voice breaking slightly. “And I chose Virginia over her. Again.”
Virginia shifts on the couch, and I catch a glimpse of something in her eyes. Satisfaction? The emotion is gone before I can catch it, and I wonder if it was just my vision.
“Jasper, you were trying to do the right thing-”
“No.” I cut her off. “I had a misguided sense of responsibility. Just like I always did when it
came to the two of you.”
James clears his throat, clearly ufortable with the direction this conversation is taking. “What’s done is done. The question now is what happens next.”
“What happens next is to get my wife back.”
“Even if she doesn’t want you back?” The same question againes from Virginia, her voice so soft it’s almost innocent. I don’t know what she’s expecting, why she keeps asking the same question despite my answer being the same.
But there’s something underneath the tone with which she asks this time that makes my skin
crawl.
“Even if she doesn’t want me back.”
Virginia’s smile is small, almost pitying. “Jasper, you know Scarlett better than anyone. When she makes up her mind about something, when she decides she’s done… that’s it. She doesn’t look back.”
Her words hit hard because they’re true. Scarlett isn’t someone who makes decisions lightly. When she left four years ago, she meant it. When she told me earlier that it was over, she <fn6167> Checktest chapters at find?novel</fn6167>
meant that too.
But I can’t ept it. I won’t.
“People change,” I say stubbornly.
“Do they?” Virginia leans forward slightly. “Tell me, when you saw her today, did she seem like the same Scarlett who used to wait by the door for you? The one who would forgive you anything just to keep the peace?”
The answer is no, and we both know it. The woman I saw today was harder, colder. She
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looked at me like I was nothing.
“That’s just her protecting herself—”
“Or maybe it’s her finally seeing you clearly.” Virginia’s voice remains gentle, but her words <b>are </b>poison. “Maybe four years away from you showed her what she was missing. What she could have instead.”
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