My General Mother Ruined Me For My Cousin—Then Regretted It Too Late Chapter 08
After that, I didn’t leave my room. I let the medical team do their work and refused all visitors. My mother moved to the Hart Foundation’s training center—giving me space, she said.
Damien sent something every day. Medical supplies and care packages. First editions of books I’d mentioned once, in passing, years ago. A handwritten note tucked into a box of imported chocolate. He never pushed. Never demanded a visit. Just kept showing up, quietly, through the things he left at my door.
One afternoon, my father drove to the training center. He found my mother in her temporary office, her back to the door.
“How is she?” She didn’t turn around.
“Come home and ask her yourself. One honest apology and you might still have a daughter.”
She spun around. “I’m her MOTHER. Mothers don’t apologize for discipline. I punished the staff who abused her. I dealt with Sienna. I returned every gift I ever redirected. What more does she want from me?”
My father’s voice rose. “Every year. Posted overseas. I would spend weeks finding something special for my daughter. A hand-carved music box. A ruby brooch I had an artisan make from my own sketch. And every single year, the moment the shipment arrived, YOU intercepted it and handed it to Sienna.”
“Twenty years of marriage, and I never knew my wife was running a shell game behind my back. Was I your husband—or just another asset?”
She opened her mouth. Nothing came out. Finally: “I did it for fairness. Sienna’s mother—Cecilia—was my closest friend. She died in my arms. Her last words: take care of my daughter. She had a miserable life. A miserable marriage. And I had everything. The career. The husband who loved me. How could I let her daughter have less than mine? I was repaying a debt.”
My father stared at her. “You repaid a debt to a dead friend by taking nineteen years of happiness from OUR daughter. Mia is not a line item in your moral ledger. She is a human being.”
“When we married, your career came with demands most husbands would have resented. I never once held you back. I never made you smaller. And you destroyed my daughter to feel righteous.”
“That’s different,” she whispered.
My father looked at her for a long time. “If you hold on to this, Victoria, you’ll lose more than Mia. You’ll lose me.”
He walked out. She sat alone in the dark until dawn.
The next morning, her aide knocked. “General. Helena Blackwood has sent a formal invitation for Miss Mia to stay at the Blackwood estate. Miss Mia accepted. She’ll remain there for the rest of the engagement.”