Ten Years a Stand-in Wife—Old Money Only Recognizes Me Chapter 17

Ten Years a Stand-in Wife—Old Money Only Recognizes Me Chapter 17

A complicated expression crossed his face.

“You… knew that?”

“I found out in the third month of the first year. The bank records didn’t match.”

“Then why didn’t you-”

“Because I didn’t have a choice back then.”

I sat down.

“When I married into the Shaw family, I had nothing. No savings, no job, no friends. I was living

there under a fake identity. I didn’t have the leverage to turn against you.”

“So I endured it.”

“Not just that $1,440,000.”

“My mother coming over to freeload meals at the Shaw Manor, asking me to send gifts to her friends, coming to me for this and that during holidays-I all endured it.”

“Because I knew if I fought back, the Mercer family would expose the arranged marriage switch. Back then I hadn’t secured my footing yet. And Adrian and I hadn’t-”

I stopped.

Didn’t finish the sentence.

But the meaning was already clear.

David curled in on himself.

His shoulders collapsed. His eyes were red. The deep lines beside his nose were so sharp they looked like they could hold something.

“I am sorry.”

Those three words squeezed out of him like a decayed tooth being pulled-painful, hollow.

“Sloane, I’m sorry.”

“Dad.”

I looked at him.

“Do you know why I don’t hate you?”

“Because you showed up today.”

“Mom won’t come. Valerie won’t come. In this family, you’re the only one who took a step

forward.”

“Even if it was ten years late.”

He lowered his head.

Tears dropped onto the coffee table, forming a small puddle that soaked the corner of the bank card.

I didn’t take it.

“Keep the money for yourself,” I said. “Life is still long.”

“I don’t need it.”

David wiped his face with his sleeve.

He stood there for a moment.

Then he bent down-deeply. So deeply that all the accumulated curve of his spine over ten years

seemed to release in that instant.

“I’m leaving.”

“Alright.”

He walked to the door.

Paused.

But didn’t turn back.

“Sloane.”

“Hmm?”

“Be well. I-”

He didn’t finish.

The door closed.

I sat on the sofa for a long time without moving.

Footsteps came from behind.

Adrian walked over and sat beside me.

He didn’t speak.

Just pulled a thin blanket from the side and placed it over my legs.

Then his hand covered mine.

His fingers slid between mine.

Warm. Firm.

I didn’t pull away.

“Hmm,” I said.

Just a sound.

But he understood.

He always did.

Three days later.

2 a.m.

The phone lit up on the nightstand, again and again.

Adrian moved slightly, rolling over, his arm resting across my waist.

I carefully picked up the phone and stepped into the hallway.

“Valerie.”

The background was loud. Bar music. Glasses clinking. People talking everywhere.

Valerie’s voice was buried in the noise, slurred and unsteady.

“Sloane…”

“You’re drunk?”

“No… no.”

A pause.

“Let me ask you something.”

“Go ahead.”

“Do you hate me?”

“No.”

“No?” She laughed, broken and uneven. “You don’t hate me? I destroyed your life—”

“You didn’t destroy my life.”

“You-”

“Valerie,” I leaned against the hallway wall, voice calm, “you did destroy a few things when you left. My graduation trip. My first love. My summer when I was twenty-two.”

“But the ten years after that-I lived them myself.”

“Every step was mine.”

“You didn’t destroy anything.”

“Because I didn’t let you.”