Chapter 3 - THE TEST THAT SHOULD NEVER HAVE EXISTED
The gala ended for me ten minutes later.
Not officially.
I simply stopped caring about chandeliers, reporters, or whatever speech Gabriel had been scheduled to give.
We left through the private entrance.
Julian followed.
Dalia followed him.
Gabriel wanted security to stop them.
I said no.
I needed answers.
We ended up in a private conference room beneath the ballroom.
No cameras.
No guests.
Just four people and too many years of lies.
“What do you mean someone caused it?” I asked.
Dalia sat down.
Julian remained standing.
“She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
Dalia laughed bitterly.
“Of course I do.”
Gabriel looked at Julian.
“Sit down before I make you.”
Julian actually listened.
That surprised me.
Dalia took out her phone.
“I found this six months ago.”
A scanned medical invoice appeared.
Julian Duval.
Private clinic.
Experimental hormonal suppression.
I frowned.
“What is that?”
Julian looked away.
Dalia continued:
“It was prescribed under another diagnostic code.”
“By who?”
“Dr. Marcus Vale.”
I knew the name.
Julian’s private physician during our marriage.
The man who once told me stress was probably affecting my fertility.
I almost laughed.
Of course.
“Why would he suppress Julian’s fertility?”
Dalia looked at Julian.
“I don’t know.”
Julian finally spoke.
“My father may have.”
I stared.
Julian’s father, Victor Duval, had died five years earlier.
A powerful venture capitalist.
Controlling.
Image obsessed.
He had never liked me.
Too poor.
Too outspoken.
Too aware of how ordinary the Duvals had once been.
“Why would your father want you infertile?”
Julian’s jaw tightened.
“Because he didn’t want children with you.”
The room went silent.
I stared.
Gabriel’s face hardened.
Dalia whispered:
“Victor wanted Julian to marry into another family.”
I laughed once.
“No.”
Julian closed his eyes.
“It’s true.”
“So your father sabotaged your fertility because you married me?”
“I didn’t know.”
“Did he know we were trying?”
“Yes.”
My stomach turned.
I remembered Victor putting his hand on my shoulder at Christmas.
Telling me not to “stress myself” about children.
He knew.
He had known exactly why nothing happened.
And Julian?
He had been another victim.
But not innocent.
Because after learning the truth, he still let me carry public blame.
That choice belonged entirely to him.
Gabriel asked:
“Why did the treatment continue after Victor died?”
Julian frowned.
“It didn’t.”
Dalia shook her head.
“Yes, it did.”
Everyone turned.
“I found pharmacy transfers eighteen months after Victor died.”
Julian stared.
“Impossible.”
“Your father started it. Someone else continued it.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Dalia added:
“But I know who paid the clinic.”
She opened another record.
Duval Horizons Foundation.
Julian frowned.
“That was my mother’s charity.”
My stomach dropped.
Margaret Duval.
Julian’s mother.
Alive.
Elegant.
Charming.
The woman who sat beside me during fertility appointments and told me to “stay hopeful.”
Julian stared at the payment.
“No.”
Dalia whispered:
“Yes.”
Gabriel looked at me.
I barely heard him.
Julian’s mother had funded the medication that made her own son infertile.
Then another thought hit me.
“If Julian was infertile…”
Everyone looked at me.
I placed one hand over my stomach.
Gabriel’s child.
No question.
But Dalia was pale again.
Too pale.
I turned.
“What?”
She whispered:
“There’s another reason I found these records.”
Julian’s eyes narrowed.
“Dalia.”
She ignored him.
“I’m pregnant too.”
The room froze.
Julian stared at her.
“How far?”
“Ten weeks.”
His face changed.
May you like
Then she delivered the secret:
“And the baby is not yours.”
