Chapter 8 - THE SECOND SAMPLE
We finally understood why Victoria panicked over the envelope.
She had spent years controlling whether Nathan learned the truth.
My test took that control away.
But Rebecca still wanted to know whether Victoria had attempted her own DNA test.
The encrypted message said force a test.
Fulton Risk Services had billed for “biological collection.”
The invoice date was four months earlier.
I felt sick.
“What did they take from Lily?”
The investigator requested the underlying report.
Fulton’s retired operations manager cooperated after receiving a subpoena.
An operative had retrieved a juice straw from a public trash can outside Lily’s daycare.
Another had collected Nathan’s coffee cup from a charity event.
No consent.
No chain acceptable for court.
But enough for a private screening.
The result showed a high probability of paternity.
Victoria knew months before I did.
Nathan looked at the report for a long time.
“She knew.”
“Yes.”
“And still planned to marry me without telling me I had a daughter.”
No one answered.
I thought that was the worst part.
It wasn’t.
A handwritten instruction appeared at the bottom:
Do not retain original Nathan sample.
Initials VH.
Why destroy his sample?
Rebecca asked Fulton.
The operations manager remembered.
“Client wanted no discoverable biological material retained.”
Careful.
Calculated.
Then he mentioned another test.
My pulse jumped.
“What second test?”
Three years earlier, Fulton had been hired to run a different relationship screen.
Lily was only one.
The client supplied Lily’s sample.
The alleged father sample came from Nathan’s company gym.
Result:
Consistent with paternity.
Victoria had known since Lily was a baby.
Not suspected.
Known privately.
I remembered all the nights I cried after the fake settlement.
All the times I told Lily her father was someone I could not safely contact.
Victoria knew the entire time.
Nathan left the room.
I found him ten minutes later on the balcony.
“I need you to stop disappearing every time something hurts.”
He looked at me.
“I’m trying not to explode in front of you.”
“Then say that.”
He nodded.
“I’m furious.”
“I know.”
“I lost her first word.”
“Yes.”
“Her first step.”
“Yes.”
“Her first fever.”
“Yes.”
His eyes filled.
“And Victoria watched from a distance.”
That one hurt both of us.
We stood silently.
Then Nathan said, “I don’t want to take anything from you.”
“What?”
“Parenthood.”
I waited.
“I want to be her father. But I don’t want to arrive with lawyers and money and make you feel like I’m replacing the person who raised her.”
“You can’t replace me.”
“I know.”
“Good.”
It was the first conversation we had about Lily that felt less like a mystery and more like a future.
Then Rebecca called.
Daniel Hayes had filed a motion demanding the private DNA evidence be excluded from any proceeding and accusing me of stealing Nathan’s genetic material.
The irony was almost impressive.
But attached to Daniel’s motion was a sworn declaration from Victoria.
She claimed I had told her months earlier that Nathan was not Lily’s father.
A direct lie.
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And she said she had a recording to prove it.
📖 Victoria’s private tests showed she knew Nathan was Lily’s father for years, but her sworn declaration now claimed Grace herself had denied paternity on tape. 👇
