Chapter 7 - VANESSA HAD HER OWN REASON
Vanessa was the last person I expected to cooperate.
Then she requested a meeting.
“I didn’t know.”
I stared at her.
“You called my daughter a bastard.”
“I thought you cheated.”
“So that made it acceptable?”
“No.”
She looked down.
“I know that now.”
“You knew it then.”
She did not argue.
That was at least honest.
Vanessa explained why she ordered the first test.
Margaret had spent years making comments about Lily’s appearance.
Her light hair.
Gray-blue eyes.
Facial structure.
Daniel and I dismissed it.
Vanessa absorbed it.
Then Margaret told her privately that I was “hiding something about the fertility clinic.”
Vanessa assumed infidelity or donor conception I had concealed from Daniel.
She wanted to expose me.
“Why?”
She swallowed.
“Because I hated that Daniel chose you over us.”
There it was.
Not science.
Not concern for her brother.
Possession.
Daniel had been Margaret’s favorite child.
Vanessa spent her life competing with him.
Then, when he married me, she redirected competition toward me.
If I could be exposed as deceptive, Daniel would return emotionally to the family structure.
The DNA test became a weapon for an old sibling wound.
Vanessa admitted taking hair from Lily’s brush during the Saturday visit.
She submitted it using false parental attestation.
The testing company banned her account after the complaint.
Whether her conduct violated criminal statutes depended on jurisdiction and evidence.
Civil privacy claims were clearer.
But what mattered most to me was Lily.
Vanessa wanted to apologize to her.
I refused.
Not yet.
May you like
Adults often seek forgiveness when the discomfort of guilt becomes inconvenient.
My daughter was not treatment for Vanessa’s conscience.
