Chapter 5: The Truth About Leo
Silas stood beside me as I opened the envelope.
Inside were medical records, a confession signed by Arthur, and one photograph.
My mother was in it, much younger, standing beside Arthur Sterling in a private garden.
She was not smiling.
He was holding a newborn baby.
Leo.
I felt the chapel tilt around me.
Silas read the confession over my shoulder, his voice barely a whisper.
“Leo Marlow is my son.”
My breath caught so sharply it hurt.
Arthur had written everything.
My mother had not stolen from the Sterling estate. Vivian had framed her after discovering Arthur’s affair and the child born from it.
Arthur had allowed it.
He had chosen his empire over the woman he ruined.
He had paid lawyers to bury the truth, then paid quietly for years through fake charitable transfers my mother never knew came from him.
Silas looked like he might be sick.
“Leo is my brother,” he said.
I folded the confession with trembling hands.
“Half-brother.”
“And you knew?”
I turned on him.
“I found out five seconds before you did.”
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