He Left Me in the Fire Chapter 07
Tree days later, I was discharged.
The Ashfords reached out to Nathan directly.
In the living room, two documents were placed in front of him.
The first: a DNA test report.
The report identified Serena Hayes as the Ashfords‘ biological daughter, missing for twenty years.
The second was an agreement requiring Nathan to waive any claim to custody of our child.
Nathan’s fingers trembled.
He gripped the papers so hard they nearly crumpled.
He shoved both documents away.
“I won’t sign!”
He turned to me.
“Serena, I know I was wrong.”
Vivian chose that moment to appear.
She put on her pitiful look.
“Nathan, Serena doesn’t even love you.
“Just sign.”
She said it like it meant nothing. Nathan looked up, his eyes bloodshot.
Vivian opened her mouth again, only to be slapped across the face and sent sprawling.
Catherine glared at her with open contempt.
“Who the hell do you think you are, showing your face here?”
Vivian clutched her cheek and whimpered, “Mom.”
“Don’t call me that.”
Catherine stepped back, putting distance between them.
“Your biological mother wanted our family’s money and influence, so she switched you with Serena.
“All these years, we turned a blind eye and raised you as our own.
“But you’ve known about Serena all along, and you’ve been scheming to destroy her. Haven’t you?”
Vivian lay on the floor, stunned.
She and her biological mother had arranged for people at St. Agnes to torment me.
They had arranged for me to be sexually assaulted:
Vivian had pursued Nathan to steal his love.
Every scheme had come to light.
Nathan hadn’t imagined Vivian could be so vicious.
From beginning to end, she had played him like a fool.
Vivian’s mask had finally been torn away.
Vivian could no longer pretend to be sweet and innocent.
Her voice came out shrill and broken.
“I’m the Ashford daughter! What right does she have?”
She jabbed a finger at me.
“What right does she have to everything the Ashfords can give?
“What right does she have to Nathan’s love?
“It’s all mine! Nobody gets to take it!”
Her frenzy deepened.
Nathan looked at her, his eyes cold as ice.
“You’re not.”
Those three words were enough.
They destroyed the obsession Vivian had clung to.
They also shattered the false life she had built over twenty years.
I looked at her with pity.
She had known from the beginning that she was a fraud.
She had tried to destroy the real Ashford daughter so she could keep the life she had stolen.
That afternoon, Vivian was taken away by the police.
The police formally charged her, and only the courts could decide what came next.
As Vivian was led out, Nathan broke down before me and my parents, begging for forgiveness.
“I shouldn’t have taken Vivian out for shrimp and grits and left you alone at the hospital.
“I shouldn’t have ordered every flavor of Haagen–Dazs and ignored your feelings.”
My parents looked at him with undisguised disappointment.
“You find out who someone really is when things go bad.
“Sign the custody waiver and leave.
“Serena gave you years of her life, and in the end she doesn’t even have a legal marriage to show for it.”
Nathan went rigid.
Mr. and Mrs. Ashford, this is all a misunderstanding!”
When he still refused, William produced another document.
“If you refuse, effective immediately, you will be removed from your position at the company.”
Nathan stared, stunned. The Ashfords had quietly become his company’s majority shareholders.
They owned sixty–one percent.
“How is that possible…”
He trailed off, the fight draining out of him.
He himself had originally owned sixty–one percent.
He’d transferred ten percent to me.
After Vivian’s supposed amnesia made her emotionally unstable, he’d given her two percent as well.
He looked up sharply at Vivian, who was still waiting to be taken away.
“What did you do with those shares?”
