“She wrote you a letter. She asked you to read it out loud. So I could hear her voice again.”
Charles unfolded it carefully.
“Charles,” he read, voice shaking, “if you’re reading this, our son found you. I left this house pregnant with your child, but not by choice. I was called into the office and told you didn’t want a scandal. They made me resign within an hour…”
Margaret covered her mouth, remembering that day.
“I believed you knew. I resented you for years. I worked wherever I could, raising our son alone. But recently I learned the truth—that you were told I left for a better job. I don’t want to die without correcting that lie.”
Daniel’s eyes burned, but he held steady.
“I am ill,” Charles continued. “I won’t ask for anything for myself. Only that you meet Daniel. If you choose not to be his father, be honest. But if you choose to try, you will give him something I never could alone.”
The letter ended: With love and regret, Elena.
Silence lingered.
“There’s one way to be sure,” Charles said at last. “A DNA test. Will you agree?”
Daniel nodded. “Mom said I should.”
Three days later, the call came.
Charles lowered the phone slowly. “It’s positive,” he whispered. “You’re my son.”