My father, Robert Brooks, sixty-two, stood quietly near the side exit. He wore the same dark suit he’d owned for over a decade. The cuffs were frayed, the leather shoes cracked from years of use. His shoulders were slightly hunched, not from age, but from habit—years of making himself small so others wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.
He raised me alone after my mother passed away. Worked endless hours on our small rural property so I could go to college. Never complained. Never asked for anything.
And now, surrounded by wealth and arrogance, he looked painfully out of place.
My throat burned. I wanted to run to him, pull him into the front row, make sure everyone knew who he was to me. But whispers had already begun.
“Who invited him?”
“He looks like he got lost.”
“Is that really the groom’s father?”
Soft laughter followed. Judgment disguised as amusement.
Vanessa’s father, Charles Harrington, chairman of Harrington Global, glanced at my dad briefly—then looked away with visible disgust, as if acknowledging him wasn’t worth the effort. He resumed chatting with a state official, smiling like nothing had happened.
My fists clenched.