Her comments about Emma being “too delicate” to become a real mother.
The cold silence between them whenever I left the room.
And worst of all, the day after Emma’s second miscarriage.
I remembered finding my mother standing alone in our kitchen.
Smiling.
At the time, I convinced myself I had imagined it.
Now I wasn’t sure.
“Emma…” I whispered painfully. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
A bitter smile touched her lips.
“Would you have believed me?”
The question went straight through my chest.
Because the horrifying answer was probably no.
Back then, I would have defended my mother instantly. I would have called Emma emotional. Paranoid. Broken by grief.
God.
What kind of husband had I been?
Emma wiped tears from her cheeks with a trembling hand.
“I stayed quiet because I had no proof,” she whispered. “And because I knew how much you loved your mother.”
I looked down at the documents again.
“There’s more,” Emma said softly.
With shaking hands, I kept reading.
A private toxicology report.
Prescription traces.
Repeated chemical exposure.
Then another page.
A doctor’s handwritten note.
Patient’s condition strongly suggests intentional long-term poisoning.
My vision blurred.
Intentional.
Someone had deliberately harmed my wife.
