Sophie turned toward her. “We know exactly who he is. Our mother told us everything.”
The auditorium fell silent.
Marianne revealed that she had raised the twins alone, working tirelessly to give them the opportunities I had denied them. She had never needed my money. She had only wanted honesty—and I had given her neither.
Then she handed me an envelope.
Inside were letters she had written when the girls were babies. Every letter I had never received. Every birthday I had missed. Every moment I could never reclaim.
My hands trembled.
Cordelia suddenly understood that the fortune she had married into could not buy her daughter a gold medal—or erase the truth.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered to Marianne.
She shook her head. “Sorry doesn’t give our daughters back thirteen years.”
Chloe and Sophie turned toward the audience, holding their medals proudly.
“We won because Mom believed in us,” Chloe announced.
