He Gave My Father's Lifeline to His Mistress

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Four years after my father died, my husband transferred $400,000 into my account out of nowhere.

He watched my face and gave a resigned little smile.

Money-grubber. That four hundred grand was your dad's surgery fund. I'm returning it today.

He saw my confusion.

He sighed.

There's something I lied to you about. The surgery money wasn't stolen by phone scammers.

"Bess was diagnosed with liver cirrhosis at the same time. I gave her the money for a liver transplant."

I went completely still.

Bess Hugheshis former student. The one he'd been emotionally unfaithful with.

He sighed again.

"Dad was old. Even if the surgery worked, he didn't have long. But Bess is young, she's a graduate researcher, the kind of talent this country needs. Using his life to save hersthat's building good karma for him."

Everything inside me went cold.

The bank card in my hand was ice-cold, but it burned like the blood that had sprayed from my father's mouth that day.

A sharp crack.

My vision went red and I slapped Jarvis across the face.

"Do you hear yourself? You think a human life can be measured by its value? That was my father. He was YOUR father too!"

"He was the only one who stood up for you when you were trapped in that academic scandal! The only one who fought to clear your name!"

"And you gave his surgery money to the student who accused you of sexual harassment? Jarvis, do you even have a heart?"

A flicker of impatience cut through his guilt.

"Yes, but she was desperate back then. Nowhere to turn, people whispering in her ear. She didn't do it on purpose."

"Can you stop dragging up the past every single day? I've always been grateful for what Dad did for me, but honestly, even without his help, it was only a matter of time before I was cleared. Stop bringing it up over and over, okay? Keep pushing it and sympathy turns into disgust."

My legs went soft. I stared at him in disbelief.

Sympathy into disgust?

My father had spent his entire career never bowing to anyone. A proud, principled old professor. And to save Jarvis, he'd pulled every string he could find, drunk himself sick at banquet after banquet, landed in the hospital twice.

Everything that once made Jarvis sick with guilt and regret now rolled off him like it was nothing.

He saw the color drain from my face and softened his tone.

"Okay, I shouldn't have said that. But honey, what's done is done. I only told you because I didn't want that on my conscience anymore, didn't want to feel guilty facing you every day. Dad's gone. Let's just move on."

But he was the one who'd knelt at my father's grave and sworn to God he would never betray his teaching, never waste his help and mentorship, that he would love me and take care of me for the rest of his life.

Then he'd taken my father's last chance at survival and spent it saving the woman he cheated with.

I was about to speak when his phone rang.

Bess.

"Professor Swanson, there's a problem with the experiment. Can you come look at it? Please?"

"Sure. Hang tight, I'm on my way."

He forgot I was standing right there. Grabbed his jacket and turned to leave.

I stepped in front of him.

"In your eyes, my father's death doesn't even matter as much as one of her research reports? Do you know how many times I had to convince myself you didn't lose that money on purpose? Do you?!"

He ignored me completely. Sighed, pulled a tissue from the box, held it out.

"I gave you the money back. People have to look forward. Don't let something that's already gone ruin what we have now, okay?"

He shook my hand off and walked out.

So in his mind, giving the money back meant none of it ever happened.

And my father?

Who could give my father back?

My legs couldn't hold me anymore. I collapsed onto the couch.

The bank card was even the same one from four years ago.

Every glance was a reminder.

The man I'd trusted, the man I'd forgiven, was the one who killed my father.

The tears came and wouldn't stop.

My phone chimed with a notification.

A friend request from Bess Hughes.

*Dear mentor's wifethank you so much for agreeing to transfer Senior Professor Henson's unpublished Verdant Harvest Project to me! With that behind my application, getting into the Academic Research Council won't be a problem at all!*

Every nerve in my skull fired at once.

The Verdant Harvest Project was my father's agricultural research project, named after me.

He'd spent a full month in the fields himself for that study, working until his body gave out and he had no choice but to be hospitalized.

Before he died, the project was nearly finished. He asked me to verify the final results myself, fill in the remaining data, and file the patent. His last wish. The final mark on a life's work.

Last week I verified the data, and Jarvis took every bit of it the same daysaid he needed to get a head start on the application materials.

I thought he genuinely cared about honoring my father's dying wish.

But now he'd told me my father's life should step aside for Bess Hughes, and the data my father clung to until his last breath was going to pave her way too.

I was half out of my mind by the time I burst into the lab.

Jarvis was there with his students, throwing her a celebration.

The two of them stood close in the candlelight, their shadows nearly overlapping.

What a joke.

Back when Jarvis had been reported for sexual harassment and suspended, he certainly hadn't looked this happy.

"Bess, you're incredible! You're the first person in the country to pull off this experiment! This is going down in history!"

Bess smiled, glancing shyly toward Jarvis.

"Oh, please. I couldn't have done any of it if Professor Swanson wasn't looking after every little detail for me."

The students around them piled on one after another.

"Professor Swanson's always so good to you. The rest of us mere mortals could never get that kind of treatment."

Bess blushed, rose on her toes, and pressed a kiss to the side of Jarvis's face.

The lab erupted in sharp, gleeful hooting.

"So sweet! Too sweet!"

A thousand tiny needles drove into my chest all at once.

So behind my back they were already this shamelessopen enough for the whole room to cheer them on.

The corner of Jarvis's mouth curved up.

"All right, enough. Let's just"

He didn't finish. I pushed the door open and stood there, watching them.

"Let's just what? Just kiss? Or just hurry up and finish the party so you two can get a room?"

The air in the lab froze solid.

Jarvis frowned, a flash of panic crossing his eyes, and waved the other students out.

"What are you doing here? This isn't your place."

Funny. He used to beg me to come. Used to wheedle and tease until I showed up to check on him, to pick him up.

He couldn't wait for everyone to know he had a wife like me. Pretty. Devoted.

"Then when am I supposed to come? Go on, tell mewhat's next? What else of my father's are you handing her? Or is it something of mine this time?"

"You stole my father's data, you stole his surgery money, and you built your affair on top of his corpse! Why the hell shouldn't I be here? I want every single person to see these two animals for what they are!"

I ran toward the corridor, screaming it for anyone who could hear, my voice tearing raw.

No one looked surprised.

They looked at me the way you'd look at a lunatic.

The lab's security guard caught me before I got far.

Jarvis jogged over, wearing an expression of weary concern.

"Sorry about thisshe's having another episode. I'll get her out of your way."

I stared at him in disbelief, and the moment I opened my mouth to speak, something struck the back of my neck hard, and everything went black.

I woke to find the university forums had already done their work: I was a psychotic who'd trashed the lab, a disgrace who hadn't inherited a shred of her father's dignity.

My hands shook as I held up the phone, showing Jarvis the private messages crammed with slurs and insults.

"What is this? Why are they calling me crazy?"

He took the phone from me and sighed.

"After your father died, I was afraid you'd lose it and wreck Bess's academic career. So I told everyone the grief broke youthat you'd been diagnosed, that you were unstable, that you never left the house. I've been saying it for years."

"Renee, no one is going to believe you. You know that, right? So stop making a fuss."

"Stay home. Her condition could take her any dayI don't want her to die with regrets. Once she's made it academically, I'll come back to this family."

"Remember, no matter what happens, you are always the one I love most."

Three years. He had spent three years turning me into a madwoman in everyone's eyesall so Bess wouldn't face even the slightest threat.

No wonder every job I applied for went well on the surface, then rejected me the moment the background check came back.

No wonder he always told me not to bother looking for work, not to subject myself to that. Just stay home. Let him take care of me.

How could he keep saying he loved me while treating me like an enemy?

I was shaking.

"Jarvis Swanson, you're terrifying. I'm done. I want a divorce!"

He rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Stop this. You have no job, no family left. Keep pushing and you'll only make things worse for yourself. Calm down and think about it."

The door slammed shut behind him.

Wind howled outside the window.

I felt so cold all of a sudden.

Everything here felt like it belonged to a stranger nowso completely foreign that Jarvis holding me in this same room three years ago, his hand on my back, telling me he'd always be here, felt like something I'd dreamed up entirely.

He said he would be the only person I'd ever need to rely on.

What he meant was he'd tear out my wings.

Leave me bleeding and unable to go anywhere but back to him.

But even if it killed me, I was leaving him first.

I contacted a lawyer and drafted a divorce agreement.

The next morning, I took the signed papers and went to find Jarvis, but the security guard at the entrance stopped me.

"Sorry, ma'am. Professor Swanson left strict ordersyou're not to be let in."

While I was arguing with the guard, Bess's voice came from behind me.

"Ms. Henson, here to see Professor Swanson?"

"He's tied up with my academic presentation materials right now, so I doubt he's free. But I can take you inyou could wait for him?"

The guard frowned and started to say something, but she cut him off with a single look.

He let me follow her without another word.

We were halfway down the corridor.

Then she smiled and spoke.

"Ms. Henson, I heard Professor Swanson told you the whole story about the surgery money?"

"Well, there's something I never told you either."

I stopped mid-step. Seeing the calm smile on her face, dread hit me before I even wanted to hear it.

"Professor Henson's heart attack wasn't some accident. When I found out you wouldn't lend me the money for my liver transplant, I took a private video of me and Professor Swansonand I showed it to your father."

"I only meant to make him angry. How was I supposed to know he was that weak? He couldn't even breathe."

"The doctors said his chances were basically zerothat even if they saved him, what was the point? So Professor Swanson said the money should go toward my surgery instead. I'm young, after all. I'm worth more than a dying old man."

"He just lay there, in pain, dying bit by bit, and he never got to see you one last time. Don't you think that's such a shame?"

My blood caught fire. I couldn't move.

I looked up and met those wide, harmless eyes staring back at me without a flicker of guilt.

I was shaking violently.

"You vicious woman! Why would you do that?"

I grabbed a fistful of her hair and slapped her across the face.

I was going in for another when someone seized my arm and wrenched it back.

"Renee, what the hell are you doing on campus again? I told you to stay home! Can you stop making problems for me? Today is Bess's academic presentation. Don't cause a scene!"

Jarvis hurled me to the ground.

Contempt. Pity. People watching like it was a show. I understood thenBess had provoked me on purpose, goaded me into losing it so everyone here could see the crazy woman they'd all been told about. So she could step into my place. So she could close in on me from every side.

I stared him down.

"She showed my father a video of you two together. She killed him. And I shouldn't have hit her? I only hate myself for not beating her to death!"

Something flickered across Jarvis's eyes. Panic, maybe. Surprise.

Bess caught it instantly. She pressed a hand to her cheek, eyes reddening on cue.

"That's not true! Ms. Henson must not be right in the head. Why would I ever record something like that?"

One wounded look from her, and every trace of doubt in Jarvis vanished.

"You've completely lost your mind!"

I opened my mouth, reaching for the voice recorder hidden in my pocket, the one I'd brought to trap Bess into a confession.

But a heavy, dragging pain tore through my lower abdomen where I'd struck the curb.

I grabbed for his hand without thinking.

"Jarvis, I... my stomach hurts."

He glanced back at me, brow furrowed.

"Enough. You're a grown woman. Drop the act. Even if you collapse right here, it won't change anything."

"No one is ruining Bess's presentation today. Get out of here. Go home before you embarrass yourself any further."

He scooped Bess into his arms and walked away without looking back.

I fought through the pain, shaking as I got to my feet. I made it two steps before everything went black.

When I opened my eyes again, I was in a hospital.

The doctor stood beside the bed, frowning.

"You're pregnant. Two months along, and you haven't been careful at all. Where's your family? We need to get you admitted. You have to stay on bed rest."

My heart seized.

My hand drifted to my stomach, trembling.

The child we'd hoped for so desperately, and it chose now to come.

The man who used to panic if I so much as sneezed, who'd rush over asking if I was okaythat same man had just walked away and left me on the ground. That faint thread of joy vanished instantly.

Tears slid silently into my hair.

"I don't want it."

The doctor paused.

"A termination requires your spouse's signature on a consent form. Think it over."

I took my ID to the nurses' station to have the form drawn up, already trying to figure out how I'd get him to sign it.

The nurse frowned at her screen.

"Ms. Henson, according to our records you don't have a legal spouse. You can make the decision on your own."

I stared at her.

The absurdity of it crashed over me, and my voice shook so badly I barely got the words out.

"That's impossible. I've been married for years. My husband is Jarvis Swanson."

The nurse shook her head.

"I can't speak to that. Our records pull directly from civil registration."

I was still shaking when I got into a cab and went straight to the county clerk's office.

The clerk took my ID.

Every keystroke landed like a hammer blow against my chest.

After a long silence, her voice came out flat and routine.

"Your marriage to Mr. Swanson was dissolved three years ago. His current legal spouse is Ms. Hughes."

The room tilted. The light collapsed. Everything went dark.

I looked at the reissued divorce decree. The date on it was the day his father died.

My skull felt ready to split.

When I refused to lend Bess the surgery money, he'd promised he would take care of her, that he wouldn't abandon her. What he meant was divorcing me.

During the cooling-off period, he transferred out the money meant for my father's life-saving surgery.

Killed the man who had funded him, who had lifted him to the peak of academia.

Then turned around and married someone else.

A mouthful of blood surged up my throat.

Disgusting. Truly, utterly disgusting.

I didn't hesitate for a single second. I went to the hospital and had the abortion.

Lying on the operating table, I had Bess's social media feed open on my phone.

*Big win in the lab today All thanks to my amazing Professortonight's reward is on me*

The photo showed two hands with fingers intertwined, and on his hand was an unfamiliar wedding ring.

No wonder. No wonder they could flaunt their love openly in front of the students.

I was the only one kept in the dark about the divorce.

From start to finish, I was the other woman.

In that moment, every emotion came crashing back.

Only one thought left in my head: Why?

Why did their romance, their perfect life, have to be built on the blood and bones of my father and me?

How could anyone repay kindness with cruelty so thoroughly, so completely?

I refused to accept it.

I would make them pay.

I came off that operating table, wiped my eyes, and took one long breath. Then I did two things.

I pulled every recording from the voice recorder, bundled them with the experimental data and handwritten notes my father had saved on his computerall dated three years agoalong with on-site photographs, and sent the entire package to their university and the Academic Research Council. Then I issued a public statement charging them with research data theft.

I hired the best lawyer money could buy and handed over three years' worth of living records, plus my psychiatric diagnosis report proving I was perfectly sane. I sued Jarvis for bigamy, and for conspiring with Bess to defraud and steal four hundred thousand from our familymoney whose loss killed my father. I sued him for forging a psychiatric diagnosis report to brand me insane, and for forging official government documents.

When it was all done, I changed my phone number and blocked and deleted both of them.

This fake, laughable three years could end right here.