Yet here he was, performing his role with the poise of an award-winning actor.
If that's the game they wanted to play, I didn't mind joining in.
I clasped his hand.
"Nadine."
As his palm brushed against my fingers, I felt the faint ridge of a familiar scar. It sent a sharp tremor through my chest.
"Brother-in-law, you have a scar on your palm?"
For just an instant, Darwin froze. But he recovered quickly.
"Got it when I fell as a kid," he said without batting an eyelid.
Tch. A smooth and effortless lie.
But I knew the truth. That scar existed because of me.
It was just after our wedding, during our honeymoon. He had taken me sea fishing when a sudden wave hit, capsizing the boat. I was thrown into the sea. Without a second's hesitation, Darwin jumped in after me. While keeping us afloat in the churning water, his hand got caught in a fishing line, slicing it open deep enough to bleed through the current.
"Nadine, don't cry. Look, I'm fine."
After we were rescued, he wrapped his heavily bandaged hand over his head, pretending to be a rabbit just to make me laugh.
Ever since, every time I saw that scar, I remembered the man who had risked his life for me.
But now, he dismissed it with a single casual lie—"I fell as a kid."
He was the one who had abandoned our shared past first.
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I forced a polite smile.
"So, Brother-in-law, are you here to handle Darwin's funeral?"
Before he could answer, Sydney tightened her grip on his arm.
"Thanks to Nadine, the funeral was arranged beautifully. But Rence came back especially to see me."
Darwin smiled at me, explaining, "She likes to act spoiled. Don't mind her. I'm here to read Darwin's will. We'll meet tomorrow at the Herrera family estate."
He always used that line—she's just a girl who likes to act spoiled—to excuse the harm Sydney caused me.
Six months after our wedding, Sydney had barged into our bedroom under the pretense of wanting to see our home renovations, then scratched a deep gouge across our wedding photo. The jagged edge told me it was no accident.
But Darwin had said, "She's just a young girl. How could she think of something so malicious?"
Yet Sydney was my age. In his eyes, she was the delicate younger sister worth protecting, while I, his wife, was expected to be the one who "understood the bigger picture."
Suppressing the bitterness in my chest, I kept my smile in place.