Page 150 of Lavish

Her jaw clenched. “You lied to me.”

“No, I—” I ran a hand down my face. “I didn’t lie. I just didn’t…tell you.”

“Which is a lie, Miles.”

He told her. He fucking told her.

I opened my mouth, but the words felt like shards in my throat. Because she was right.

I’d been hiding Victor from her since the beginning. Not out of malice—at least, that’s what I told myself—but because if she knew the truth, everything would crumble.

“Serena,” I started. “I was trying to protect you.”

Her laugh was bitter and quiet. “Don’t insult me.”

“It’s not what you think?—”

“No, just…let me finish.” Her tone wavered for a split second, but the steel was still there. “I get it, Miles. I do. I know you’ve had to make choices—do things you probably hated just to survive. To protect your company. I’m not blind to that.”

She took a breath, jaw tense.

“But you should’ve told me. I’m your wife. You don’t get to make decisions that could wreck both of us and then keep me in the dark. That’s also why you should have told me the real reason you and Erik aren’t friends.”

“He told you that too?”

“Yeah. He told me everything. That he was the one who blew the whistle on your dad.”

Silence pressed down, thick and heavy.

So it was out. Finally out.

“He said he didn’t want to,” she added quietly. “But after what happened at that party, after what your father did to my dad, Erik said he couldn’t stay quiet.”

My throat burned. “He didn’t have to do it.”

“Come on, Miles. You know Erik. He’s always had a bigger sense of loyalty than you—especially when it comes to family. It was only a matter of time. And deep down…you knew that.”

Serena watched me closely, taking a step. “Unless that was your plan.”

“What?”

“You didn’t want to deal with your father. You didn’t want the responsibility of turning him in or confronting what he did. Erik knew. You kept stalling and let him do it.”

I looked away. The air was suddenly too thick.

“You didn’t have to betray your father,” she said, voice low, “because Erik did it for you. And you’ve hated him ever since for taking the choice out of your hands when you should have owned it.”

“That’s my father, Serena.”

She shook her head. “And now I’m your wife. What if that was going on today? Would you choose him or me?”

I turned from her, pacing the living room. “I kept hoping he’d stop. That he’d fix it before it got worse. That if I just held the line, kept the gossip off us, kept the company from crumbling, he’d wake up and fight for it too.”

Her silence was brutal.

“How do you deal with that? Watching the man you spent your whole life looking up to…crumble right in front of you? How do you reconcile that?”

“You don’t.” Her voice was calm. “You adjust. You grieve what you thought he was. And then you face what he really is.”