I left the hospital carrying my daughter’s ashes when my husband finally called from wherever he was with his mistress and coldly said, “The bill has been taken care of. Stop bothering me.” I didn’t argue with him. I didn’t allow him to hear my voice break.

“No,” Gideon conceded softly.

“But your father was deeply worried that eventually Brendan would treat his own family the same way he treated his company.”

My father had noticed something I spent years trying not to see.

Brendan believed providing money was the exact same thing as providing actual care, and once he delegated a responsibility to someone else, he rarely questioned what happened afterward.

Gideon told me my father had specifically asked whether medical expenses for Chloe could ever be delayed by the Fairchild family’s internal approval system.

Gideon had personally assured him that emergency treatment would always take immediate priority.