Chapter 3

On the flight back to Veridian Bay, I didn't text Henry at all.

After landing, I grabbed a cab home, and by the time I walked in, it was already nine o'clock at night.

Henry was sitting on the couch in the living room, not holding a book, nor watching TV. He was sitting there.

"You're back," he said.

"Yeah," I replied.

I dropped my suitcase and took a seat across from him. "Thanks for covering the money."

"No problem," he replied, looking at me. "But there's something I need to clear up with you."

"Go ahead."

"Do you have any idea how much I've paid for this family over the past eight years?"

I was taken aback.

"Mortgage, car loan, Lucas's tuition, property fees, insurance, daily expenses," he counted them one by one. "Every single thing was paid with my card."

"I-I thought we were splitting everything."

"Do you think the 7 thousand dollars left after you transfer 126 thousand dollars every month is enough to cover anything?"

I opened my mouth, but couldn't find the words.

"The mortgage is 14 thousand dollars a month, and Lucas's private school is 120 thousand dollars a year.

"Car insurance and maintenance are 30 thousand dollars a year, and the housekeeper is 4 thousand dollars a month," Henry said, his voice flat, like he was reading off a medical report. "Your card has never covered any of these expenses. Not a single cent."

"I thought it was automatically deducted from my salary card."

"Your salary card is emptied within three days of every month. Where would the automatic deduction come from?"

I was speechless.

"For the past eight years, I've been the one covering every single family expense." Henry stood up and pulled a folder out of the coffee table drawer. "That includes your parents' daily expenses every time they come to Veridian Bay.

"That even includes the 70 thousand dollars you said you'd add for your brother's wedding. That all came from me. Because your card only had 10 thousand dollars left at the time."

He set the folder down in front of me. Inside was a thick stack of printed bank records. All of them were his records.

"When did you print all these records?"

"Last year."

I looked up at him. "So you found out about all this last year?"

"I've always known," Henry said, meeting my gaze. "From the second year onward, I knew you were sending almost all your income to your father."

"Why didn't you ever bring it up?"

"You never cared what I thought." His words felt like a dull knife, slowly carving into me.

"You never once asked, 'How much do you think I should send Dad each year?' You went ahead and transferred the money, then told me, 'This is how much I sent Dad this year.' That's not discussing it. That's notifying me," Henry added.

"But you never objected—"

"Would it have made a difference if I had?" he shot back. "Would you have sent your parents a single dollar less because I said no?"

I fell silent. The answer was no. I knew it.

"Nina, it's not that I mind you supporting your parents," Henry said, pushing the folder toward me. "But have you ever thought about it? You make 1.6 million dollars a year, but you barely keep 70 thousand dollars for yourself.

"The mortgage, Lucas's school, all the big bills, they're all on me, and I only make 280 thousand dollars a year. Meanwhile, your parents are living in a 3,000-square-foot villa, and your brother's rolling around in a Porsche."

"I..."

"You've never saved a single dollar for this family." With that, he turned and walked into the study. The door closed softly behind him.

I was left alone in the living room.

That folder felt like it weighed a ton in my hands.

That night, I didn't sleep.

I went through every single page of the records Henry had put together.

In eight years, every expense from his salary card was laid out in black and white.

The mortgage was automatically deducted every month. It was 14 thousand dollars. Lucas's tuition was 60 thousand dollars per semester. Groceries, utilities, and property fees added up to 8 thousand dollars a month.

Every Christmas, he gave my parents gifts worth three to seven thousand dollars.

And there were also transfers marked as "Nina's Subsidy."

'What does that mean?' I wondered.

I flipped to the notes section.

[March 2019, Nina's credit card payment: 14 thousand dollars.]

[July 2020, Nina's car insurance renewal: 6.2 thousand dollars.]

[January 2021, Nina's health checkup package: 4.3 thousand dollars.]

He'd been quietly filling in the gaps for my personal spending. But I never had a clue.