Alan gently extended what he had been holding so carefully in both hands toward his father.
"I remember so well when you gave this to me, Father! You said since your wife would be gone soon, you could finally call me your heir without shame. You told me to study hard so I could meet everyone's expectations... and that you were looking forward to it!"
What he held out with a weighted gesture was a brass paperweight.
A brass weight fashioned into the shape of a four-leaf clover and a flower crown. It was just the right size to be cradled in the hands of a nine-year-old child.
A four-leaf clover, a symbol of good luck.
For a man as fond of extravagance as his father, it was a surprisingly modest gift. Yet, in those small hands, it gleamed as though it were the very embodiment of happiness.
"You said I was cuter than the daughter who resembled your wife... that we could be happy as a family... Isn't that why you gave me this?"
Alan's words, sharp and bitter, were difficult to accept even for someone who was a legitimate child.
When his mother was on her deathbed, his father had been with his mistress, whispering such cruel hopes to her child, as though he couldn't wait for his wife to pass. His father saw Gloria as an obstacle, intending to make Alan the next Duke of Caldwell.
Living her second life, Gloria no longer felt sadness or anger over this. Yet, no matter how many times she experienced it, she knew she would always hold her father in contempt.
Alan stretched out his arms, showing his father the brass flower crown in his palms.
His teary violet eyes looking up at his father, his reddened ears trembling with excitement, and the way his hands cradled the crown — all of it mirrored his father's expressions.
Ignoring the small hands shaking under the weight and desperation, his father's face hardened as he turned to Gloria.
Noticing his gaze, Gloria honestly didn't understand why he seemed so panicked now, as if his secrets were only just being exposed.
Even when she was ten in her previous life, she'd known her father had betrayed her mother from the start, keeping a mistress. The moment Alan had introduced himself, everything had been clear.
When she was ordered to give up her position as the Caldwell heir to Alan, she had felt a ten-year-old's righteous anger.
After becoming the Crown Prince's fiancée, she had resolved to take on the role of lady of the house, at least to support the duchy in her mother's absence.
But when she treated the mistress and her son appropriately according to their social status, her father had raged at her and handed over the household authority to his mistress.
After such treatment, it was impossible not to realize that her father intended to deny her everything — not just the Caldwell family's heritage, but even the love a father should have for his daughter.
He stripped her of everything a legitimate daughter of the Caldwell family was supposed to have. The anger she'd felt back then had been immeasurable.
Now, hearing Alan reveal her father's words, she could only tilt her head indifferently, as if to say, *And so what?*
Her father must have noticed her lack of reaction because his face tightened with guilt. Then, he turned back to Alan.
Alan's expression lit up with joy as his father's gaze returned to him, but that joy froze the moment his father spoke.
"You think I ever wanted to be a family with you two? Don't lie to a noble's face."
His father's merciless words continued as Alan stood frozen.
"Sure, your mother was my mistress, but the child of a woman who sells herself for money? How could someone like you possibly be my son? I have no idea whose bastard you really are, and I'd never acknowledge such filth."
Disgusted, his father glared at the four-leaf clover crown resting in Alan's outstretched hands.
"Get him out of here. I don't want to see a criminal's child on this estate ever again."
The butler and the knight escort froze with the same expression as Alan.
His father sighed in exasperation and turned to check his chair, a casual motion to sit down, exposing no deliberate weakness.
And yet, that small moment was a fatal mistake.