Page 41 of Fateful Exposure

She'd once told me that my father had promised to marry her when she was pregnant with me. Obviously, he hadn't been a man of his word because the ring never came. Instead, he'd broken up with her and reduced his visits until one day, we waited, and he never came.

My heart broke for her, and right now, it was breaking even harder because I was the one who'd put that look of disappointment on her face. This wasn’t the circumstances under which I'd promised to receive her at my office, and it physically hurt to hold her gaze.

"He's…"What?I thought.A friend? An employee? My neighbor? Fuck buddy?"Someone I met."

She scoffed, her eyes shining with brazen awe. "Someone you met? What, a one-night stand?" When I averted my gaze briefly, she blinked. "Selma, you slept with some random man, and you didn't think to use protection? What the hell have I been teaching you all these years? How can you be so stupid?"

"Mama!" I cried. "Can you just stop and listen to me for a moment?"

"What do you have to say for yourself that could possibly justify your recklessness? That you're sorry? That you didn't know you'd get pregnant? After having unprotected sex with a stranger, what did you expect? A pat on the back and a warning from God to not do it again?"

"Uh…Miss Volkov, I think you should calm down," Maria interjected, earning herself a death glare from my mother.

"And where were you, young lady, when this was happening?" she demanded.

Maria cleared her throat, looking incredibly small next to my mother. I would’ve felt pity for her, but I was too busy feeling sorry for myself.

"I'll shut up now," Maria squeaked, sinking into the chair. When faced with Matilda Volkov's wrath, a million Instagram followers is a negligible feat.

My mother faced me. "Is he going to marry you?"

I raised one brow. "That’s ridiculous."

"Then get rid of it."

"What?” Maria and I exclaimed at the same time.

I stared at my mother in shock, wondering if I'd heard her right. She wanted me to get rid of my baby? That was the last thing I expected to come out of her mouth. My mother had always been pro-life, and while the circumstances couldn't have been more inconvenient, it was inconceivable that she would ask me to do something like that.

"I'm not going to do that, Mama," I said, my voice low. Desperation for her approval had long given way to anger, and I felt it boiling at the surface. "If you don't want to be involved in the child's life, that's fine. But I will not be getting rid of this baby."

Her nostrils flared. "You want to live the kind of life I did? One where you don't get to have time for yourself, and your entirelife becomes about that child? You want to grow old and have nothing but regrets?"

I opened my mouth to respond but froze when her meaning settled around me. The realization struck me like a bolt of lightning, jolting me from the comfort of ignorance into the harsh reality of truth. It was as if the ground had shifted beneath my feet, leaving me unsteady and disoriented, grappling with the weight of a revelation I had never dared to consider.

"You…" My throat felt dry. "You have regrets?"

She huffed out a puff of air through her nostrils, her eyes watering. "Of course I do. You were the best thing that ever happened to me, but at the same time, raising you was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I had no family to help me, and all my friends would rather be off doing their own thing than dealing with another person's child." She wiped under her eyes. "And it certainly didn't help that your asshole of a father was a bum who couldn't keep to his word. I had to drop out of school to work because I wanted to give you a life worth living."

Fresh tears pricked behind my eyes. For years, I had lived under the illusion that my mother's love was unwavering and unconditional, a steadfast beacon of support in an often tumultuous world. But now, faced with the painful truth that she had, in fact, harbored regrets about raising me alone, that illusion shattered into a million jagged pieces, leaving me raw and exposed to the harsh glare of reality.

And yet, amidst the turmoil of my conflicting emotions, there was a glimmer of understanding—a flicker of empathy for thewoman who had sacrificed so much for my sake, only to be haunted by the ghosts of her unfulfilled dreams. It gave a deeper interpretation of her anger regarding the present circumstances and why she would ask me to get an abortion.

"And you did, Mama. I mean, look at me. I'm Selma Volkov." I smiled sadly through my tears. "People have crossed continents just to wear my designs, and it's all because of you. So, yes. It was hard being a single mother, but if anyone could make it work, you did."

My mother burst out crying, and I reached her in seconds, wrapping my arms around her and bringing her close to my body. "It's okay, Mama."

"I just want you to live a happy life with a man who will worship the ground you walk on,” she wept. “Is that too much to ask?"

"Not really," Maria sniffed from my left, wiping her cheeks. I'd completely forgotten she was there.

Shaking my head at her theatrics, I sighed. "No, Mama. I'll find love. One day. Hopefully." I swallowed down a thick ball of spit. "I think."

"Selma," my mother scolded. "It's not funny."

How could I tell her that I'd completely given up on love? Not after the man I loved stole from me and eloped to start his own company with my cousin, who he claimed was better than me. It honestly didn't get worse than that.

I was so done with men. Every single one of them.

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