“I was furious. Humiliated. He didn’t even apologize. Just laughed it off, like I was overreacting.” Her voice trembles, but there’s a sharp edge to it now, like a blade hidden beneath velvet. “So, I decided to get back at him. I just wanted him to suffer, to feel as miserable as I did. I told him I had forgotten something at the house we needed for the honeymoon, so we stopped by our house before we left. I thought the elderberries would make him sick enough to ruin the rest of the trip, maybe even scare him a little. I didn’t know…” Her voice falters, and she looks down, her hands clenching into fists. “I didn’t know it would kill him. That wasn’t the plan. He was such a great skier, he should have been able to avoid the tree even sick.”

A muscle ticks in my jaw, rage bubbling beneath my skin. Should have been able to avoid the tree? Like she’s blaming him. Like he was the one who fucked up.

Selene exchanges a glance with me, her expression unreadable. “And Walter?” she asks, her voice calm but pointed.

Aubrey’s head snaps up, her eyes narrowing. “Walter wasn’t supposed to know,” she spits, her tone venomous now. “He wasn’t supposed to find out about my son. Nobody was. I did everything right—I kept it anonymous and handled everything through the courts. But he found him on that fucking DNA site. He figured it out all thanks to Cassandra putting it in his ear about how I disappeared after George’s death for months.”

We know the answer but ever the actress Selene’s brow furrows. “Disappeared?” she echoes. “Why?”

Aubrey hesitates.

I see it before she says it. The moment her lips part, the moment her eyes dart too quickly to the side like she’s weighing if she should keep going.

But she does.

“Because I had to carry the pregnancy to term,” she snaps, the words laced with resentment. “I got pregnant on purpose, alright? I was seventeen and stupid, but I knew George was going into the military. I knew he’d leave me. So I did everything I could—took every supplement, tracked everything—so he’d get me pregnant before he left. I thought if I had his child, he wouldn’t abandon me. But it didn’t matter. Nothing I did ever mattered to him.”

Selene’s breath catches, and Mo stares at her, stunned. But Aubrey isn’t done.

“I gave everything for that pregnancy,” she continues, voice trembling with bitterness. “And then I found him with Cassandra on our wedding night.”

“So you poisoned him,” I say, my voice flat, dead.

She doesn’t deny it. Just lifts her chin like she’s proud of it.

Selene’s arms tighten across her chest. “And your son? What happened to him?”