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Doryu nodded slowly. “I know.”

Something cold moved through my chest, wiping away the last traces of shock and leaving something much harder behind.

I'd always assumed my father believed the same thing I did. Even after the blackmail started, even after he turned my mother's death into a monthly payment, some part of me had still imagined that the cruelty had begun with what he thought he'd seen. That maybe he'd watched the footage, believed I'd pushed her, and then spent years making sure I never forgot it.

That would've been monstrous enough.

This was worse.

“He didn't find out later,” I said, hearing the answer even as I forced myself to ask. “He knew that night.”

“Yes.”

Doryu turned the laptop toward himself and brought up the file information he'd recovered. “The footage your father showed you when you were seven wasn't the full recording. The clip had already been cut to remove the part where your foot caught the step. Whoever created that version knew exactly what they were removing.”

My stomach twisted. “And my father had both?”

“Yes. The original security archive contained footage from both cameras, and the copy connected to your father included access to the wider angle. He didn't just happen to receive an incomplete clip.”

For a few seconds, I couldn't speak.

My mother had died, my entire world had disappeared overnight, and the only parent I had left had sat me down and shown me a video designed to make me believe I'd killed her.

Not because he was grieving.

Not because he was mistaken.

Because he knew what the truth looked like and chose to hide it. He didn’t even know then he would have the power to blackmail me. He was just being exceptionally cruel, and in that moment, utter hatred for him stole my breath.

Max moved closer, although he still let me decide whether I wanted the contact.

I barely noticed.

“He knew I was seven, and he still—” I stopped, swallowed, and tried again. “He watched me believe I'd killed her.”

Nobody answered because there wasn't anything they could say that would make that sentence less horrifying.

Memories I hadn't thought about in years began rearranging themselves in my head. My father telling me not to cry because crying wouldn't bring her back. Telling me I had to live with what I'd done. Telling me, years later, that if anyone ever saw the footage, they'd know exactly what kind of person I was.

He had known the entire time that none of it was true.

By the time he started demanding money, he hadn't needed to create a threat. He'd spent years building one inside me. The realization should've made me panic, but instead, something inside me went very still.

For most of my life, my father had been terrifying because he owned the truth.

Now I understood that he'd never owned the truth at all.

He'd owned a lie.

And Doryu had just taken it away from him.

“I want copies of everything.”

Doryu's eyebrows lifted slightly, but he didn't question me.

“The original footage, every camera angle, the version he showed me when I was seven, the one he's been using to blackmail me, the file history, and anything else that proves he altered it. I want all of it.”

“You'll have it.”