Author's Note: Thank you to everybody who read or reviewed the last chapter. I know it's been a little while, but I had to finish my other Ugly Betty story. Also, this is a major chapter in the development of the plot and characters and unfortunately I ran into a bit of writer's block. Thankfully, Heather kept me focused.

Chapter 23: Surprise

Betty walked into the MODE offices wondering exactly how Marc talked her into being his new assistant. He asked her the day after the will reading a week ago (a reading that Daniel did not show up for) once they knew for sure that Marc would still be replacing Wilhelmina as Creative Director at MODE.

Okay, maybe, ask wasn't exactly the right word. It was more like he begged her, and Faye felt it would be good for her to be at a magazine that did not remind her of her ex-boyfriend. In reality, she didn't think that would work because everything about Meade Publications reminded her of Daniel.

Okay, it was more like her new stepmother of exactly 2 days did not want to leave her magazine in Wilhelmina's hands without people she trusted making sure she did not destroy the magazine, especially with September fashion week just around the corner. Plus, considering she was still upset with Jamie for telling Daniel about the Wilhelmina thing, it was best that she found employment elsewhere, even if it meant working under the woman who completely ruined her relationship with Daniel.

Okay, she was really mad at Jamie for not telling Daniel that Alex was not really dead. She may have said some things to her boss that she shouldn't have the first day back in the office after the funeral.

And she may have through a cup of coffee at him, but it was ice coffee. (He forgave her because even he felt he deserved to be pelted with coffee for not telling Daniel.)

In the end, it really wasn't her choice, Faye was in charge of Meade Publications now, and she wanted Betty at MODE; therefore, Betty would be at MODE. She was also sure that this may also be her punishment for the coffee thing (or more like not telling anyone, including Daniel what Wilhelmina was doing to her and trying to handle everything on her own).

Marc was one of her closest friends, sort of, when he admits that he actually was her friend. However, she doesn't know if she can work for somebody who emailed her an outfit guide for the next week, so that they could color coordinate. She was personally shocked that Marc didn't show up at her apartment this morning to make sure that she was following the guide.

It really didn't matter if she followed the guide this morning because Alex spilled orange juice on her. She would change as soon as she had time to put on her backup outfit. (Yes, she now carried a backup outfit for herself and Alex after she realized that when he got dirty she usually got dirty. He was unbelievably messy.)

She was currently wearing a poncho she bought on the way to the office to cover the stain until she had time to change. Alex also broke her glasses on the subway ride here, and they were currently being held together by duct tape because no self-respecting mother of a one-year-old leaves the house without duct tape.

She wasn't exactly as fashion hopeless as she was before Alex was born. She was Faye Somers stepdaughter and most of her closet was now filled with designer labels. And thanks to Amanda and Justin's tutoring, she knew who most of those designers were (at least the ones that design menswear). But MODE made her uncomfortable, she didn't look like a MODE girl, and she never wanted to be that way. Exposed ribs were not sexy.

Even though she subscribed to the Alex Suarez workout plan of chasing her now mobile toddler around the apartment, she was still a size 10 and at least 20 pounds heavier than every other woman in the office. Other than a few interns, she was also probably the only one wearing braces, even if they were the invisible type. She had at least another year to go. (She was very thankful that Alex inherited the good teeth from his aunt.)

So, it really didn't help her self-esteem to have the receptionist Chloe asked her if she was the before for their mommy makeover issue (She blames the poncho covering up the orange juice stains). She felt slightly better, when Chloe started trembling after Marc informed her that she referred to Faye Somers-Suarez's stepdaughter, as the before.

"I knew I should've stopped over this morning. I'm burning that thing as soon as I get it off of you." Marc said as he ushered her into his office. The room was still in complete disarray with half unpacked boxes everywhere. "But Cliff told me not to. Okay, he distracted me with a…" at that moment she covered Alex's ears and gave Marc a glare that instantly shut him up.

The reason why Alex was with her this morning was she wasn't exactly on speaking terms with her regular babysitter. She had trusted Alexis Summers with her child, and the woman has been lying to her for months. It really would have been nice to know that her son was being watched by his uncle, who came back from the dead as his new aunt. Because of this, Alex would be spending his days split between her office, Tia Faye's office, and the daycare.

"Please don't say what your boyfriend did to you this morning in front of my child. Besides, I looked fine when I left the house. But then I made the mistake of drinking something with Alex in my arms. I bought this from a street vendor to cover up the orange juice stains until I had time to change. Besides Justin said ponchos were in this year." She told her new boss in a slightly annoyed tone. She had a feeling that she and Marc would never have a traditional boss/assistant relationship.

"Not ones that say 'I love New York' in gigantic letters that might as well spell out 'I'm a tourist, please rob me'. I'm not surprised my favorite future fashionista is to blame." He said grabbing Alex out of her arms, allowing Betty to strip off the offensive poncho. "You look fabulous, but your mom is a mess."

"I have a backup outfit." She said pulling the red blouse out of her bag.

"It doesn't match me, but it's better than being covered in orange juice and wearing that ridiculous poncho." He said, just as she took her orange juice cover blouse off. Considering how often Marc saw her breast-feeding she had no trouble changing in front of him.

"Do you have your backup glasses or contacts? I assume that Alex also broke your glasses."

"Amanda said she would bring them to me later, maybe. She's mad at me for not trusting her with Alex this morning." Betty told him.

"You know that she is my platonic life partner, but even I would not leave a small child with her. She told a grieving 11-year-old that his dad was not his biological dad. But at least, an 11-year-old can call you if she does stupid things." Marc told her, causing Betty to frown before she realized who he was talking about.

"She what?" Betty asked outraged and worried for DJ.

Daniel decided it was better for DJ not know that Alex was his biological father. He didn't want DJ to have a man who rather kill himself, then deal with the world as his father. Now that they know that Alex became Alexis Summers instead she wondered how this will affect everything. Poor DJ.

"Yes, she told Daniel Junior that he was not Daniel's son, or rather he overheard her tell Kenny this. His reaction was bad, and Daniel's was worse. Daniel cursed her out for hours. I'm surprised your BFF didn't tell you this?" Marc explained.

"Daniel is still not speaking to me." It hurt her to say this to Marc.

She hadn't spoken to Daniel since he left her in the town car in tears after she had no choice but to tell him that Wilhelmina blackmailed her. He has not returned a single one of her calls, emails, or text messages in the last 15 days. He missed the will reading and her father's wedding, and she knows for a fact that Faye invited him. Her only date for the wedding was her almost one-year-old son. He did make an absolute adorable ring bearer in his custom-made Ralph Lauren suit.

Nico would not tell her where Daniel was. Actually the teenager cannot even look at her without going off on a rant about her mother. She has been staying at Faye's house whenever she can get away from her mother, which was unfortunately not very often. Nico wasn't even sure whether Daniel was in the country because the last time Wilhelmina caught her talking to Daniel, her phone was tossed out the window.

Daniel's mother wasn't an option either because he wasn't speaking with her either. At this point, Betty was desperate to get a hold of Daniel and she was forced to call Claudette. The woman told her nothing. In fact, she pretended not to speak English and hung up on her immediately.

In hindsight, Betty realized that she should have told Daniel everything that was going on, including the discovery that Wilhelmina forged the DNA test. By hindsight, she means her sister yelling at her for several hours after she returned from her mini-vacation in the Hamptons. Except now that she was ready to tell Daniel everything, he was nowhere to be found.

"I meant Amanda, but I guess she's your stepsister now. I don't blame Daniel for not speaking to you though, you did keep Baby Fashionista a secret."

She was too busy putting her shirt on to respond to Marc. Unfortunately at that moment, the woman responsible for putting her in such an awkward position walked into Marc's office, without even bothering to knock. Surprisingly enough, Nico was with her wearing the biggest fake smile possible and an outfit that complemented Wilhelmina perfectly.

"Underneath the orange juice and breast milk stains, there might actually be something there, if you lost 30 pounds." Wilhelmina said harshly. "You know, just because Marc got his job on his knees doesn't mean you have to. Although you already spread your legs for Danny boy, so I guess it's too late for you."

Betty quickly pulled down her blouse. She doesn't care if Marc saw her naked because it's almost like changing in front of Amanda or her sister. Everyone else was different. For a split second, it almost looked like Nico was ready to throw the bottle of water in her hand at her mother, but she never did.

"Actually, Jamie was the one on his knees, not that it matters." Marc hissed in response. "My ability to do things that I can't say in front of Baby Suarez has nothing to do with me getting this job. Despite what you think, I know I earned this job by working my stylish little behind off. In contrast, you got your current position by doing men who need little blue pills, who were lucky enough to die before the long walk down the aisle." Marc quipped. For just a second, Wilhelmina almost seemed surprised by the bar, but her face became still once more.

"You know I can still fire you." Wilhelmina said in the harshest tone possible.

"No, you cannot. If the editor in chief could fire the creative director without it being approved upstairs, you would have been gone a long time ago. I make those decisions, and Marc stays. I need somebody down here that knows what the hell they're doing, so my magazine doesn't fall apart." Her stepmother said actually smiling. She knew Faye wasn't happy about having to postpone her honeymoon because Wilhelmina couldn't wait until after Fashion Week to formally take over as the new EIC.

"I can still get rid of her. She has no business working at a fashion magazine. Really, duct tape?" Wilhelmina took the broken glasses off her face and threw them in the nearest trashcan.

"People in ugly glass houses shouldn't throw stones, Wanda. Don't forget that, unlike you, Betty and her son own a percentage of this company. In a matter of speaking, she's your boss, despite your best efforts." For some reason, Wilhelmina became instantly chastened at Faye's words.

"Alex?" Her stepmom asked simply, well aware of the mess that Alex can make when he wants to. The toddler managed to put chocolate handprints on Faye's one-of-a-kind Vera Wang wedding dress an hour before the wedding. Thankfully, Christina can work miracles.

"Yes." She answered simply.

"Your dad thought it would be a good idea for me to keep a backup pair, just in case. Fortunately, I ordered you something non-hideous." She said before turning to Wilhelmina.

"Look, I don't want you here. Like Marc, I think the only reason why you have this job is because you were screwing Bradford and somehow convinced him to put you in the will. For now, I'm willing to honor his last request, but if you even think about firing my stepdaughter, you will be the one in the unemployment line. Do we understand each other?" She glared directly at Wilhelmina.

"Perfectly," Wilhelmina left the office, but Nico stayed behind.

"I will have Marisol bring down your good glasses. However, I expect everyone in the conference room in five minutes." Faye took Alex from Marc before leaving the room. She knew better than to interrupt grandma/grandson time between the two, even if Faye hated the word 'grandma'.

"Why are you trailing behind mommy dearest like Holsten?" Marc asked harshly as Betty finished getting dress.

"I was worried about that too, especially because I've had to listen to you complain about her for the last two weeks. I thought you were…" Betty stopped speaking then because she's not exactly sure how to word the fact that Nico wanted nothing more than to be completely separated from Wilhelmina Slater.

"It's a long story, and we have to be in the conference room in four minutes. It's just a means to an end." Nico said before leaving, and Betty followed behind her because it's probably going to take that long to get to the conference room without wearing glasses.

She would like to blame her lack of glasses on running into the conference room door. However, she's pretty sure the site of Daniel sitting in the conference room with Alex on his lap was the major contributing factor.

Two Weeks Earlier

"I've would pour you a drink, but considering your mother and half-brother's history, I don't feel like enabling a future potential alcoholic." Faye handed Daniel a cup of Mister Suarez's signature hot chocolate. It always worried Daniel when Faye Somers was nice to him so her returning to bitchy form was probably best, even if she was currently plying him with hot chocolate and fresh brownies.

The last couple of hours have been spent reconciling himself to the fact that Alex Suarez was his biological son and Wilhelmina Slater went through great pains to keep him away to…

Actually, he's not even sure what Wilhelmina has been trying to keep him away from or why. He doesn't want to think about it. He's too angry at everyone. Wilhelmina for her scheming and Betty for not bothering to tell him that Alex was his after she discovered the truth, even if she was under duress.

Actually, he was mad at a lot of people for not telling him. Okay, so Wilhelmina was blackmailing Betty to keep her mouth shut, but Jamie could have said something. His mom knew, and she did not say anything either, but that was starting to become a theme with his mother. She accidentally got pregnant by the guy she was cheating on dad with, go hide in South Dakota until you give birth and never mentioned it again until you sprang the surprise child on everyone nearly 25 years later. Your oldest son comes back from the dead as your oldest daughter; don't say anything until your middle child walks in on a very important mother/child moment.

Then, there's the fact that his new sister found it easier to fake her died then to tell him that she wanted to undergo gender reassignment surgery. What's wrong with him that his family doesn't want to tell him the truth?

His family truly sucked at honest communication, but at the very least Amanda should've said something. They talk to each other at least every other day, and she never told him anything, until she accidentally blabbed the entire thing on his voicemail and Faye had to come up to clean up her mess. Finding out any other way would have been better than that. Amanda told her boyfriend of only a few weeks, but she didn't want to tell him. That hurt.

After he regained consciousness, he went back upstairs to grab DJ for father-son bonding. Okay, he wanted to get out of that place as fast as possible before he found out any more bad news from Faye. Daniel took DJ to hide on the beach hoping that by the time, he returned he won't have to deal with this - revelation. Daniel knew that there were things that he had to deal with. Now that he knew that Alex was his child he just wasn't ready for it. He just wanted a few hours without responsibilities to figure out what his next move will be. Except it's hard to run away from everything and everyone, when one of those things you are responsible for keeps glaring at you.

DJ was furious at him for keeping the fact that Alex (the formerly deceased) was his real father/other biological parent a secret, even if it was to protect him. It was brought to his attention in the most sarcastic way possible that what he did was no different than what his mother Claire did regarding the Tyler and Alexis situations. Okay, Daniel realizes it wasn't that dissimilar from what Betty did either, and he did not need his child to point that out to him. Daniel could understand DJ's point that it was a lot more painful to find something like this out from a near stranger by accident than from a trusted family member.

The morning or rather afternoon consisted of vast amounts of groveling and Daniel buying DJ lots of guilt presents. Daniel was starting to think of it as taking a page out of the Bradford Meade parenting handbook. When you make your child feel absolutely miserable by lying or ignoring him completely buy him things. The 11-year-old was now completely sugar stoned on chocolate, hard candy and ice cream and had several shopping bags filled with things from all the shops catering to the obscenely rich. By the end of it, DJ is mostly convinced that Daniel was not going to leave him with a woman that he barely knows who happens to be his other biological parent (the whole 'your biological father is now a woman' conversation required an extra cone of ice cream with extra whip cream and sprinkles.)

DJ was worried that now that Daniel had a biological son in Baby Alex that he was just going to leave DJ behind. Daniel had to spend a lot of time explaining the concepts of adoption and families of choice. According to the French courts and his lawyers, DJ was Daniel's son legally and that wasn't going to change now that they were aware Alexis Summers was DJ's other biological parent. Daniel was pretty sure he told DJ that he loved him more in the last 12 hours than Daniel heard those words from his parents during his entire childhood.

Although, despite DJ's worries about being left behind, he didn't want to be away Alex. He actually liked the idea of a baby brother. Okay, there may be an entire bag of two-year-old appropriate toys purchased by DJ for Alex during their 'I'm sorry I lied to you' shopping spree. DJ was less upset now that he secured Daniel's promise that they were not going back to France. Actually, that's the only thing Daniel is sure of right now. He may never be able to be in a room again with half of his family, but he was going to be in his son's life, no matter what, both of them. (The fact that Betty wasn't on the list of people that he wanted to avoid completely for the rest of his life was something he did not want to examine too closely.)

They don't arrive back to the Wyndham-West summer home until late, mostly because he hoped that they would be gone by that point, and he wouldn't have to deal with- the fact that he didn't even question anything. Daniel feels as stupid as everybody always assumed him to be. All the signs were there, but he never questioned the validity of the DNA test or anything else.

Just the mere fact that Betty named her son after his, at the time, deceased brother should have made alarm bells go off. Alex looks nothing like Betty's ex-boyfriend. He would like to blame the fact that they never had penetrative sex before Betty conceived Alex for ignoring all the obvious signs, but he knows better. They had a lot of unprotected sex (at least that first time), even if he never came inside of her. He felt completely foolish, and he doesn't want anybody to point that out to him.

But DJ was crashing due to way too much sugar, and he was too freaked out earlier in the day to grab their luggage and check into a hotel. Therefore, Daniel had no choice but to go back to the Wyndham West house. He was hoping that everybody was gone. Instead, he walks into see every member of the Suarez family, but Betty crowded around the very large kitchen table. When he says every member that included Alex, who was at the time, throwing Apple slices at his cousin Justin. Before he had time to run out of the house, Mr. Suarez put him down in a chair and started feeding him and DJ.

The food was good, although DJ may have fell asleep sometime around the fourth bite of food. Okay, he may have also been responsible for feeding baby Alex, which felt good, but a little weird.

After he survived the most surreal dinner of his entire life and convinced baby Alex to sleep, Faye pulled him into Vivienne Windom-West's personal study and started giving him brownies and cocoa, which was enough to freak anybody out. If she didn't make the bitchy remark about alcohol, he probably would've ran out of there. It would've been too surreal otherwise.

"I have a lot of things to think about and chocolate is more conducive to that." Daniel said as he took a tentative drink of the chocolate. It was actually quite good. "Are these special brownies?" He kind of needed something to mellow him out, and he probably wouldn't wake up with a hangover with pot brownies.

"Unfortunately no but these are pretty good without anything extra. I'm going to have to do an extra hour on the treadmill tomorrow to fit in my wedding dress." Faye took a bite of her own brownie. Daniel believed this is the first time he's ever seen her eat something this caloric.

"I know I already RSVP, but I don't think I'm coming to the wedding any more. I don't think I can deal with Betty after." Even though he was still kind of in love with her and she understands that she was under duress he just can't see her right now. Maybe in a few weeks, he can be around her and they can start working through this but not today.

"I understand, but you should probably be more forgiving. I still haven't told Amanda's father that he is her father and Amanda is almost 25. Once we had the Wilhelmina situation handled I have every confidence that Betty would have told you."

"Why haven't you contacted Amanda's father?" Daniel asked because it was easier to ask that question, then anything related to why no one told him about Alex, including a woman who was supposed to be in love with him.

"Because he's some closet case soap opera star who was so stoned at the time he didn't even realize I had breasts. I'm not even sure how much cocaine we did that night, which is the reason why we can't have pot brownies now. Sobriety sucks sometimes, but it's the price I pay for the life I have now, and it's worth it." Faye explained taking a drink of her chocolate.

"I think I like this version of you better."

"That's probably because I'm not fucking your father behind your mother's back anymore." She quipped.

"I wasn't going to mention that."

"Even when under the influence, I realized that was a mistake. Look, in some ways the situation is completely different. I actually had to hire a detective to find Amanda's birth father. He was some random hookup that I didn't care about. Betty actually loves you."

"She has a very fucked up way of showing it." Daniel said in annoyance.

"If she didn't care about you Wilhelmina's blackmail would not have worked, and you know it." There wasn't anything that Daniel could say in response to that. He knew that Wilhelmina was using the fret of Daniel losing custody of DJ to keep Betty under her control. If Betty did not care about him, a fret like that wouldn't work.

"We all do stupid things to protect those that we love. I gave Amanda away. I was planning to never let her find out that I was her mother because I thought it was better for her. Now that I'm watching Alex grow up, I wonder if I made the right decision." Faye said.

"At least you got to be there for the last year. I barely found out in time for the first birthday party." He hoped he got to the point where he could be in a room with Betty before the birthday party. He may have missed the first steps, but he wasn't missing anything else.

"It wasn't that she was deliberately keeping Alex away from you for no good reason. The wicked bitch was blackmailing her. A lot of people think I gave Amanda away for the sake of my career. That was never the reason. I'm a drug addict and alcoholic and I always will be. I've just been having a good few months lately. I could barely stay clean during my pregnancy. I gave Amanda away because I wasn't healthy enough to take care myself, let alone a baby." The unflappable Faye Somers almost seemed on the verge of crying. This was almost as unnerving as her being nice.

"You did what you had to do. I mean, unlike mom with Tyler, you actually watched Amanda growing up. I mean, she told me that you took her prom dress shopping." He remembered talking about those little things with Amanda when she first found out about the adoption.

It was also in that moment that Daniel realized that he didn't miss out on this year with Alex. Betty and everyone else constantly sent him video files, 90% of them of Alex using Amanda's very expensive shoes as a pacifier. He even talked with Alex on the phone. At least once a week, even though the 11-month-old usually doesn't say more than 'Da' or 'ma'.

"Someone had to do it." She said almost smirking, forcing Daniel to return to the conversation at hand.

"But if I didn't overhear her conversation with Wilhelmina, I still would have no clue what was going on. I mean did she think that I couldn't take care of Alex." Because even though Betty has kept him in Alex's life, she didn't want him to be Alex's dad.

"Daniel, she thinks you're a wonderful father and she has told you that hundreds of times. You took in a child that wasn't yours, and you have given him everything. DJ adores you. The problem as my future stepdaughter has the unfortunate trait of thinking that she has to do everything on her own, including protect her family. Despite what you think otherwise you are her family." Faye said, handing him another folder. Considering the last one held the DNA test of doom, Daniel's not sure he actually wants to open this.

"I think Wilhelmina killed your father for her dream job and a piece of the Meade pie." Okay, now he really does not want to open the folder because even though he knows better, he's expecting to see photos of Wilhelmina standing over his father's bloodied body.

"That was a non sequitur. Also, I'm pretty sure you mentioned this sometimes yesterday during the wake." Daniel told her, slightly dazed.

"It's all connected to why Wilhelmina doesn't want you here and why Betty had a very good reason to try to protect you and Alex at all costs. Also, that was your mother. I know better than to let Wilhelmina know that I'm on to her." Okay, she may be right about that. Despite being sober this time, his mom spent most of the day cursing Wilhelmina's existence when she wasn't trying to explain why she didn't tell him that Alexis Summers was his sister.

"It doesn't really matter who said it if there is no proof." Daniel shot back.

"My niece Rufe is a detective for the NYPD. And she gave me everything in that file there."

"I thought you only have a sister?" Daniel asked realizing thanks to being really good friends with Amanda (when she doesn't say the wrong thing in front of his 11-year-old) he knows way too much about his father's former mistresses' personal life.

"I'm reconnecting. Now that I'm clean and sober and marrying a nice guy, I am no longer the black sheep of the family. They're calling your father's death a heart attack, but that can be faked. According to your father's nosy neighbor across the way, Wilhelmina was the last person to see your dad alive. She left the apartment a few hours before the maid showed up."

In front of him were now witness statements and surveillance photos from the house on the corner. For some reason, his father refused to upgrade the security system. A camera with have been a really good thing.

"You're convinced she just made it look like a heart attack?" Faye just rolled her eyes at his question. "If she was really going to kill dad off for the MODE job or whatever, don't you think she would've waited until the wedding? Right now Nico is getting her share of the pie." He has no trouble whatsoever believing that Wilhelmina Slater killed his father for money and power. Daniel thought she would've waited until she could reap the most benefit out of it.

"Not if your father broke up with her that night." That's when Faye recounted Alexis' final conversation with their father as well as calls that Faye and Claire received right before Bradford's death.

"My theory is that Wilhelmina wanted my job so her first method was convincing Alex that she could only be herself if she faked her death and that Wilhelmina would help her for a price."

"And that price was helping her take over." From his conversation, yesterday with Alexis, he had a feeling that this was what happened.

"However, Betty being introduced into your life made you less flaky and more likely to take over the reins of Meade Publications, therefore making Wilhelmina's original plan no longer feasible." Daniel was tempted to say something about the fact that his father did not believe in him (or that Betty did not change him that much). The fact that his will named Faye president instead of him, made that quite clear to Daniel.

"Please, I was only named president of the company out of some miss place guilt and the fact that Bradford knows you don't have time to run the company with a toddler and a preteen. Okay, he realizes that you rather spend time with DJ then be stuck in that dreadful office."

"That may be true." Daniel said, realizing that he doesn't want to be president of the company.

"Her next attempt to get my job was working her way into your father's bedroom." She practically growls.

"Which worked so well," Daniel said annoyed. There was an unfortunate part of his mine that was happy his father did not live long enough to have the actual wedding. Unfortunately, Bradford still left Wilhelmina MODE on a silver platter.

"Not at first. As soon as your mom served him with divorce papers, Wilhelmina was out the door. They did not get back together until the week after your father—oh, fuck she arranged that on purpose." Faye said, putting her cup down so hard on the table that she cracked the cup.

"What are you talking about?" Daniel asked her confused.

"Your father did not crawl back between Wilhelmina's legs until he found out I was dating Ignacio by catching us - on a date. Wilhelmina obviously…"

"Arranged for him to see you on said 'date'." Daniel finished for her. It seemed like something Wilhelmina would do. Also, he was pretty sure date was a euphemism for something that he does not want to know about, due to the stuttering.

"You're very observant, which is surprising." Faye said almost smugly.

"I'm not that stupid." He said defensively, even if he missed all the signs that Alex was his son. "For a while I have believed Wilhelmina was using your upcoming nuptials to convince him to finally marry her and put her in the will." Daniel told her.

"Which makes perfect sense. Of course, everything fell apart when Bradford found out what she did to your Betty, but fortunately for her, he dropped dead before the will was changed." Faye said bitterly. It made sense. It was the perfect motive.

"But why is she still fucking around with my relationship with Betty? Why did she switch the DNA test? I'm not piecing this together."

"Do I have to explain everything?" Faye asked with a sigh before continuing. "First of all, Bradford was a much easier mark when we were not on speaking terms with him."

Daniel thought back to Lucy's funeral weeks ago and Wilhelmina's attempt to make them feel like one big happy family. His father was lonely and missed his family and Wilhelmina obviously took advantage of that void.

"So basically with me off in Paris, it was easier to convince a lonely divorcee to marry her gold digging self?" Daniel asked already knowing the answer to this question.

"Yes," Faye answered simply.

"Then why not just send me to Paris with Betty and Alex? Why go through so much to keep me away from my son?" Daniel is having a really hard time understanding Wilhelmina's motivation.

"There is more for her to inherit from her sugar daddy if there are fewer pesky grandkids to split the money with." Just the mere thought of Wilhelmina keeping him away from his son for something as stupid as money made him sick. But if she was willing to kill for the Meade money, then she would obviously be willing to keep a father away from his son.

"Be happy she did not hire another hitman to push Betty down the stairs." At that moment, she placed another report in front of him.

About the same time Daniel found out that Alex was supposedly not his child, the police found the man who tried to kill Jordan. The police described him as a thug for higher. Although instead of accepting cash, he was paid with a dress that Jackie Kennedy wore on the cover of MODE during the 60s. The report in front of him from Faye's private investigator points to the fact that the courier who delivered the dress to the hitman was paid in cash by a guy matching the description of Wilhelmina's sycophant Carlo Medea. Unfortunately, the courier was deported to Honduras before a lineup could happen. However, in Daniel's mind this was enough to connect Wilhelmina to what happened.

No wonder, Betty was so afraid of the woman. She really did try to kill Jordan for the sake of money. (She also had the witness deported.) If she did it once, she would easily do it again. Daniel now had the sick feeling that she already did and that victim was his father.

"If that's what she wanted she could have had it. I really don't give a fuck about the money." He really didn't care. Being DJ's father has taught him that some things are more important. Besides he prides himself on being nothing like DJ's grandparents who were money loving vampires. Even though he was furious at Bradford for a number of things, Wilhelmina could have every single penny if he could spend another day with his father. She could have everything if he could have these last 11 months with Alex back.

"That's because you understand that some things are worth more than money, Wilhelmina does not. Otherwise, she wouldn't be sucking up to Nico now only for the sake of getting her hands on the money that Bradford left for her. She would still be effectively ignoring the child otherwise. She always has." Faye said bitterly.

"Which is why Nico wants to be emancipated."

"You know, Wilhelmina won't let that happen. The official will reading hasn't even happened yet, and she's already scheming on how to remove me as the administrator of Nico's trust." Faye's words did not surprise him at all.

"When did this become about the money for her?" Daniel shook his head. "I thought this all started because she wanted your job. She has that so why is she going after Nico's trust fund?"

"Sometimes money and power are the same thing to some people. Wilhelmina doesn't care who she hurts. She has heard a lot of people I care about in her campaign to get my job. My grandson, and my stepfather and a man I loved very much, even if I know he never stopped me."

"Unfortunately, she finally got what she wanted." Daniel said with another sigh. He wasn't brave enough to address her statement about Bradford, and he knew she was talking about Bradford. From dinner this afternoon he knew that Faye loved Betty's father, but Bradford Meade will always mean something to her.

"You know I don't give up that easily." She said with a smirk.

"I know. It took you nearly 2 decades and a heart attack to give up on my father." Daniel joked, even if he probably should not considering her earlier statement.

"If I knew Wilhelmina was going to take advantage of that I probably would've tried harder, but it doesn't matter now. You and I are going to pay her back for her cruelty by making sure the bitch gets everything she deserves and nothing that she wants." Faye said smirking as she placed a copy of Bradford's will in front of him. She purposely highlighted the section regarding his father's last wish that he and Wilhelmina be made co-EICs of MODE US.

"What are you planning?" Daniel asked slightly worried.

"You and I are going to bring Wilhelmina Slater down to her knees."

To Be Continued