Laya lifted her boarding pass with a triumphant grin. “First-class boarding, Daddy. We’ll have champagne before takeoff.” She looked at me and said, “Enjoy that.”

“Don’t be bitter,” she added with a roll of her eyes. “Some of us just make better life choices.”

That one stung. Two years ago, I’d made a choice: I walked away from my father’s company after he married a woman only five years older than me and handed her daughter, Laya, everything I had built. Now they stood there, all smiles and status, while I was the outsider with a worn suitcase and a quiet face.