“Gabriel isn’t well. I need to head back to the hospital. Please… can you sign this travel clearance?”
Vincenzo didn’t even bother reading what I handed him. He just took the pen, signed it with a quick stroke like it meant nothing, then pushed the papers back toward me.
“Go on,” he said flatly. “Deal with your own child.”
I left before dawn broke. The mansion behind me stayed silent, heavy and lifeless, like it had never held anything warm to begin with.
**
The drive to my father’s estate took hours—five of them that felt longer than they should’ve. The gates came into view like something out of a memory I didn’t fully belong to anymore: tall black iron, sharpened tips, guards standing stiff and motionless like they weren’t people at all.
Everything there was controlled. Polished. Still.
I wasn’t.
I had become thinner. Worn down in places no one noticed. Changed in a way mirrors couldn’t properly reflect.
When I stepped out of the car, no one came to greet me. No voices. No welcome. Just the long corridor of silence stretching inward, like the house itself was watching and deciding whether to let me exist again.
And then I saw him.
My father.
He stood like he always had—quiet authority, gaze sharp enough to cut through anything it landed on.
“So you came back,” he said coldly. “After everything you chose to destroy your life for.”
I didn’t react. Not a blink, not a tear. I had already spent all of that inside Vincenzo’s world.
“I want the arrangement you once mentioned,” I said evenly.
He studied me for a moment. “That deal is no longer available. The man you’re talking about is married now—to someone who doesn’t bring shame into my house.”
He started to turn away, like the conversation was over.
But I didn’t move. I just kept looking at him.
He paused.
“However,” he added after a beat, “his younger brother is still unmarried. Your sister was originally meant for him, but she chose her own ambitions instead. If you want it… the position is still open.”
I didn’t ask questions. I didn’t bargain. I just nodded once.
If this was the only path left, then I would take it. Survive first. Everything else later.
That night, they gave me a guest room that felt more like a forgotten storage space. It smelled faintly of dust and old polish. Even the staff avoided looking at me directly, like I was something that didn’t quite belong in the present anymore.
Like I had already died somewhere and just forgotten to leave.
Later, I was called.
The younger brother.
Leonardo Lancaster.
He was waiting inside the old observatory, dressed in black, half-hidden in shadows. Moonlight slid across the glass floor, breaking into sharp reflections around him.
I expected softness. Weakness. Someone easy to read.
Instead, he moved like something sharp and alert—measuring me the moment I stepped inside.
“So this is her,” he said quietly. “The wife who ran away.”
My throat tightened, but I didn’t answer.
His eyes stayed on me. Heavy. Unfriendly.
“Tell me,” he said, voice low, almost dangerous, “did you come here for forgiveness… or for revenge?”
My fingers curled slightly, stopping myself from shaking.
He let out a small, humorless laugh and turned toward the glass window instead. The moonlight cut across him like broken silver.
“Go back,” he said. “Come again only when your divorce is done.”
I wanted to respond. I wanted to explain that nothing about my life could be reduced to something that simple.
But nothing came out.
So I left.
Back in the room, everything felt empty. No comfort. No history. No version of me left intact. I sat on the edge of the bed, breathing slowly, trying to remember who I used to be before everything started breaking.
Before love became something that destroyed me instead of saved me.
**
I didn’t sleep that night.
Morning came, but it didn’t bring anything soft with it. Just silence layered over silence. My body moved out of habit more than thought—like I had been doing ever since Gabriel got sick.
At the long dining table, I sat alone. Then my phone rang.
Vincenzo.
I answered.
“We’re heading out,” he said casually, like he was talking about nothing important. “Noel wants parasailing. Lena didn’t refuse. You know how she is.”
He chuckled lightly, like this was something funny we were sharing.
“My parents might drop by later. Make sure the house is ready.”
“Okay,” I replied.
Then the line went dead.
No goodbye. No hesitation. No mention of Gabriel.
Not a single word.
Today was his birthday.
I went back to the glass mansion.
Every step inside echoed too loudly against the cold floors. My hands were shaking by the time I reached my room—the only place in that house that still held anything of him.
I lit a small candle beside his photo. The blue urn sat underneath it. His dinosaur plush leaned against the wall, slightly tilted, like it was waiting for tiny hands that would never come back.
Gabriel had once begged me to take him sailing. He’d seen it in a cartoon and talked about it for days—how he would wear his little pirate socks and “fly with the wind.”
I remembered how his eyes lit up when he said it.
Vincenzo only laughed at the time. Said it was reckless. Said Gabriel was too fragile for something like that. Said he would get hurt.
Now Noel was the one going parasailing.
And Gabriel… had no birthday to celebrate.
I stayed near the doorway, barely breathing, until the gates outside beeped.
The front doors opened.
Footsteps followed.
The staff welcomed them like royalty returning home.
Vincenzo’s parents.
I stepped back slightly, pressing myself against the wall.
They didn’t look pleased to see me.
His mother’s eyes landed on me briefly—then sharpened with open disgust.
“And where is the sick child?” she asked coldly. “Did he finally die… or is he still hanging on?”
