I looked directly at Veronica.
For a brief moment, she met my eyes, and I saw the satisfaction she was trying so hard to hide. She was enjoying every second of this.
"Darius, you can't seriously believe this," I said. "You know exactly what kind of person I am. After everything we've been through, how can you still sit there and listen to this?"
His jaw tightened.
"What I know is that Veronica ended up in the hospital while you keep insisting you had nothing to do with it. At some point, Marianne, repeating the same lie doesn't make it true."
"I didn't do anything," I shouted. "I've told you the truth from the beginning. I never touched her, I never hired anyone, and I never even knew where she was."
Darius let out a short laugh.
"You've been saying that for days, and I'm getting tired of hearing it. Every time I give you a chance to take responsibility, you find another excuse."
The room fell silent. Everyone seemed to recognize the warning in his voice. Fear crawled up my spine. Not because of the men surrounding me… but because the man I had loved for ten years was looking at me like I was a stranger.
Darius rose from his chair and walked toward me.
“Break her pride,” he said. “Not her body yet. Just enough so she understands what happens when she keeps lying.”
The first blow came without warning. A fist slammed into my ribs and forced the air out of my lungs. I staggered into the edge of the table, pain exploding through my burned shoulder as my body folded. Before I could recover, someone grabbed my arm and yanked me up only to throw me down onto my knees again.
Laughter spread around the room as if nothing serious was happening.
“She still thinks she can stand?” one of them said. “She won’t last long like this.”
“I didn’t do anything,” I choked out, forcing myself to look toward Darius even as my voice broke.
A kick hit my side before I could finish. Agony exploded through my abdomen. That side had barely healed after losing a kidney. My body was still weak from the surgery.
My vision blurred. Lara's smile flashed through my mind. Her laughter. Her tiny hand in mine.
Tears slipped down my face.For a moment, I genuinely thought I was going to die.
Then someone grabbed my shoulder where the bandage was still attached and twisted me around. The dressing tore open completely.
I screamed, and warm blood immediately soaked through the fabric.
Veronica sat beside Darius with her hand pressed lightly against her chest, as if she was disturbed by what she was seeing. But her eyes stayed steady, calm, and focused on me in a way that didn’t match her expression at all.
I looked at Darius again, still holding onto something inside me that refused to die, still waiting for him to recognize me.
He was leaning back in his chair, watching everything without a flicker of emotion, like I was nothing more than noise he no longer cared to silence.
Another hit followed. Then another. They stopped treating me like someone who could speak and started treating me like something that only reacted. Every time I collapsed, they dragged me back up. Every time I tried to breathe, something else interrupted it.
My body stopped responding properly. My vision blurred at the edges. The floor became harder to distinguish from the room itself. Blood dripped down and gathered beneath me.
Eventually I couldn’t stand anymore. My legs gave out completely and I fell forward, shaking, curling slightly in on myself because there was nothing else left I could do.
“Darius…” I whispered, barely able to form the word. “Please… stop this.”
He stood up.
The entire room went silent at once.
Even the men stopped moving.
For a brief moment, something inside me reacted to that silence. Not hope exactly. Something worse. Habit.
He walked forward slowly and picked up a heavy wooden chair.
“This is the price... For touching Veronica.”
I shook my head weakly, trying to speak through the pain. “I didn’t…”
But he had already lifted the chair higher.
And in that moment, I understood there was nothing left to argue, nothing left to reach for. Whatever I had been to him before was gone, replaced by something he could erase without hesitation.
The chair came down.
And everything went dark.
…
When I finally opened my eyes again, Verona was already there. She stood at the edge of the room like she belonged to it, like she had always been part of my pain instead of the reason behind it.
My body still ached from everything before, but the moment my gaze landed on what she was holding, everything else disappeared.
It was Lara's music box!
My breath caught painfully.
I had given it to Lara on her third birthday.
She had loved it so much that she slept with it beside her pillow every night.
After she died, it became the only thing that still carried traces of her.
I pushed myself upright despite the pain tearing through my body.
"Who gave you permission to touch that?" I demanded, my voice shaking.
Verona turned the music box slowly in her hands. The soft melody drifted through the room. A melody I hadn't been able to listen to since Lara died.
"This?" Verona asked softly. "Carson saw it and immediately fell in love with it. He wouldn't stop talking about it."
My stomach dropped.
"Give it back." I reached for it instinctively.
Verona stepped back. "Darius gave it to me," she said casually. "He said Carson could have it."
For a moment, I couldn't process the words.
"No." My voice came out barely above a whisper. "No. That's impossible."
Verona's smile deepened.
"Carson likes it very much," she said. "I suppose children know how to appreciate gifts."
The cruelty beneath her words was impossible to miss.
"Give it back," I repeated.
"Why?" she asked. "Lara isn't using it anymore and my son, Carson treasures it already. You wouldn't want to upset a child, would you?"
Before I could speak, the door suddenly opened.
Darius walked in.
The moment his eyes landed on Verona, something shifted across his face, quick and controlled, before it settled into something unreadable.
“Get out,” he said simply.
Verona looked at him, then at me, as if memorizing the moment. Then she smiled gently and lowered her gaze.
“Of course,” she said. “I’ll leave, baby.”
As she passed me, she leaned in just enough for me to hear her clearly.
"Good luck,” she whispered. “He always chooses me when it matters.”
Then she was gone.
The silence she left behind felt heavier than her presence.
I turned to Darius immediately.
“Why did you give her that?” I said, my voice breaking as I forced myself to speak through the pain. “That music box belonged to Lara. You know exactly what it means to me.”
I could barely sit up straight, but I still looked at him, waiting for something that felt like truth.
Darius exhaled slowly.
“It’s just a thing,” he said as he stepped closer and brushed my hair back. “You’re making this bigger than it needs to be.”
“It’s not just a thing,” I snapped. “I gave that to Lara. She loved it. She carried it everywhere. It's one of the only things I have left of her.”
He didn’t react to the words the way I needed him to.
Instead, he kept his hand there like I was something fragile that needed managing.
“I know what it is,” he said more calmly. “But you’ve been difficult lately, and I needed to handle things in a way that made sense.”
Difficult?
“So you took something that belonged to our daughter and gave it to her son?” I whispered.
“I’ll replace it,” he said. “I can buy you a hundred music boxes. Just stop reacting like this.”
I stared at him.
“No..." My voice shook. “You don't get to replace Lara.”
For the first time, he looked slightly uncomfortable.
But it lasted only a second.
Darius's expression shifted, impatience creeping in.
“You’re overreacting again,” he said. “This isn't something worth breaking down over.”
I let out a short, empty laugh.
“Not worth it?” I repeated. “Is that what I am to you now? Is that what Lara is? Everything we loved is just not worth it?”
Before he could answer, the door burst open.
His assistant rushed in, out of breath and pale.
“Mr. Davenport,” he said urgently. “There’s a situation on the rooftop. Miss Stuart is there, and she’s threatening to jump.”
Darius froze.
