But now, with my decision already made, I no longer had the energy to argue with them.
"You're absolutely right," I said calmly. "I'll move out as soon as possible."
Then I added, almost casually, "And there's no need to transfer me to another department. I'm resigning."
Dante let out a cold sneer. "So you're still planning to cling on like a leech?"
"Fine," he continued dismissively. "For my mother's sake, I'll overlook it this once. But you'd better remember your place from now on."
I walked past him without another glance, my voice soft but firm as I murmured, "There won't be a next time."
Although this place had once held so many of my cherished memories, I finally understood something.
It had never truly been my home.
I had thought that packing my things would take a long time, that I would need hours, maybe even days, to sort through everything I had accumulated over the years. But when I actually began, I realized how wrong I was.
After taking a closer look, there was barely anything left that truly belonged to me. The room felt emptier than I remembered, as if my presence had already been erased long before I made the decision to leave. The compound had a way of doing that. You could live inside its walls your entire life and still own nothing that couldn't be taken back by the family whose name was on the gate.
Nearly all of my clothes had been chosen by Dante. Back then, he would smile and say, "Bianca is the most beautiful princess, so of course she should dress up prettily every single day."
Those words had once made me feel cherished. But now, those same clothes lay piled on the floor, soaked in dirty water, giving off a foul, unidentifiable stench.
It was almost laughable.
The "princess" he once spoke of had long since disappeared. In his eyes, I had become nothing more than a troublesome parasite with an undeserved sense of pride.
As I pushed the damp clothes aside, my eyes landed on a scatter of photographs lying across the floor.
Back then, Nico had loved taking pictures of me. He used to say he wanted to capture every moment of my life, every smile, every memory.
Whenever the three of us took photos together, he would even compete with Dante, both of them trying to stand as close to me as possible.
Those moments had once felt warm and full of meaning.
But now, every single one of those photos had my face crossed out with a thick red pen, scribbled over without mercy.
I didn't have the courage to look any longer.
Without hesitation, I gathered them all and threw them straight into the trash, as if discarding something that had already lost all meaning.
Just as I was doing that, Dante happened to walk downstairs with Serena and saw everything.
For a brief moment, a trace of surprise flickered in his eyes. After all, I used to treasure every single thing he gave me.
But that moment passed quickly. His expression turned into a cold sneer. "You really don't mind wasting the DeLuca family's money, do you?"
The Dante I once knew had never hesitated to spend anything if it meant making me happy. He would go out of his way to give me the best of everything.
But ever since Serena appeared, everything I did had become wrong in his eyes.
I had lost the right to be willful, to complain, or even to feel hurt. And I no longer had the energy to argue.
"I'll pay you back," I said quietly, my voice calm.
"The DeLuca family doesn't care about that little amount of money," Dante replied dismissively. "But you need to remember one thing. Don't trouble Serena again."
Serena gently tugged on his sleeve, pouting slightly as she spoke in a soft voice. "Dante… don't waste your time on unimportant people."
"Besides, I still want to go to that secret place to watch the stars. Let's go," she added sweetly.
Her words made me freeze in place for a moment. My thumb pressed hard against the pulse point inside my wrist, holding there until I felt the beat steady beneath my skin.
The "secret place" she mentioned was something Dante had created just for me.
Back then, Naomi DeLuca had been occupied with family obligations and had entrusted Dante, who was six years older than me, to take care of me. It was the way things worked inside the compound: the eldest son carried what the household head couldn't, and for a time, that weight had included me.
He had tried his best to give me everything he could. He once told me that I was his "pure moonlight," something gentle and irreplaceable.
