Chương 6
Domenico stared at her.
“So it’s true.”
Valentina crossed her arms.
“I was protecting myself.”
“From me?”
“From what happens when you decide someone is against you.”
He looked at the documents.
“You were going to take Ruby.”
“I was trying to make sure I could keep her.”
The honesty was almost worse than another lie.
Domenico placed the folder on the desk.
“You moved her out of her room.”
“I needed pressure.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Pressure on who?”
Valentina looked toward the floor.
“On you.”
The answer came quietly.
That was the first moment she looked less like a villain and more like a person who had made a series of choices she could no longer defend.
Domenico shook his head.
“You used a child to win an argument.”
“No.”
Her voice sharpened.
“I used the only thing you care about.”
The sentence cut through him.
Because there was truth inside the cruelty.
Ruby was the center of his life.
Valentina knew that.
She had always known that.
“You wanted me afraid.”
“I wanted you to listen.”
“By making my daughter afraid?”
Valentina looked away.
That was the first time she had no immediate answer.
Domenico stepped closer to the desk.
“Who is Daniel?”
Valentina’s expression changed.
Only slightly.
But enough.
Marcus noticed too.
“Valentina.”
She ignored him.
“Don’t bring other people into this.”
“Who is Daniel?”
Nobody spoke.
The silence lasted too long.
Domenico looked between them.
“Another lawyer?”
Valentina’s face tightened.
“No.”
“Then who?”
She sat down slowly in the chair beside the door.
The confidence was gone.
“Someone who was helping me understand my options.”
“Your options.”
“Yes.”
“For taking my daughter?”
“For surviving after you decided I was disposable.”
Domenico studied her.
The anger was still there.
But now there was something else.
A question.
How long had this been happening?
How much had he missed while believing the house was peaceful?
Valentina looked at the folder.
“You think I woke up one morning and decided to destroy your family?”
She laughed softly.
“I spent years feeling like a guest in my own home.”
Domenico did not answer.
Because he knew that feeling existed too.
Not for the same reasons.
But he knew what it meant to feel like someone else controlled the story.
Valentina continued.
“You loved Ruby.”
Her voice softened.
“You still do.”
She looked toward the hallway.
“But sometimes you love being her father more than you love being present as one.”
The words stayed between them.
Domenico felt the truth and the manipulation mixed together.
That was what made it dangerous.
A lie was easy to reject.
A painful truth wrapped around a lie was much harder.
He picked up the folder again.
“Tomorrow morning, we are going to talk about every page in this.”
Valentina looked at him.
“And then?”
Domenico glanced toward the hallway where Ruby was sleeping.
“Then we decide what happens next.”
For the first time that night, Valentina looked afraid.
Not because he had threatened her.
Because he had stopped reacting.
He was thinking.
And everyone in the room understood that the next decisions would not be made in anger.
They would be made with consequences.
Domenico knew the next decisions would not be made in anger.
They would be made with consequences.
The following morning arrived without the relief he had secretly hoped for.
The mansion looked exactly the same.
That was the strange part.
The marble floors still reflected the sunlight.
The flowers on the dining table were replaced by fresh ones before breakfast.
The staff still moved quietly through the halls.
Everything appeared normal while the family inside it had shifted overnight.
Domenico sat at the end of the dining table with the folder in front of him.
Ruby sat beside him in the chair that had caused so much damage without ever making a sound.
He had found another chair for her temporarily, but Elena had brought the gold chair back from storage before breakfast.
Nobody explained how she found it.
Nobody needed to.
The chair had been hidden in a small unused room behind the laundry area.
Ruby ran her fingers over the gold-painted edge.
“Was it lost?”
Domenico looked at her.
“No.”
He paused.
“Someone moved it.”
Ruby accepted the answer with the strange simplicity children often had.
Adults searched for complicated explanations.
Children usually understood the important part first.
“Can it stay here?”
“Yes.”
This time he answered immediately.
“It stays here.”
Across the table, Valentina sat silently.
She looked different without her usual confidence.
Not weaker.
Just tired.
She had spent the night in the guest room after their conversation.
Domenico had not told her to leave.
He had not told her to stay.
He needed facts before decisions.
That was something he had failed to do the night before.
He had reacted before he understood.
He would not make that mistake twice.
Marcus stood near the doorway.
He looked like he had not slept.
Domenico had asked him to remain for the morning conversation because he was involved now.
Avoiding that reality would not change it.
“Before we discuss anything,” Domenico said, “Ruby needs to leave the room.”
Valentina looked up.
“Why?”
“Because this is an adult conversation.”
“She is the reason for it.”
Domenico’s eyes moved toward her.
“No.”
The word was calm.
“That is exactly the problem.”
Valentina looked away.
Elena appeared at the doorway.
“Ruby, would you like to help me choose flowers for the upstairs rooms?”
Ruby looked at her father.
Domenico nodded.
“Go with Elena.”
Ruby slid down from the chair.
Before leaving, she touched his hand.
It was a small gesture.
A reminder.
He watched her disappear down the hallway.
Only then did he open the folder.
The documents spread across the table.
The first hour was not an argument.
That surprised Valentina.
Domenico asked questions.
Specific questions.
Dates.
Names.
Reasons.
He did not accuse.
He recorded.
That made the conversation harder.
Anger could be dismissed.
May you like
Careful attention could not.
“When did you first speak with Daniel?”
