Chương 5
Roman softened his voice.
“You can tell me.”
Sophie stared at the floor.
“She was nice at first.”
Nora closed her eyes.
Roman noticed.
“What happened after?”
Sophie rubbed the edge of the jacket sleeve between her fingers.
“She stopped smiling.”
The sentence made the room colder.
Helena stood slowly.
“That is enough.”
Roman turned toward her.
“No.”
“Roman.”
“No.”
His voice was firm.
Not angry.
Certain.
“You do not get to decide when this ends.”
Helena looked at Sophie.
“She is tired.”
Roman looked down at his daughter.
She did look tired.
The excitement and fear of the night were catching up with her.
Her shoulders had started to sink beneath the weight of the jacket.
For a moment, Roman hated himself for continuing.
He wanted to take her somewhere quiet.
Somewhere without strangers.
Somewhere she could sleep without hearing adults argue about her life.
But he also knew that every unanswered question was another door someone could close.
He had already lost three years.
He refused to lose another night.
“Can we sit?” he asked Sophie.
She nodded.
Roman guided her toward a nearby chair away from the crowd.
He did not pick her up.
He waited until she reached for his hand.
That small choice mattered.
She was not a possession.
She was a person who had spent too long without choices.
Nora followed them.
Helena remained standing.
The guests slowly began leaving.
Nobody announced it.
Nobody needed to.
The evening had ended the moment a little girl walked into the room.
The powerful people who had gathered for business conversations now avoided looking at the family tragedy unfolding in front of them.
A few men approached Roman before leaving.
They offered quiet words.
Some offered support.
Some offered nothing.
Roman remembered every reaction.
After the last guests disappeared through the large doors, the banquet hall felt strangely empty.
The chandeliers were still glowing.
The tables were still covered with expensive plates and untouched food.
The room looked exactly the same.
But everything had changed.
Roman sat across from Sophie.
He noticed she was studying the buttons on his shirt.
“What are you looking at?”
She touched one carefully.
“You always wear black.”
Roman looked down.
“I guess I do.”
“Why?”
He almost gave the usual answer.
Because it was practical.
Because it was expected.
Because people respected a certain image.
Instead, he paused.
“I stopped thinking about clothes a long time ago.”
Sophie nodded like that made sense.
Children accepted strange answers more easily than adults.
Nora sat nearby.
She looked exhausted.
Not physically.
Emotionally.
Like someone who had been holding a door closed for years and had finally run out of strength.
“I need to tell you everything,” she said.
Roman looked at her.
“Yes.”
Nora took a breath.
“When Sophie was born, I thought the hardest part was going to be raising her.”
She looked at her daughter.
“I was wrong.”
Her fingers tightened around each other.
“The hardest part was deciding who I could trust.”
Roman did not interrupt.
That was unusual for him.
Everyone who knew him knew he was a man who preferred decisions over discussions.
But tonight he listened.
“I started receiving messages,” Nora said.
“From Helena?”
Nora shook her head.
“At first, I thought so.”
Roman frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“Because they came from numbers I did not recognize.”
She looked at him.
“But some of them mentioned things only Helena would know.”
Roman leaned back slightly.
“Why did you not show me?”
Nora laughed once.
It was a sad sound.
“I tried.”
Roman’s expression changed.
“When?”
“Several times.”
“When?”
Nora looked away.
“The first time was after Sophie’s first birthday.”
Roman went still.
“She had just started walking.”
The memory hurt him before he could stop it.
He had missed that.
Not because he chose to.
Because he believed he would have more time.
Nora continued.
“I called you.”
Roman looked confused.
“I never got that call.”
“I know.”
The answer was immediate.
“How do you know?”
“Because Helena answered.”
The room became silent again.
Roman looked toward the empty doorway.
His mother.
The person who had raised him.
The person who had taught him how to recognize betrayal in everyone else.
The person who had been hiding it from him.
“What did she say?”
Nora swallowed.
“She said you were busy.”
Roman looked back.
“That was all?”
“No.”
Nora hesitated.
“She said if I cared about Sophie, I would stop trying to bring your world into hers.”
Roman looked at Sophie.
The child was quietly drawing circles on the tablecloth with her finger.
She did not understand every word.
But she understood tension.
“She made you afraid of me.”
Nora looked at him.
“No.”
The answer surprised him.
“She made me afraid of everything.”
That was different.
Roman had expected anger.
He had expected blame.
He had expected Nora to say she regretted him.
Instead, he saw someone who had spent years trapped between impossible choices.
“I should have come to find you,” Nora said.
“Yes.”
The answer was honest.
It hurt.
But he did not soften it.
Nora nodded.
“I know.”
No defense.
No argument.
Just acceptance.
Roman respected that more than an excuse.
Before he could speak again, Helena’s phone vibrated from across the room.
Everyone looked.
She had left it on the table when she sat earlier.
The screen lit up.
Roman stood.
Helena moved quickly.
Too quickly.
She reached for it.
Roman was faster.
He picked it up before she could.
“Roman.”
Her voice changed.
Not anger.
Fear.
That was enough.
He looked at the screen.
There was a message.
One sentence.
No name.
No number saved.
Just a message from someone who knew exactly how to make Helena panic.
You failed to keep him away.
Roman looked at his mother.
“Who is this?”
Helena said nothing.
The message disappeared from the screen.
Deleted.
But not before Roman saw it.
May you like
Not before Nora saw it.
Not before Sophie saw her grandmother’s face change.
