Part 9
She had gone quiet again.
He pressed his fingers to the side of her neck, not trusting himself, not sure what he was searching for beyond proof that she was still there.
Her pulse fluttered beneath his touch.
He swallowed hard.
Vivian descended another step, then another.
“Don’t,” Julian said.
“I can help you move her.”
“No.”
“Julian, she needs help.”
“I know.”
“I know how to stabilize her.”
“You know how to stabilize people?” His laugh came out raw. “Is that what you think you’ve been doing?”
Vivian stopped halfway down the staircase.
Her eyes narrowed.
“You have no idea what I’ve done for you.”
“No,” he said. “I don’t.”
The words struck both of them.
For the first time, Vivian looked truly uncertain.
Julian looked past her toward the upper railing.
He could still see where Elena’s hands had gripped the white stone. There were faint smears on the polished surface, perhaps from makeup, perhaps from skin, perhaps from nothing that mattered.
He imagined Elena above him.
He imagined Vivian holding her arm.
He imagined the word choose passing between them.
He imagined fear tightening into force.
He imagined the moment Vivian’s hands opened.
But imagination was not proof.
That was the cruelest part.
Julian had built a life around refusing to make decisions until he had enough proof to protect himself from regret. He waited for documents. He waited for confirmations. He waited for someone else to say the thing first.
Tonight, proof lay out of reach.
Elena was in his arms.
Vivian was on the stairs.
The letter waited in his jacket.
And every second that passed made some choices impossible.
“Elena,” he said softly. “Listen to me.”
Her eyes opened, but slowly.
“Did Vivian let go?”
Vivian inhaled sharply.
“Julian.”
He did not take his eyes off Elena.
“Did she?”
Elena stared at him.
Her lips moved.
No sound came.
He bent closer.
“She said…” Elena whispered.
“What?”
“She said you would never forgive me.”
Julian’s chest tightened.
“What did you do?”
Elena’s eyes filled with panic.
“I didn’t do anything.”
Vivian looked away.
Julian saw it.
He saw the quick movement of her gaze.
He saw the way she shifted her weight as though her heels had suddenly become unstable on the stairs.
“What is she talking about?” he asked.
Vivian did not answer.
“Elena,” he said. “What did Vivian mean?”
Elena’s breath shuddered.
“The letter,” she whispered.
Julian looked at the jacket again.
The envelope remained where it had fallen.
His mother’s handwriting looked too gentle for the room.
“What about it?”
Elena tried to lift her hand.
He caught it carefully.
Her fingers pointed weakly toward the stairs.
“She told me she burned the first one.”
Vivian’s face went white.
Julian looked up.
“What first one?”
Vivian did not speak.
The house hummed around them.
A vent came alive somewhere above the staircase, pushing cool air through the foyer. Elena shivered. Julian pulled the loose edge of his jacket from the step and draped it carefully over her shoulders without moving her more than he had to.
The fabric smelled like him.
Elena closed her eyes briefly against it.
Vivian watched.
Julian saw something pass through her expression again.
Grief, perhaps.
Or envy.
Or the exhaustion of someone who had spent too long believing that love meant being needed.
“My mother wrote more than one letter?” he asked.
Vivian looked at the railing.
“She was sick.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“She changed her mind constantly.”
“Did she write me more than one letter?”
Vivian’s silence answered before she did.
“Yes.”
Julian sat back slightly.
Elena’s hand fell against his wrist.
His mother had written him more than one letter.
Vivian had kept them.
He could not decide which hurt more: the fact itself or the fact that it sounded believable.
Vivian’s face seemed older suddenly. The silver gown, the carefully arranged hair, the flawless makeup—all of it looked like costume against the nakedness of the moment.
“She asked me to hold them,” Vivian said. “She didn’t know what she wanted.”
“She knew I existed.”
“Don’t make this simple.”
“You made it simple,” Julian said. “You hid them.”
“I was trying to keep us together.”
Elena let out a small breath.
Vivian looked down at her.
“You don’t understand,” Vivian said.
Elena’s eyes opened again.
“No,” she whispered. “I understand exactly.”
Vivian’s mouth tightened.
“You came here and you decided you knew our family.”
“I came here and found a woman who thought her brother belonged to her.”
Julian felt Elena’s body tense. He felt the cost of each word.
“Stop,” he said.
Neither woman stopped.
“You wanted him isolated,” Elena said. “You wanted him grateful. You wanted him too guilty to leave.”
May you like
Vivian’s face twisted.
“And you wanted him to save you.”
