Chapter 7
Dominic came to the estate the next afternoon.
I expected arrogance.
Instead he looked exhausted.
Old suddenly.
He sat across from me.
Isabetta refused to attend.
Good.
Her father’s explanation did not belong inside her guilt.
“Rosamund saved you.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell your daughter?”
He stared at the floor.
“Because I was ashamed.”
At twenty-two, Dominic delivered a message for men who would never have risked themselves.
Sebastian caught him.
He begged.
Not elegantly.
Cried.
Promised everything.
Rosamund saw him afterward.
Not as coward.
As frightened young man.
She gave him one chance to become someone else.
He did.
Mostly.
Built business.
Protected his family.
Helped younger associates avoid being used as disposable messengers.
Good things.
But he built a lie on top.
Never afraid.
Never begged.
Never spared.
Men admired him for toughness he partly invented.
Then his daughter chose to marry me.
The past moved toward him.
“I asked Isabetta to find the letters.”
“Why not ask me?”
He laughed bitterly.
“Because then I would have to tell you why.”
Exactly.
“How much did you know about the photographs?”
“Nothing until Sebastian called yesterday.”
I believed him.
That mattered.
Dominic hid his past.
Isabetta escalated independently.
Then Dominic asked:
“Will you tell everyone?”
I thought.
“No.”
Relief crossed his face.
I continued.
“You will.”
It vanished.
“Percival—”
“No.”
My voice stayed low.
“You built standing on a story that harmed no one until protecting it required people to interfere with Rosamund’s name.”
He flinched.
“Tell the men whose respect you care about.”
“What if they laugh?”
“Then learn who you built your life around.”
That was his test.
Not punishment.
Truth.
Dominic nodded eventually.
Before leaving, he looked at Rosamund’s gown laid carefully across a chair.
“I never thanked her.”
“No.”
“Can I?”
I almost said she is dead.
Instead:
“You can stop making her mercy something shameful.”
May you like
He understood.
Sometimes gratitude to the dead is behavioral.
