Chapter 5
The red room was worse than I expected.
Not because of weapons.
Because of chairs.
One large chair at the head.
David’s.
Two smaller ones beside it.
One labeled socially by habit as Sarah’s.
One for Emma when she became “old enough.”
Not written.
Everyone simply knew.
Photographs on the walls showed David hosting men I trusted.
Sarah stood beside him in some.
In others, absent.
Emma appeared more often.
That mattered.
David was using my granddaughter visually.
A DeLuca child at Mercer dinners.
Proof the alliance had blood.
Proof the future already existed.
Then Sarah revealed the part that made me furious.
David had begun telling people Emma would eventually spend more time at Mercer House “to learn both sides.”
Reasonable sounding.
Except he never asked Sarah.
He had been normalizing the idea that Emma belonged partly to the Mercer structure.
Then if Sarah ever left him?
The room already told a story.
David keeps Emma connected to both families.
Sarah becomes the emotional woman who broke the marriage.
Narrative prepared before the event.
May you like
My daughter’s body was not the only thing being controlled.
Her future credibility was too.
