Chapter 8
Lily remembered the fire.
Not clearly.
She was four.
Memory came in images.
Veronica inside Elena’s old sitting room.
A metal bowl.
Paper.
Smoke.
Richard standing by the doorway.
Lily watching from behind a chair.
The child therapist told Matteo not to interrogate her.
So he did not.
He sat on the carpet while Lily drew.
His knees felt absurdly large beside her crayons.
“Can you draw what you remember?”
Lily nodded.
No pressure.
No repeated questions.
She drew a blue chair.
A red bowl.
Veronica.
Richard.
Then another shape.
A necklace.
Elena’s necklace.
Matteo’s eyes narrowed.
“Where was that?”
Lily pointed at Veronica’s drawn hand.
The necklace Veronica claimed Elena had gifted her appeared in Lily’s memory beside the burning papers.
That changed the story again.
Matteo confronted Veronica with the drawing only after the therapist documented it independently.
Veronica stared at the page.
Her lower lip trembled once.
Then stopped.
“I burned copies.”
Richard looked sharply at her.
Matteo saw it.
“Copies of what?”
Veronica inhaled.
“Elena’s accusations.”
“Why?”
“She was dead.”
The room became silent.
Veronica immediately realized how cruel the sentence sounded.
Her voice softened.
“I mean Richard was already trying to repay things. I thought dragging it all back out would destroy everyone.”
Matteo’s eyes remained cold.
“So you erased her.”
“No.”
“You took her letters.”
“I took evidence that would destroy my brother.”
“You hid my daughter’s letters too.”
Veronica looked at him.
“That was different.”
Matteo’s jaw tightened.
“How?”
For the first time, Veronica’s voice broke.
“Because Lily kept finding things.”
That answer mattered.
Lily had not been chained because she misbehaved.
She had become dangerous to Veronica because she kept uncovering pieces of Elena’s hidden record.
Then Richard spoke quietly from across the room.
“You still haven't told him about the first fire.”
Veronica’s face emptied.
Matteo slowly turned toward her.
May you like
There had been another destruction of Elena’s papers.
And it happened before Elena died.
