Chapter 6
I went to Hawthorne the next evening.
Not alone.
Not with an army either.
I took Marco and Rafael.
Sophia stayed at my estate with people I trusted more than my own blood.
Before I left, she grabbed my hand.
“You’re coming back?”
The question almost stopped me at the door.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“After dinner.”
She studied my face.
“Really?”
That word hurt.
Really.
As if promises now needed inspection.
I crouched.
“If I’m late, Rafael calls you.”
Rafael looked at me.
Then nodded.
Sophia finally let go.
Hawthorne House looked exactly as I remembered it. Stone walls. Dark shutters. Long dining room. My father used to bring men there when he wanted them to feel history pressing down on their shoulders.
Six older Bellandi figures were waiting.
Lucia was not.
Interesting.
One of the men stood when I entered.
“We were told Sophia would be here.”
Marco’s jaw tightened.
I smiled without warmth.
“Were you?”
The man realized too late what he admitted.
I sat.
“Tell me what Lucia promised you.”
Nobody answered.
So I waited.
Old men who build their authority on other people’s discomfort usually hate silence when it stops working for them.
Finally one spoke.
“She said you were considering restoring consultation.”
“No.”
“She said Camilla supported it.”
“She did.”
That surprised them.
I continued.
“She supported it while my daughter was locked behind a pool fence.”
The room changed.
One man whispered, “What?”
There.
They did not know.
At least not all of it.
I told them exactly what happened.
No embellishment.
No rage.
Three days.
Phone taken.
Food controlled.
A sentence copied in a school book.
Belongings packed into waterproof bags.
By the time I finished, two men looked sick.
The oldest shook his head.
“That wasn’t the agreement.”
“What was?”
He hesitated.
“Camilla takes Sophia away for a week. You come here angry. Lucia forces the conversation you’ve refused for years.”
Family leverage.
Again.
But even the old men had been sold a cleaner version.
Then Marco noticed something on the far wall.
A photograph of my father.
Beside it was a fresh Bellandi pin.
Not one of the six.
A seventh.
May you like
Lucia had never planned to restore an Inner Table.
She planned to sit above it.
