"Yes. And your sister's daughter—the niece you once loved and cared for—was left with the monster. You cast her aside like trash," I accuse.
"Watch your mouth!" he warns.
"What do you call it?" I ask.
His eyes turn to slits.
"She was a child. She had no one to turn to, and all she did was fight to survive. And they tortured her. One ritual after another, they brutalized her and persecuted her. You're her blood, and you did nothing!" I say louder than I anticipated.
He slams his hand on the desk. "I didn't know! Her father took my sister and her to Italy and disappeared. I didn't even know she was still alive until she was older. I assumed she died with them. Then I learned Salvatore raised her, and she was doing all the things that Abruzzos do!"
"Because she had to in order to survive!" I roar.
Silence fills the room, hot with growing tension.
I lean closer, my voice dropping to a deadly calm. "They branded her. And not just with the skull."
The words stop him cold. His lips part, but no sound comes out.
"They took a heated iron as big as her torso and burned a V into her chest. Then they turned it scarlet to shame her for the world to see," I announce.
His face drains of color.
I don't give him time to recover. "She blamed herself for not understanding why you never came for her. She'd never speak of it, but I know. I see it in her. And you're partly to blame."
His hand grips the armrest so tightly his knuckles turn white. His voice finally cracks. "I had no idea?—"
"No, you didn't want to know."
He flinches.
"You left and never checked the debris left behind. You didn't look for the niece you once loved."
He swallows hard, throat bobbing unevenly, eyes turning wet.
"She's finally free. The council is gone. The monsters are ash because she took down the demons who killed her family...the same ones who wanted to kill your daughter and grandbabies. She survived the impossible. No. She did the impossible. Yet one phone call from Zara and she folds in like she's the bad person."
Luca presses a hand to his forehead. He admits, "I never wanted to hurt her."
"But you did. You still are."
He looks at me, glassy-eyed, voice unsteady. "What do you want from me?"
I take a deep breath. "Responsibility. Not excuses. Not the noble self-sacrifice you've fed yourself for decades. I want you to understand the destruction you didn't bother to try and stop."
"I can't fix the past."
My chest curls. I control my voice, insisting, "She spent her entire life suffering consequences from decisions you had a hand in. Directly or not."
His jaw tics. "I don't know what she told you?—"
"She didn't tell me anything. She never gives herself that much permission. I learned by digging," I snap.
His eyes widen a fraction.
I pound my finger into the wood. "She's my wife. And your blood."
He turns his face and grinds his molars.
