THIRTY-SEVEN
ENRICO FERRARA
Darkness still clung to the mansion when I finally got back to São Paulo.
My footsteps hit marble and wood in quick, echoing strikes, the familiar house silent—too silent—stripped of any comfort it might have once represented. Nothing in it felt warm anymore. Nothing in it felt like safety.
My chest burned with a crushing mix of rage, regret, and the most desperate kind of betrayal, and I couldn’t think about anything except one fact:
I needed to confront my grandmother.
I needed to look Eloá Ferrara in the eye and force her to own what she had done.
After my own daughter rejected me—after she looked at me like I was something to fear and told her mother to take her away—I was left with nothing. Not even the right to drown in my own grief.
Because I had rejected them first.
I had made her mother cry.
And far worse than Clara’s small mind could ever understand, I had built the man she was afraid of with my own hands.
“Eloá!” I called, my voice loud and sharp as I stepped into the main room.
The sound carried through the house, hard-edged, weighted with fury I could barely contain.
A few seconds later, she appeared at the top of the stairs.
Silk robe. Elegant. Black with gold detailing at the cuffs. Tied neatly at her narrow waist as if she’d had time to plan even her indignation. Her gray hair was twisted into a flawless chignon despite the hour. Her face—clean of makeup—looked even harder without the softening tricks of powder and paint.
Her posture was what it always was.
Tall. Regal. Untouchable.
“What is the meaning of this intrusion in the middle of the night, Enrico?” she demanded coldly as she began to descend.
I drew a breath through my teeth, forcing myself not to explode on the first word.
“It means you have a great deal to explain,” I said, voice tight with contained violence. “I know everything, Eloá. I know what you did to Valentina.” I stepped closer to the base of the stairs. “I know how you manipulated me all these years.”
She stopped mid-stair.
For a brief, startling second, her expression shifted—genuine surprise cracking through her usual composure.
Her mouth parted as if she’d forgotten how to arrange her face.
Then she recovered.
The mask slid back into place.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she replied smoothly, adjusting her robe with studied elegance—but there was a hesitation under the words.
A hairline fracture.
Guilt.
“Don’t lie to me.” My control snapped. I surged forward a step. “I have proof. Altered photos. Fabricated emails. Payments sent to the people involved in that grotesque farce.” My voice rose, rough with fury. “You set it up so I would believe Valentina betrayed me.”
Eloá’s eyes narrowed, the last trace of pretense dropping away as she descended the remaining steps.
