"No."
She doesn't flinch. Doesn't step back. Just looks at me with those gold-flecked eyes, processing.
"The women from the auction," she says. It's not a question.
"Yes. Mirella and seven others. They're safe now."
"You went yourself."
"It required a personal touch."
She's quiet for a moment. The rain continues to fall, soaking us both, but neither of us moves toward shelter.
"How many?" she asks finally.
I don't pretend to misunderstand. "Three. By my hand. More by my team."
"And the women?"
"Alive. On their way to medical care and counseling."
She nods slowly. I wait for the horror, the revulsion. Wait for her to realize that the man standing in front of her has fresh blood on his hands and no real remorse about it.
Instead, she says: "I found something. In the greenhouse."
It takes me a moment to shift gears. "What?"
She reaches into the pocket of her jacket and pulls out a bundle of envelopes, yellowed with age, wrapped in faded ribbon. "Letters. From your father to your mother. They were buried in one of the pots."
The world tilts.
Letters. My father's letters. I didn't know they existed—didn't know he wrote to her when he was away, didn't know she kept them, didn't know she buried them in her sanctuary like treasures.
Bianca holds them out to me. I take them with hands that aren't quite steady.
The first envelope has my mother's name on it, written in my father's bold handwriting.Maria. Just the name. I haven't seen his handwriting in seventeen years. I hide them under my jacket to protect them from the rain.
"I read them," Bianca says. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have, but—"
"It's all right."
"He loved her. Really loved her. You can feel it in every word."
I look at the letters in my hands. Evidence of a love I barely remember, written by a man I've tried not to think aboutfor almost two decades. My father. The one who taught me to shoot, to fight, to lead. The one who died trying to shield my mother from bullets.
"They used to dance in the kitchen," I hear myself say. "After dinner, when they thought we weren't watching. My mother would turn on the radio, and my father would pull her into his arms, and they'd dance like they were the only two people in the world."
Bianca is silent, listening.
"She sang to us at bedtime. Russian lullabies, the ones her grandmother taught her. Anna used to request the same one every night—something about a river and the moon. I can't remember the words anymore." I swallow hard. "Dmitri pretended he was too old for lullabies, but he always left his door open so he could hear."
"And you?"
"I used to watch them from the hallway. After they thought I was asleep, I'd sneak out of bed and watch them dance. I thought—" My voice catches. "I thought that was what love looked like. Two people, holding onto each other, moving to music no one else could hear."
The rain falls around us, soft and cold. Bianca reaches out and touches my arm—not romantic, not demanding. Just human contact. Connection.
"You're soaked," she says. "We should go inside."
