My throat closed.
The stretcher moved past me.
His blood still marked the floor.
Marking the space where forgiveness and revenge had collided violently.
I turned my head and watched them carry him away.
My body felt numb.
My emotions were shattered into fragments I couldn’t identify anymore.
I pressed my palm against my stomach instinctively.
Then whispered to myself —
“What have we become?”
The hallway remained silent long after they disappeared.
But the consequences of what had just happened —
Echoed loudly.
Chapter 12
ELENA
Some scars never fully fade.
They simply learn to settle beneath the skin — quiet, persistent, and permanent.
Mine still ached on rainy nights.
I felt them then:
The cold metal of prison shackles biting into my wrists.
The damp concrete floor pressing against my back.
The hollow silence after my first baby never drew breath — the unbearable absence of a cry that should have filled the room.
Betrayal had lived in my body long before forgiveness ever did.
I had learned how to survive pain.
Not how to erase it.
But Ruslan’s scar was different.
His punishment wasn’t hidden.
It was visible.
A black leather eyepatch now covered the empty socket where his right eye used to be.
It gave him an even more dangerous presence — not less.
