“But,” he went on, voice low but sure, “that is not all she would’ve wanted for him.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I did not build what I built,” he said, and his eyes were suddenly sharp, “for shareholders. I built it for my son. I bled myself for him. I broke my marriage for him. I lost my wife for him. And I will not stand by and watch him walk away from his birthright because he thinks hating me is more noble than inheriting what I made for him.”
The words weren’t angry.
They were… begging. Hidden under steel.
“I don’t want him to drown in Sofia’s ghost,” he said. “I don’t want him to live in grief forever and call it loyalty. I want him to have more than pain. I want him at the helm of something powerful. Something that will let him take care of himself, and you,” his gaze flicked to me, quick and pointed, “and whoever else he decides is his.”
Heat flashed up my face.
Oh.
He kept going.
“He can still fund the orphanage. He can still run it. He can still honour her. I would never take that from him. But it doesn’t have to be all he is.” His jaw tightened. “Sofia wouldn’t want him to chain himself to loss. She’d want him to be… successful. Safe. Respected. Untouchable, if he wants to be.”
Successful. Safe. Respected.
Untouchable.
He means powerful.
He means protected.
He means no one can ever touch him again.
I swallowed and finally dared to speak. “M-May I say something?”
His mouth twitched, the corner, as if he almost smiled. “Please.”
I wet my lips. “Maybe he doesn’t w-want the empire,” I said softly.
John went still.
I was shaking a little, but I forced myself to keep going. “M-Maybe he just… wanted a dad.”
Silence.
Like actual silence.
Like the whole castle held its breath.
His eyes locked on mine. Hard. Not threatening, just stunned. Stopped.
“I’m not trying to be rude,” I added quickly, cheeks burning. “I—I’m not. I’m sorry if that sounded—”
“No,” he said, voice low.
I bit down on the inside of my cheek.
He exhaled, slowly, as if that one sentence had cut straight through his ribs. He leaned back, hand over his mouth for a moment. Then he dragged his palm down his face and let out something that wasn’t a laugh and wasn’t a sigh. Somewhere in between. Raw.
“You’re honest,” he said finally, looking at me again. There was something almost… relieved in his eyes. “Good.”
I didn’t know what to say to that.
