His gaze had gone distant.
Pulled somewhere else entirely.
“I was violated too.”
The words were quiet.
So quiet I almost didn’t hear them.
But they hit harder than anything else in the room.
My breath caught.
“By your father,” he continued, still not fully present. “Many years ago.”
Something cold settled into my bones.
“Traumas like that never leave you,” he said. “Time doesn’t erase them. Nothing you build can stop them.”
His lips pressed into a thin line. “They hunt you.”
His gaze returned to mine.
“I know it feels shameful, but you don’t have to pretend it didn’t happen,” he said, voice softer but still intense.
“I would’ve found the best therapist to help you heal... and to guide you in whatever decision you make about the pregnancy.”
The room felt too small.
Like the walls were pressing in.
“Vincenzo, I was never violated.”
I stepped forward, ignoring the flare of pain in my side.
Forcing him to see me.
To hear me.
“I spent those four weeks in a locked room,” I said. “Holding someone hostage.”
His brow furrowed.
Confusion cutting through the certainty.
“My father,” I said. “Vasquez.”
That got his full attention.
“He’s alive,” I continued. “He faked his death. He’s been working with the Spanish the entire time.”
Silence.
“I took my father’s gun the first night he came in to harm me and seized him. He came alone. That was his mistake.”
My voice didn’t waver.
“I used the cuffs they left in the room to chain him to the pipe—tight enough that he couldn’t move—and used him as leverage so the soldiers wouldn’t harm me.”
