My father is still dead. That’s the third, and the one everything else keeps failing to improve.
I sit in the north wing with the file open on my lap and a cup of tea going cold beside me. Teresa brought it twenty-three minutes ago. Mint. Ginger. Honey. The holy trinity of keeping pregnant women functional enough to endure criminal consequences.
The room is quiet. I brought my father’s murder, Dante’s exile, Alessandro’s silence, Alessandro’s choice, and two heartbeats I still cannot feel but somehow organize every decision around.
Very crowded, all things considered.
There are five exits here. Door to hall. Door to adjoining sitting room. Window. Balcony doors, locked. Service panel behind the screen.
Five. I count them once. Then again. Not because I intend to use them. Because the habit remains, even when the purpose shifts.
That might be what survival is: a habit that outlives the danger and becomes part of the furniture.
I look down at the file. Dante’s confession. Council vote. Alessandro’s signature. Current orders. Removal from succession. Permanent exile. No family protection beyond transfer. Accounts closed. Name removed.
I read the removal order three times, because apparently I enjoy making sure disappointment is thoroughly documented. It’s real. Dante Vitale has been cut from the family he thought would absorb any amount of his violence and still call him heir.
That should feel good. It does. A little.
But I expected revenge to move something larger. It doesn’t. The world doesn’t tilt back into place. My father doesn’t walk in, complaining about the rain. His study doesn’t smell of peat smoke and damp wool. His thumb doesn’t rest beside my signature. He doesn’t get to tell me he was sorry and be wrong and still alive.
A soft knock sounds.
“Come in,” I say.
Teresa enters, carrying a small plate.
“I’m not hungry,” I say.
“You rarely are when you should be.”
“That sounds like criticism disguised as nutrition.”
“Yes.” She sets the plate down. Toast. Pear. Crackers. A menu for emotional instability. “How do you feel?” she asks.
“What an aggressive question.”
“It’s a simple one.”
“Those are the worst kind.”
She waits. Damn her.
I look back at the file. “I don’t know.” The answer irritates me by being true.
Teresa folds her hands. “Then start there.”
“I prefer not to begin with failure.”
“Not knowing isn’t failure.”
“It is in this house.”
“In this house, men pretend knowing is the same as control. It’s not.”
I stare at her. “That sounded expensive. Did Salvatore teach you that?”
“No. Men taught me by being wrong.”
