“But you left.”
“Victor found me. He said that if I stayed, he would ruin you, Daniel, and the children.”
“So you disappeared.”
“I thought distance would protect you.”
I could barely breathe.
“All these years, I believed you hated Daniel.”
“He made me promise never to tell you. He believed you were safer if you knew nothing.”
Anger rose inside me.
Not at Clara alone.
At Daniel.
At Victor.
At every person who had decided I was too fragile to know the truth.
“They all made choices for me,” I whispered.
Samuel stepped forward.
“Evelyn, we should leave.”
I looked at the red ledger.
“No.”
Priya frowned.
“No?”
“Victor believes I will bring him that ledger.”
“You will not.”
“He believes I am frightened.”
“You are not meeting him.”
I closed the steel cabinet.
“No,” I said. “But someone is.”
That evening, the red ledger was placed inside Daniel’s wooden box.
