Chapter 8

I had returned for one reason only: my passport.

It was locked in the safe at the Estate, tucked away in the small, modest room I used to occupy near the kitchen.

I had assumed the house would be empty at this hour.

I was wrong.

I slipped through the side entrance, shaking the heavy rain from my coat, shivering as the damp cold clung to my skin.

Laughter drifted down the hallway, light and carefree.

It was coming from the music room.

I should have turned around right then.

But my feet moved on their own, drawn by a force I couldn't resist.

I walked to the open double doors and froze.

Dante sat at the grand piano, his posture rigid yet elegant.

He was playing *Liebestraum*. A dream of love.

It was the song he had written when he was blind, composed in the darkness that had once consumed him.

He used to play it for me at 3:00 AM, in the quiet hours when the pain in his eyes became unbearable.

He had told me, once, that the melody was the very sound of my voice.

Now, he was playing it for her.

Sofia sat on the bench beside him, too close.

She leaned her head on his shoulder, her fingers trailing playfully over the keys, pretending to play along in a mockery of intimacy.

She looked up, her gaze landing on me standing in the doorway.

Her eyes lit up with pure malice.

"Oh, look, Dante," she cooed, her voice dripping with false sweetness. "The help is back."

Dante's hands faltered on the keys.

The music died abruptly.

He turned.

His eyes found mine across the room.

"Elena," he said, his voice low and guarded. "What are you doing here?"

"Getting my things," I replied.

My voice sounded hollow, like wind whistling through an abandoned house.

"Don't be rude, Dante," Sofia scolded lightly, placing a possessive hand on his chest. "Play the rest. I love this song. You wrote it for me, didn't you?"

Dante looked at me.

He knew.

He knew that I knew.

But he didn't correct her.

"Yeah," he said, his dark eyes never leaving mine, cold and unyielding. "I wrote it for you, Sofia."

Something inside me snapped.

A final, vital cord severed.

Sofia smiled, victorious.

She leaned in.

She pressed her lips to his.

It wasn't a quick peck; it was a claim of ownership.

Dante didn't push her away.

He didn't pull back.

He simply closed his eyes and let her kiss him.

I stood there and watched them.

I watched the man I had bathed, the man I had fed, the man I had saved from the brink of despair, kiss the woman who had left him to rot.

I didn't scream.

I simply turned around.

I walked out the front door.

It was pouring now, the rain transforming into a thunderstorm.

I didn't run for cover.

I walked straight into the deluge.

The water mixed with the tears on my face, making them indistinguishable.

I was free.

I had nothing left to lose, because he had just taken the last thing I truly owned.

My memories.