Chapter 13 - THE WOMAN HE HAD TO MEET AGAIN
We dated for two years.
That sentence would have enraged the old Dante.
Good.
He was used to solving problems with speed.
I needed time.
Leo needed stability.
Victoria needed her own life.
I needed to know whether Dante’s changes existed when no crisis demanded them.
They did.
He attended preschool events.
Then kindergarten.
He learned to braid nothing because Leo had short hair.
Instead he learned lunch boxes.
Pediatric appointments.
Toy dinosaurs.
The crushing bureaucracy of summer camp forms.
He hated every form.
I enjoyed that.
Then his legitimate companies prospered under independent management.
Turns out professionals could run companies without threatening people.
Dante found this disappointing and useful.
His health stabilized.
He continued therapy.
Yes.
Therapy.
The first time he told me, I stared.
“What?”
“I have a therapist.”
“Voluntarily?”
“Apparently.”
I laughed.
Then I cried later.
Because eight years ago, I had begged him to talk.
Now he paid someone to make him.
Worth it.
Victoria began dating too.
A federal architect named Daniel Reeves.
Boring.
Kind.
Excellent.
She loved that he had no interest in trusts.
Mia moved back to Chicago permanently.
Leo called her Aunt Mia despite no blood relation.
Correct.
Marcus Carter cooperated with investigators after his father’s arrest.
He lost Carter Development control but avoided prison on some charges due cooperation and evidence he had not ordered violence.
I maintained distance.
Gianna received a long sentence.
Samuel Carter too.
Our mother’s case was formally reclassified as homicide-related medical misconduct.
Painful.
Necessary.
Dad’s death case resulted in conviction.
His name cleared of some later crimes after records showed he had been trying to dismantle the schemes he helped build.
Not hero.
Not monster.
Human.
Then Leo turned five.
Birthday at a park.
No mansion.
No private ballroom.
Dante grilled hamburgers badly.
Victoria brought too much cake.
At sunset, Leo fell asleep across Dante’s lap.
I watched them.
Something inside me shifted.
Not toward the past.
Toward possibility.
Dante noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s a lie.”
“Maybe.”
He smiled.
Then:
“Elena.”
“Yes?”
“I want to ask you something.”
My body tensed.
He saw it.
“Not marriage.”
I relaxed.
He laughed.
“Progress.”
“What?”
“Can I have a key to your apartment?”
I stared.
“That’s almost worse.”
“Why?”
“Domestic intimacy.”
He looked terrified.
Good.
I gave him one three months later.
Not because he needed access.
Because I trusted him with access.
Difference.
Then, on the anniversary of the day I left Chicago three years earlier, he returned the key.
I frowned.
“Why?”
“Because I want you to know I can give access back too.”
That broke me more than any diamond could have.
Then I said:
“Keep it.”
May you like
He did.
And still knocked.
