“I was afraid,” she sobbed. “Afraid you’d leave. Afraid you’d replace me with someone younger. If you needed me, you wouldn’t go.”
He stared at her, horror replacing disbelief. “So you weakened me so I would depend on you?”
The girl spoke again, softer this time. “My mom died like that. Someone she trusted made her sick. Nobody believed me.”
That was the moment something inside him shifted.
He didn’t shout. He didn’t create a scene. He took out his phone and called the police.
Victoria fell to her knees, pleading, her composure shattered. “Please… we can fix this.”
“Fear doesn’t excuse cruelty,” he said, his voice steady now. “And love does not look like this.”
When the officers led her away, the park slowly returned to life around them. People whispered. Some stared.
He removed his coat and placed it gently over the girl’s thin shoulders.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Layla,” she whispered.
“Thank you, Layla,” he said. “You didn’t have to tell me.”
That night, the mansion felt hollow. Crystal chandeliers sparkled above a dining table set with precision. He stood in the kitchen alone, imagining powder falling like silent snow into a bowl of soup.