Chapter 213: And They Never Forget It

LOUISE’S POV

The thought leaves a dull ache beneath my ribs. I press my palm against it for a moment, then lower my hand.

There is no comfort in remembering what I can never have again. But there is no point in pretending it meant nothing, either.

The phone remains silent.

I wonder whether Alice has tried to call. I wonder whether she has already begun to consider what she will say when she needs me again.

The thought does not make me angry in the way it once would have. My anger has not disappeared, but it has settled into something less restless. It no longer demands that I act immediately or prove that I am still capable of hurting someone before they hurt me.

It simply remains.

I know what Alice will do if she gets the chance. She will return to the same habits, the same little demands, the same expectations she has carried for years. She will assume that whatever has happened between us can be put aside when it becomes inconvenient.

She has always mistaken my willingness to return for an inability to leave.

Perhaps I helped her make that mistake.

I have spent years convincing myself that I could manage her, that I could take what I needed from her while keeping enough of myself out of her reach to remain independent.

It was a comfortable lie.

Every time I accepted another task, every time I allowed her to turn my anger toward someone else, I made it easier for her to believe that I would continue doing so.

She never needed to own every part of me. She only needed to know which parts she could call upon when she wanted something done.

And I kept answering.

I think of the girl I was before the Dubois estate, before the expensive clothes and the dinners where every smile carried a hidden meaning. I think of how badly she wanted to belong somewhere, how easily she mistook being chosen for being loved.

I would like to say I have outgrown her. I haven’t. I have only learned to hide the need better.

It is there beneath the bitterness, beneath the sharp words and the habit of treating every kindness with suspicion.

It is there in the part of me that still remembers Matteo’s affection as though I could return to it if I only found the right door.

That part of me has never been useful to Alice, except when she has needed to remind me what I might lose if I disobey her.

She knows where to press. She has always known. But I am tired of waiting for her to decide what happens next.

The realization comes without any sudden rush of courage. I do not feel stronger. I do not feel free. I am not filled with the sort of righteous anger that makes a person believe they can change the world if they only stand up and speak loudly enough.

I feel tired. I feel cornered.

And I no longer believe there is a version of my future in which Alice simply lets me go.

Orion will not forget the scandal. Even if I manage to leave his reach, the consequences will follow me. There will be questions, accusations, and people eager to decide what kind of woman I am based on the ugliest parts of my life.

They will not be wrong about all of it.

Adrien will not suddenly look at me differently because I have finally understood how much damage I have done. He has no reason to forgive me, and I have no right to expect him to forget.

Whatever happened in that glasshouse belongs to a time when neither of us understood how thoroughly our lives would be shaped by the people around us.

That time is gone.

The house by the water remains an idea, nothing more. I cannot give it to him, and I cannot make the world leave him alone long enough for him to find it.

I cannot even tell him that I remember. The words would sound ridiculous coming from me.

He would probably look at me with that familiar, cold expression and ask what I wanted from him this time. He would have every reason to ask.

So I leave the memory where it belongs.

I do not turn it into a promise. I do not imagine myself appearing in his life one day to offer an apology that would change nothing. I do not picture him understanding me or reaching across the distance between us.

Those things belong to people who still believe there is something waiting for them at the end of a difficult road.

I have spent too long looking for a way to win. Now I can barely imagine what winning would look like.

The room remains still around me. Somewhere beyond the door, a guard moves along the corridor, his boots making a faint, regular sound against the carpet. The noise approaches, pauses, and fades again.

I listen until I can no longer hear it.

Then I reach into the lining of my vest.

My fingers close around the pocketknife hidden there. The metal is cold against my palm, its familiar weight bringing me back to the present.

I turn it over once, feeling the edge through the fabric, then let my hand rest in my lap.

I do not need to make myself brave. I do not need to convince myself that what lies ahead is noble or that my choices will somehow make the people I have hurt suffer less.

Nothing I do can return Matteo to me. Nothing I do can undo what I have done to Adrien. And nothing will make Alice become the mother I spent my childhood hoping she might be.

I am not doing this for Adrien. I am not looking for a way to protect him, and I am not hoping that he will remember me kindly when everything is over.

He has his own life to live, even if it is not the life he once described to me.

It’s best he never forgets that.