Chapter 14
Gregory lost every Venturi-associated privilege.
No routes.
No meetings.
No estate access.
No ability to introduce himself as connected through me.
He still belonged to the Hayes family.
Fine.
Let them decide what remained of his authority there.
He confronted me one final time.
“You’re taking everything.”
“No.”
“You took my wife years ago.”
I stared.
“I left you.”
His face hardened.
Yes.
Important distinction.
Our marriage had ended before Theo disappeared.
Gregory had always told himself Venturi stole me because that story made abandonment easier to bear.
“You became someone else.”
“No.”
“I became visible.”
Silence.
He had married a doctor.
Then discovered the doctor had power he could not outrank.
That resentment never healed.
Theo became his correction.
“If I couldn’t have my family, neither could you?”
Gregory looked away.
There.
Not the whole motive.
Enough.
“You let your mother take him.”
“Yes.”
“Did you regret it?”
Long silence.
“The first month.”
I stared.
“Then?”
“It became impossible to undo.”
Again.
Cowardice disguised as inevitability.
Every day after the first was a new choice.
He could have returned Theo.
Called.
Left him somewhere safe.
Sent proof anonymously.
Anything.
Instead he kept choosing the previous lie because admitting it grew more expensive.
“You weren’t trapped.”
I stood.
“You were ashamed.”
His eyes hardened.
“That isn’t the same thing.”
No.
It wasn’t.
Shame did not excuse five years.
May you like
But understanding it mattered because I did not want Theo growing up believing his disappearance required some enormous mysterious evil.
Sometimes children lose years because adults are too cowardly to admit yesterday’s mistake today.
