Chapter 11
Sofia had left one more recording.
Not about the Table.
About me.
I almost wished she hadn’t.
“Domenico, if you find all this, you’re going to become unbearable.”
I laughed for the first time in days.
Even dead, she knew me.
“You’ll want to lock Livia inside ten walls and call it protection.”
My smile disappeared.
Fair.
“Don’t.”
She looked directly into the camera.
“Fear creates cages faster than enemies do.”
I sat alone with that sentence.
After her death, I had become more controlling.
Not cruel.
But watchful.
Guards everywhere.
Schedules.
Routes.
Background checks.
Livia had grown up surrounded by adults whose main job was preventing possibilities.
Now I knew part of that fear had been manufactured deliberately years earlier.
The Table had succeeded more than I realized.
Even after it stopped operating actively, I carried its lesson.
Danger everywhere.
Stay close.
Trust fewer.
Sofia’s final request:
“Let our daughter know caution. Don’t teach her that safety means never leaving your reach.”
I closed the laptop.
That afternoon, Livia wanted to run through the garden without holding my hand.
My instinct said no.
Stone steps.
Fountain.
Security gates.
Then I remembered.
I let go.
Rafe walked twenty feet behind.
Compromise.
Livia ran.
Tripped.
Scraped one knee.
Cried.
I nearly laughed at the universe.
She came back to me.
I cleaned the scrape.
No conspiracy.
No hidden council.
May you like
Just childhood.
Maybe that was the future Sofia had wanted.
