Chapter 8
Livia asked about Camilla the next morning.
Children refuse convenient timing.
“Aunt Camilla mad?”
I sat beside her at breakfast.
“She made a very bad choice.”
“She slap.”
“Yes.”
“Because vase?”
I paused.
“No.”
She frowned.
“Because letter?”
Smart.
“Yes.”
“What letter?”
“Grown-up family stuff.”
She accepted that for three seconds.
“Bad?”
“Yes.”
Then:
“Was vase expensive?”
I almost smiled.
“Yes.”
Her face fell.
I touched her hand.
“You are worth more.”
She looked at me.
“More than vase?”
“Much more.”
“More than house?”
“Yes.”
“More than Rafe?”
From across the room Rafe looked offended.
I laughed.
“We’ll discuss that.”
Livia giggled.
Good.
Then she asked whether she needed to apologize for breaking the vase.
“No.”
“Accident.”
“Yes.”
That mattered.
She had begun the entire night apologizing for something accidental while adults around her hid deliberate choices for years.
I wanted her to learn the difference.
After breakfast, I brought Marco into my office.
No Camilla.
“What Second Table members remain?”
He gave me six names.
Two dead.
One retired.
Three active.
None surprised me.
That angered me.
Not because I knew they were traitors.
Because I had felt their resistance for years and kept interpreting it as normal family politics.
Again.
Silence mistaken for peace.
I summoned them separately.
No grand confrontation.
I wanted individual answers before they coordinated.
One admitted everything.
One minimized.
One blamed Marco.
Different men.
Same structure.
They all believed they were protecting Valenti from me.
None could identify a moment when I asked them to.
That was the arrogance.
They had appointed themselves guardians of a family already led by someone else.
I removed every one from decision-making authority.
No executions.
No spectacle.
No martyrdom.
May you like
Just closed doors.
The Second Table would die because nobody needed to fear it anymore.
