Page 33 of Ruthless Vow
She doesn’t appear for breakfast. Working in the study, no doubt. Lost in numbers and patterns and whatever conspiracy she’s unraveling in my family’s records.
I should be grateful for her competence.
Instead, I find myself listening for her footsteps. Noting her absence like a missing tooth.
By afternoon, I need a book.
The library has always been a sanctuary. Mama’s space, preserved the way she left it. Her reading chair by the window. Her poetry collection on the third shelf. The faint scent of jasmine that somehow never fades, even eleven years later.
I’m looking for military strategy. Sun Tzu, maybe. Or Clausewitz. Cold and logical enough to drown out the noise in my head.
I stop at the threshold.
She’s there.
Curled in Mama’s reading chair like she belongs there. Bare feet tucked beneath her, shoes abandoned on the floor. Afternoon light spills through the window and catches the copper threads in her dark hair, turning her edges to fire.
She’s holding one of Mama’s books. Poetry. Neruda. The one Mama read to Papa on their anniversary every year. The one I haven’t been able to open since she died.
She doesn’t know I’m watching.
The careful composure she wears like armor has slipped. Underneath it, her face is open. Unguarded. Her lips move with the lines of the poem, and her hand cradles the book’s spine the way you’d hold something breakable.
She’s humming. Low and tuneless.
I absorb the details without meaning to. She’s made herself smaller in the chair, taking up as little room as possible. The strand of hair she keeps pushing behind her ear. The furrow between her brows as she reads. The curve of her neck where her blouse has slipped, exposing skin that looks soft enough to bruise.
Fuck.
My mother’s reading glasses are still in the drawer beside the chair. She didn’t touch them. Didn’t presume.
She could have. Could have put them on, played at being the lady of the house. She left them where they were. Respecting boundaries I never drew.
My hand locks on the doorframe. Knuckles white. Something seizes behind my ribs, tight and airless, and I can’t make it stop. Can’t look away from her face.
She looks the way I do at three in the morning.
I should announce myself. Break this moment. Put us back on solid ground.
I don’t.
I watch her another long second. Let myself see her for the first time. Just her. Cassia.
Then I step back. Leave without a sound. Don’t get my book.
Romano arrives at three.
Polished as always. Silver hair combed with precision. The image of competent service that’s been his hallmark for decades.
“Don. The Baton Rouge routes need your signature before Thursday.” He sets a folder on my desk. “Weather delays have complicated the timeline, but I’ve arranged alternate transport.”
I review the documents. Everything in order. Efficient. Professional.
I sign where indicated. Hand it back.
Romano doesn’t leave.
His eyes drift to the side table where Cassia’s papers are spread. Her notes in careful handwriting. Color-coded tabs marking pages. Cross-references written in margins.
