Chapter 7
Margaret had kept notes.
Not because she was spying.
Because Victoria’s instructions kept changing, and Margaret had begun worrying someone would later blame her.
Smart woman.
She brought me a small notebook.
May 3 — Ms. Hale says Sophie begins sitting beside Mr. Marconi at Sunday dinners.
May 12 — Noah’s chair moved to opposite end. Told this came from Mr. Marconi.
May 20 — Asked to stop calling Noah “young Mr. Marconi” around Sophie.
June 2 — Instructed to prepare lake house child room.
June 14 — Told after marriage Sophie should be addressed as “Miss Marconi” at formal functions.
I stopped.
“What?”
Margaret nodded.
“She said the name would help Sophie feel secure.”
Victoria’s daughter was Hale.
There was nothing wrong with Hale.
So why was Victoria already planning to overwrite that too?
I looked at her.
“You weren’t blending a family.”
She stared.
“You were rewriting one.”
Her face hardened.
“That is unfair.”
“Noah loses Marconi.”
I tapped the notebook.
“Sophie gains it.”
Silence.
“His room becomes hers. His seat becomes hers. His photographs become hers.”
Victoria finally shouted:
“She deserves something permanent!”
There.
That was the wound beneath everything.
Permanent.
Her late husband died.
Her daughter lost a father.
Victoria had decided permanence could be manufactured by replacing every uncertain thing with mine.
My house.
My name.
My position.
My attention.
But permanence taken from a three-year-old was not security.
It was theft disguised as healing.
I looked at Sophie.
She was crying silently.
Victoria noticed.
Her anger collapsed for a moment.
May you like
Good.
For once, she was looking at the child instead of the future she had designed for her.
