Chapter 6 - Unearthing the Past
Up in the master suite of the Ramos estate, the silence was broken only by the crackling of wood in the stone fireplace.
I sat wrapped in a heavy charcoal cashmere robe, my back clean, disinfected, and dressed in soothing medical gauze that Diego had applied with an unexpected, clinical gentleness. The horrifying marks were hidden again, but the memory of them hung in the air between us like a physical weight.
Diego stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, a glass of neat bourbon in his hand, staring out into the dark, churning Atlantic.
“The audit of your father’s estate is complete,” Diego said without turning around. “Your brother is officially broke. By morning, the bank will foreclose on the Martin manor, and Thomas will be sleeping in his car.”
I stared down at my hands resting in my lap. For twenty-four years, I had believed that the Martin name was an inescapable cage, that my father’s cruelty was a law of nature, and that escape was a fairy tale told to children.
Now, with a single phone call, Diego Ramos had dismantled the entire empire that had held me prisoner.
“And my father?” I asked, my voice barely audible over the crackle of the fire.
“He goes to a state-funded care facility in Newport,” Diego replied, turning to face me, his expression unreadable. “A basic room, standard medication, no private nurses, and no silver spoons. Exactly what he earned.”
I looked up, meeting his dark gaze. There was no triumph in his eyes, only a quiet, heavy understanding.
“You didn't have to clean my back, Diego,” I said softly, breaking the silence that stretched between us. “You could have left the dress on. You could have used me as a hostage and never looked beneath the silk.”
Diego took a slow sip of his bourbon, walking toward the fireplace. He stopped a few feet away from my chair, looking down at me with an intensity that made my pulse quicken.
“When I was twelve years old,” Diego said, his voice dropping into a register so quiet I barely caught the words, “my father died in a tenement fire that your father’s men set to clear the waterfront. My mother died six months later from grief and winter pneumonia. I grew up in the gutter swearing I would burn the Martin family down to ash until not a single brick remained.”
He took another sip, his jaw tightening.
“I spent twenty years hating Arthur Martin. I thought he was a titan. I thought he was a worthy enemy.” Diego shook his head slowly, a bitter shadow crossing his face. “Seeing your back tonight... I didn't see the daughter of a titan. I saw the casualty of a coward. Arthur wasn't a king, Noelle. He was just a bully who beat people smaller than him because he was too weak to fight men who could fight back.”
The words hit me harder than any blow my father had ever delivered.
For my entire life, I had blamed myself for not being strong enough, for not dodging fast enough, for not earning the approval that was never meant to be given. Hearing the most feared man in New York dismiss my abuser as a pathetic coward felt like chains falling off my ankles.
“Does it still hurt?” Diego asked suddenly, his voice losing its harshness, replaced by something dangerously tender.
I touched the gauze resting against my spine. “Not physically. Not anymore.”
“What about the rest?” he asked, stepping closer. He knelt down in front of me again, resting his large hands gently on the arms of my chair. “What do you want, Noelle? Now that the cage is open. Now that your father is powerless and your brother is ruined. What do you want to do with the rest of your life?”
I looked down into his dark, searching eyes. He had bought me as a weapon of revenge. He had married me to break my family.
Yet here he was, offering me the one thing I had never possessed in my entire life:
A choice.
“I want to burn it all down,” I whispered, a slow, fierce smile spreading across my lips. “Starting with every last trace of the Martin name.”
May you like
Diego’s mouth curved into a slow, approving grin that made him look less like a crime boss and more like an equal partner in crime.
“Consider it done, Mrs. Ramos,” he murmured.
