I stood in the kitchen with my hand resting against the marble counter watching Rosa move around the space as she prepared dinner. Her movements were steady and practiced in a way that had always been comforting.
She had been part of this house longer than I could remember, long enough that she felt like a constant in a world that rarely stayed still. And she carried herself with a calm that never seemed forced, even when everything else around us shifted.
And I loved her like a mother.
The scent of garlic and herbs filled the air, warm and familiar, but it didn’t settle the uneasy feeling that had followed me since I had woken up that morning.
“You’re not listening to me,” Rosa said, glancing over her shoulder as she stirred the sauce on the stove, her tone gentle but inquisitive.
I blinked, realizing I hadn’t responded to whatever she had been saying. I pushed myself off the counter as I tried to gather my thoughts back into something resembling attention. “I am,” I said,though the words came out automatically, more habit than truth.
She turned fully then, her gaze settling on me in a way that made it clear she wasn’t convinced. I didn’t try to argue the point. There wasn’t any reason to. She knew me too well for that.
“You’ve been somewhere else all afternoon,” she said, wiping her hands on a cloth before setting it aside. “That’s not like you.”
I let out a soft breath and moved toward the table, more to give myself something to do than because I was hungry, and pulled out a chair before sitting down. “I didn’t sleep well,” I said, keeping my tone even because it wasn’t entirely a lie. Sleep had been shallow, broken by a restless awareness I couldn’t quite explain, like something had shifted just out of sight of my well-constructed, strictly controlled world.
Rosa studied me for a moment before nodding slightly, as if she was choosing not to push further, and returned her attention to the stove. “Your father asked for you this morning,” she said after a moment, her voice casual in a way that didn’t quite match the weight of the words.
That made me pause, my fingers tighteningslightly around the edge of the table before I forced them to relax. “When?” I asked.
“Early,” she replied. “You were still asleep.”
“Did he say why?” I kept my voice steady.
Rosa shook her head. “No, but he wasn’t in a good mood.”
My father rarely was.
I picked up my fork and forced myself to take a few bites of the food she set in front of me, even though I suddenly had no appetite. My attention drifted toward the open window across the room.
Outside, everything looked as it always did. The grounds were quiet, and the distant sound of voices carried just enough to suggest normalcy. But there was something off beneath it, something subtle that wouldn’t have stood out to anyone who didn’t know what to look for.
An ominous undercurrent weighted the air. Was that why I had trouble sleeping, why I’d felt off all morning? That was surely why my father wanted to speak with me.
I set my fork down after a few minutes, the food untouched beyond that, and pushed my chair back as I stood. “I’ll go find him,” I said, wanting to get this over with. Whateverit was.
Rosa watched me carefully, her expression softening slightly. “Be careful with him today.”
There was something in the way she said it that made me hesitate. It wasn’t the warning itself being new. This felt heavier than usual, like she understood more than she was saying.
“I always am,” I replied quietly before leaving the kitchen.
The hallway was silent as I made my way toward my father’s office, my steps steady, even as that same restless awareness settled deeper in my chest. The closer I got, the more certain I became that whatever had shifted wasn’t small and that I was about to be pulled into something I had spent most of my life being kept just outside of.
Two men stood outside his door, both of them straightening slightly when they saw me approach. One of them reached for the handle without a word, allowing me entry.
I stepped inside, the door closing behind me with a soft click, and found my father standing near his desk, his attention fixed on something spread out across the surface. He didn’t look up right away which meant he already knew I was there.
“You took your time,” he said.
“I didn’t know you were asking for me,” I replied, moving farther into the room.
He glanced at me briefly, his expression sharp and assessing before his attention shifted back to the papers in front of him. “Sit.”
I did, folding my hands in my lap as I waited, giving him the time he always took before saying what needed to be said. He was deliberate in everything, especially when it came to decisions that carried weight, and whatever this was, it had already been decided before I walked in.
“You’re aware of the tension between families,” he said after a moment, his tone calm as if he were discussing something ordinary.
