“Give me a name.”
I frowned slightly. “A name?”
“Give me the name of the man who did this to you.”
I froze.
My past pressed against my ribs, demanding space.
My father.
My own blood.
And the men who paid him to look the other way.
The truth clawed up my throat, sharp and immediate.
I swallowed it down violently.
“I’m waiting,” Rafael said quietly, pulling me out of the memory I had fallen into.
“And what will you do with the name?” I asked before I could stop myself, my throat tight. “You don’t care about me in any way. So why do you need the name of my rapist?”
Silence followed.
Then his answer came—low, absolute.
“You are my wife.”
A pause.
“In everything that word means.”
My breath caught, but he continued before I could interrupt him.
“I don’t care how long ago it was. I don’t care what distance you think time has given him.”
His tone hardened slightly, not with anger—but certainty.
“I need the name of the man who did this to you.”
Another step closer. I could feel it in the shift of the air between us.
“It is my responsibility as your husband to bring ruin to anything—and anyone—that has ever laid hands on what is mine.”
The words landed like a sealed sentence.
Then, quieter. Almost controlled restraint.
“Because this version of you... the one sitting here carrying it alone... I don’t accept it as the final one.”
His voice lowered further.
“I don’t believe this is who you are meant to remain.”
The idea of someone looking at me and seeing me broken should have angered me.
It should have made me shut down completely.
