Cyril’s POV
The moment Lora’s perfume faded from my study, something in me started to clear—like smoke thinning after a fire. For the first time in weeks, the anger wasn’t the only thing loud in my head. There was something else now. Doubt.
I sat there in the quiet, the scattered fruits still on the floor. The silence was heavy, but behind it was a slow, creeping realization that I had been blind. Willingly blind.
I leaned back in my chair, my eyes unfocused on the ceiling. Images came to me—Ella’s small, uncertain smile the day she’d told me that her family never really treated her like a jewel. That her sister was always the one who got the attention. She’d said it in such a quiet, resigned way, like she’d long accepted it. I remember teasing her then, asking if she was jealous. She h
