Chapter 41 - 42
ELODIE’S POV~
I didn’t plan on fighting for Liora’s custody. I’d already made my peace with that. She was Dante’s daughter as much as she was mine, and if he wanted to raise her under his pack’s roof, I wouldn’t stop him. Still... when she turned to me with those soft amber eyes that mirrored his and asked me to peel her shrimp, I couldn’t say no.
“Alright,” I said quietly, setting my chopsticks aside.
The table was filled with laughter and clinking glasses, but everything sounded distant to me like I was hearing it through a wall. I tried to focus on peeling the shrimp, to pretend I didn’t feel Dante’s presence sitting right beside me, cold and distant as ever. I could feel him without even looking, his scent, that sharp cedar and faint smoke I used to crave. Now it only made my chest ache.
The elderly lady, his grandmother, stopped talking mid-sentence. Her gaze dropped to my hands, and the warmth in her eyes faltered. “Elodie,” she said softly, her tone both confused and disapproving, “where’s your ring?”
The room went still. Even Amber stopped talking. I froze, my fingers tight around the shrimp, my mind blank for a moment before I forced a faint smile.
“I must’ve left it at home,” I murmured, trying to sound casual. “I was in a hurry, Nonna.”
My lie hung in the air. I didn’t meet anyone’s eyes, especially not Dante’s.
In truth, I’d taken the ring off the night I packed the divorce papers. It had felt like cutting off a piece of myself. That thin band had been the last thing tying me to a man who no longer looked at me the same. I’d slipped it into the envelope beside the divorce agreement, knowing it was over even if the world hadn’t caught up yet. In the past I always wore the ring like my life depended on it, everywhere I went. Even to sleep. Even Amber had once mocked me because of it but now? No more.
His grandmother didn’t press further, but her sigh was heavy enough to fill the silence. “Ah... I see,” she said, smiling faintly as if she believed me. But I saw the way her eyes softened, sad, disappointed, like she could already sense the truth.