CHAPTER 6 – THE WOMAN UPSTAIRS
Camila did not go upstairs immediately.
For a few seconds, she stood at the base of the staircase in the black dress and gold belt, champagne glass trembling just enough to reveal the fear beneath her poise. She had expected anger from Julian, perhaps even an argument. She had not expected belief. Men like Julian, powerful and exhausted, often preferred the adult version because it required less emotional repair. A child’s version demanded action.
Action threatened everything.
“You are making a mistake,” she said.
Julian set Sofia down only after making sure she could stand. The child kept one hand in his, the other wrapped around Snowdrop. He positioned himself between her and Camila, not theatrically, but instinctively.
“The mistake was leaving her alone with you.”
Camila flinched as if slapped.
Good, Julian thought, then hated himself for the satisfaction.
Cruelty tempts even when righteous.
He kept his voice controlled. “Put the glass down.”
Camila looked at the champagne in her hand as if surprised to find it there. She set it on the console table slowly.
Sofia watched the glass.
Julian noticed and added it to the growing list of details he had ignored.
Camila spoke lower now. “You have no idea what it’s like trying to live with a ghost in every room.”
Julian’s face changed.
There it was.
The name she did not say.
Elena.
His first wife. Sofia’s mother. The woman whose absence had shaped the house. The woman Camila had once claimed to honor. The woman whose photo kept disappearing from places where Sofia could see it.
Julian looked at the staircase wall.
Elena’s portrait had once hung beside the foyer mirror. Now it was gone.
“Where is her photo?” he asked.
Camila’s lips pressed together.
“Sofia was becoming fixated.”
“Where is it?”
“In storage.”
Sofia made a small sound.
Julian closed his eyes.
The cake was not the beginning. It was the moment he finally came home in time to witness the ending of a longer pattern.
He thought back to Sofia’s recent changes: the way she apologized too quickly, stopped wearing bright clothes, asked before touching things she owned, flinched when Camila entered rooms unexpectedly. He had blamed grief, school stress, adjustment. He had trusted Camila’s reports because adult language sounded more organized than childhood sadness.
Camila had been writing Sofia’s story before Julian heard it.
No more.
“Pack a bag,” he said.
Camila stared. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am.”
“Over a cake?”
“Over my daughter sitting on the floor believing she deserved it.”
The words struck the foyer into silence.
Camila’s eyes glittered. “You’re choosing her.”
Julian looked almost confused by the accusation.
“She is my child.”
“I am your wife.”
“You are the woman who made my child afraid to tell me the truth.”
For the first time, Camila looked truly wounded—not because she understood harm, but because she had believed marriage elevated her above consequence.
Sofia pressed closer to Julian’s leg.
Camila saw the movement and sneered before she could stop herself. “There. Look. She’s doing it again. The helpless little princess act.”
Julian’s voice cut through her.
“Enough.”
It was not loud.
It was the voice he used in boardrooms when a contract was over.
Camila went still.
He picked up his phone, then paused. He did not want Sofia to remember police lights on her birthday unless necessary. He called his sister instead.
“Marianne,” he said when she answered, “I need you at the house. Now. Sofia is safe. I’ll explain when you get here.”
Camila’s mouth parted. “You’re calling your family?”
“I’m making sure there is another adult here for Sofia.”
“Because of me?”
“Yes.”
No hesitation.
No softening.
No space for her to rewrite it.
Camila stepped back toward the staircase, eyes burning. “You’ll regret humiliating me.”
Julian looked at the smashed cake.
May you like
“No,” he said. “I regret not seeing sooner.”
That answer followed Camila up the staircase, past the curved railing, into the upper hall where the doors still held all the secrets she thought she owned.
