What Do You Want?
Valeria
After Ciphera’s delegation leaves, silence crashes over the conference room like a lead blanket.
Dante rises from his chair. He walks to the floor-to-ceiling windows, hands in his pockets, staring out over the city for a few seconds before turning back toward us.
“Leave us.”
Gaspard Peltier and the two attorneys exchange a glance, gather their things, and exit the room without a word.
“You too, Bianca.”
She opens her mouth, then seems to think better of it.
Is this the kind of woman he likes now?
Because if he’d spoken to me that way, I would’ve made him regret it very quickly.
She gathers her documents with calculated slowness before crossing the room toward him.
Her hand settles against his chest.
Then she rises onto her toes and kisses him.
Not a quick kiss. A long one. Intimate. Deep.
Dante stiffens at first. Then his hands find Bianca’s waist, pulling her against him.
I want to look away. To disappear.
But I’m trapped there, forced to watch the scene burn itself into my memory.
It takes every ounce of control I possess not to reveal what I’m feeling. Not to let them see me falling apart inside.
A presence moves discreetly closer beside me.
Hugo.
His voice brushes softly against my ear.
“Don’t let them see how much this hurts you. Smile at me. Pretend we’re sharing a secret.”
He’s right.
Neither of them can ever know.
So I reach for reserves of strength I didn’t know I still had and smile at him. A natural smile. Almost conspiratorial.
“Good,” he murmurs.
When I glance back toward the couple, Dante is glaring at us like he wants to kill someone.
Is he… jealous of Hugo?
I dismiss the thought immediately.
He just kissed Bianca in front of me. Deliberately.
I can’t afford to read meaning into his silences simply because I want to find it there.
That’s the fastest path to destroying myself.
Hugo leaves in Bianca’s wake. Before disappearing through the doorway, he gives me one last meaningful look.
Then the door closes.
We’re alone.
Dante wastes no time.
“You seem very sure of what you want, so tell me. Let’s save ourselves some time.”
You.
The answer rises instantly inside me. But I swallow it back.
Then come the other truths, equally desperate.
I want the years that were stolen from me. I want my life back.
But I look at the man who just kissed the woman who plotted my death, and I answer in a detached, neutral voice:
“I want my shares returned and my position formally restored.”
He assesses me like a stranger.
Deep down, he’s right.
I’ve changed. I didn’t have a choice.
“You’ve got nerve, I’ll give you that,” he says coldly. “What exactly do you think we’ve been doing for the past two years? We have a new Head of R&D. I’m not firing her just to make room for you.”
“I don’t want her position. I want my research back. I don’t care about titles.”
“Don’t insult me by pretending your research still means anything to you. Not after abandoning it for two years.”
Abandoning it.
“Believe whatever you want,” I reply.
“So you’re really not going to give me any explanation?” he asks.
“I don’t remember you asking for one.”
“Well, I’m asking now.”
I’ve imagined a thousand possible explanations.
One that would point him toward the truth without betraying myself.
Without revealing to the enemy—to the woman he may very well confide in tonight—how vulnerable I still am.
“I…” I hesitate. “I had health problems.”
He laughs, but there’s no amusement in it.
“Problems you apparently didn’t think were worth sharing with your husband. Problems you still refuse to explain.”
His tone is bitter, hurt, almost exhausted.
I could tell him everything right now.
That someone tried to kill me. That I survived. That I paid for it dearly.
But even if he believed me… would he turn against Bianca?
Or would he stop me from bringing her down?
Because that’s exactly what I intend to do.
Find everyone responsible and make them pay.
Silence stretches between us.
Then, very quietly, almost against his own will, he asks:
“Did you ever love me?”
The question nearly destroys me.
How can he even ask that? How can he doubt what we had together?
Then another thought cuts through me.
Why does it matter to him so much? Could a part of him still love me? Is there still hope for us?
Then I remember.
“How long after the ink dried on my death certificate did you end up in my best friend’s bed?”
He doesn’t answer. And his silence kills me.
“That’s what I thought.”
Something flashes through his eyes. Pain. Regret. I can’t tell which.
But he pulls himself together almost immediately.
“I never would’ve disappeared without warning you,” he says defensively.
Then he turns away, his voice colder now.
“You’ll get what you want. My lawyers would probably advise me to contest your claim.”
He pauses, as though carefully weighing every word.
“But I won’t. I’ve wasted enough time on all of this already.”
The implication doesn’t escape me.
“I have a funding round to close, a company to run, and a public legal war with my dead wife returning from the grave would send a very bad signal.”
He keeps staring out over the skyline.
“You’ll get your lab back as soon as the court signs off.”
Then he pivots toward me.
His gaze locks onto mine. His voice hardens.
“But you came back too early, Valeria. A few more days and the dilution would’ve gone through. The valuation would’ve skyrocketed. You could’ve walked away with an obscene check.”
Silence.
“Now everything’s frozen. Worse—you heard Wald.”
A humorless smile touches his mouth.
“Ciphera might even decide to pull out.”
He actually seems worried by the idea.
Is Aurenza really in such a fragile position?
He heads for the exit, pausing briefly by the door before leaving without another glance.
I remain standing in the middle of the empty room, my chest aching.
He truly believes freezing the funding round would upset me. He couldn’t be more wrong.
I didn’t come back to cash in on a higher valuation.
I came back to stop it.
And expose everything it’s hiding.