The Ivanovs
Dante
“What’s the plan?” Andrea asks after Valeria and her bodyguard leave.
Yeah.
What is the plan, Dante?
“Let’s go see Yasin. We need to get an update from him first.”
“Okay. Let’s go.”
We take the elevator down three floors.
Andrea is unusually quiet.
I’ve known my brother for thirty-three years. This silence isn’t thoughtful. It’s restraint.
“I know it’s none of my business, but—”
“As you said,” I cut in, “it’s none of your business.”
“Maybe,” he replies. “But I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t say it.”
He pauses.
Andrea never hesitates without reason.
“Are you sure you want to marry Bianca?”
My jaw tightens. The question unsettles me because it forces me to look at parts of my love life I’ve been refusing to examine.
He takes my silence as permission to continue.
“I mean... Valeria’s back. And it’s obvious there’s still something between you.”
“She didn’t come back for me.”
The words taste bitter because they’re true. And because that truth hurts in ways I hadn’t anticipated.
“All she cares about is her precious formula,” I continue.
“And why couldn’t it be both?”
His persistence irritates me deeply.
“Didn’t you hear what Stephen said? Her memories came back gradually. Not last week. And she never—”
I cut myself off abruptly.
The pieces click into place.
I understand.
“She knew there would be cyberattacks. And that they’d escalate until whoever’s behind them got what they wanted.”
But how? And for how long?
*
After leaving instructions for Andrea and Yasin, I cancel the rest of my meetings for the day.
Then I leave the company without looking back.
Inside the Huracán, engine running, I stare at my phone for several seconds before typing:
DANTE: Don’t wait up for me tonight. I have an emergency to deal with. Meet me tomorrow morning at eight at the Trianon Palace for breakfast.
I know it’s brutal.
But I can’t talk to Bianca right now.
Not while Valeria’s face occupies every inch of my mind.
Bianca calls almost immediately.
I hesitate before answering.
“So that’s it? You’re not coming home tonight?”
Her voice is already trembling.
“There are only three days left before our wedding, Dante. Three. And you disappear without explanation? Don’t tell me you’re with her.”
The her lands like an insult.
Her voice rises, cracks.
She’s on the verge of a breakdown.
And I know I’m partly responsible for it.
“Dante... please come home. Whatever’s happening, we can talk about it. Don’t shut me out... I know everything feels confusing right now, but don’t forget: she left. She abandoned us.”
My jaw clenches.
My grip tightens around the steering wheel.
I want to defend Valeria. Tell Bianca what Stephen revealed to us...
But Valeria’s coldness toward Bianca flashes through my mind, and I stay silent.
I don’t understand what happened between them. And somehow, talking about what Valeria went through without her consent feels like betraying her all over again.
“I have to go, Bianca. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Wait, Dante—”
I end the call.
She calls back immediately.
I don’t answer.
Yeah.
I’m an asshole.
But I need silence.
There was a time when Bianca filled the emptiness. She kept my thoughts from swallowing me whole. She was comforting.
Now she suffocates me. She keeps me from thinking.
I leave Paris and drive toward Giverny.
*
The gates open almost immediately after I ring the bell.
I barely step out of the car before my mother appears on the front steps.
She opens her arms, and I go to her without an ounce of shame.
Her embrace is firm and gentle. She doesn’t ask a single question.
She’s simply there.
There has only ever been one woman I loved more than her, and she came back from the dead only to blow my life apart.
When my mother finally lets me go, she studies my face.
“How is she?”
I know she doesn’t mean Bianca.
“Not well.”
“Come inside. You’re going to tell us everything.”
My father is waiting in the living room. He pulls me briefly into his solid embrace.
Aline brings in a tray with glasses and salted biscuits.
My father pours whisky topped with sparkling water.
The Ivanov ritual.
We raise our glasses.
Then I start talking.
I tell them everything: how I found Valeria in the lab, Stephen’s explanations, the chaos in my head and in my heart.
My anger.
My jealousy.
My frustration.
“I resented her for blaming me for moving on. I thought she’d erased me from her life… but none of it was true.”
Silence settles again.
“To this day, I still don’t know why someone wanted her dead, and it’s eating me alive.”
“Have you looked into her research?” my father asks.
“The only project valuable enough to trigger that kind of greed is an unpublished treatment. An experimental therapy capable of revolutionizing neurology… but also extremely dangerous in the wrong hands. But Valeria and I are the only ones who know it exists.”
“Are you certain of that?” my mother asks quietly.
For the first time, I consider the possibility.
“We barely talked about the project with anyone.”
My father hesitates.
“Not even Bianca?”
I don’t like his tone.
“Bianca and Valeria were very close,” he adds.
Despite myself, I consider the possibility.
“Even if Bianca knew, she never would’ve betrayed her.”
For the first time, I’m no longer entirely sure of that.
My father holds my gaze.
“Would you bet Valeria’s life on it?”
A chill runs through me. And suddenly I understand what he’s implying.
If Bianca knew about the research… could she really have betrayed her best friend?
“Let’s say Bianca talked,” my father says cautiously. “Who could she have passed that information to?”
“Hector Wald,” Andrea says as he walks into the room.
He must have come straight here from the office.
My father frowns.
“Who is that?”
“One of our potential future investors,” I answer.
My father pours Andrea a drink.
“Why do you think he could be involved?” he asks him.
“Yasin dug into his background. Wald made his fortune through the black-market pharmaceutical trade. Five years ago, one of his counterfeit generics triggered a medical catastrophe. The victims’ families filed lawsuits. Then the case disappeared. Just like that.”
My mother goes pale.
“You think he’s the one targeting Valeria?”
I consider the possibility, and it makes sense.
“What are you going to do?” my father asks me.
I take a sip before setting my glass down.
“If he’s involved, I won’t stop until I destroy him.”
A strange tension settles in the room.
“Now that you know what happened to her, what are you going to do?” my mother asks.
I frown. Haven’t I made myself clear?
“No, I’m talking about the wedding,” she says softly. “What are you going to do?”
I close my eyes.
I have no proof that Bianca was involved. I can’t condemn her based on suspicion alone.
And yet, one fact remains.
One way or another, I have to choose.