19 - Isa #2
But in this ballroom, under the antiseptic glare of chandeliers, that memory fractures. The Lins are dressed in black, blacker even than the marble around them, a mourning that never left their wardrobe. Mrs. Lin's mouth is fixed in a line so tight I wonder if she’s ever smiled since.
Mr. Lin has aged harder, gray threading through hair that used to be solid black, shoulders bent under weight that has nothing to do with years.
"Isadora Navarro," Mrs. Lin says my name like she's tasting poison. "We heard you were doing well."
My throat closes. They're here. Real. Not fragments from guilt dreams but flesh and bone and grief standing in designer clothes at a gala I should never have attended. Looks like they really did get a big payout from the quarry.
"Look at you," Mr. Lin's voice carries an edge that cuts. "From that neighborhood to this. Quite the rise."
Adrian shifts beside me, reading threat in their posture. His hand moves from my back, ready to intervene.
"How does someone like you," Mrs. Lin continues, each word precise, "end up here?
The clothes, the company, the influence?
" Her gaze travels over my dress, Adrian's protective stance, the casual wealth we're draped in.
"What exactly did you do to afford this life?
Or should we ask what you do for him?" Her gaze flicks to Adrian.
"Meiling always said you were clever. I suppose we know now what kind of clever pays for silk dresses. "
The suspicion in her voice is worse than anger would be. She's not just grieving. She's questioning how I climbed from where I started to here, what I might have done, who I might have hurt, to earn this elevation.
Adrian moves forward, everything about him shifting from warmth to threat.
I've seen him handle problems at La Sirena.
The way he smiled while breaking a dealer's fingers, how he whispered comfort to a trafficker before putting him in the bay.
He's about to unleash the Marín brand of hospitality on two grieving parents.
My palm flattens against his chest, stopping him cold.
He looks down at me, confusion flickering across his features. In five years at La Sirena, no one has ever stopped him mid protection. The confusion shifts to something darker. Not anger but recognition that I'm shielding them from him, choosing their safety over his defense of me.
I press harder, feeling his heartbeat under my hand. Don't. The word stays trapped in my throat but my hand says it clearly: Do not touch them.
These are Meiling's parents. Whatever they throw at me, suspicion, hostility, accusations, I deserve it.
This is my penance. The guilt I've carried for fourteen years demands I stand here and take this.
Their daughter is dead, might be dead because of me, and accepting their anger is the smallest penance I can offer.
"We're just curious," Mr. Lin continues, emboldened by my silence. "How a girl with your background manages all this. Unless you've found ways to make yourself useful to the right people."
The implication lands sharp. That I'm Adrian's whore. That I traded my body for this dress, this life, this proximity to power. Mrs. Lin's lips curve in something too bitter to be a smile.
Adrian's chest tenses under my palm. I can feel the violence building in him, the need to defend what he considers his.
But I won't let him. Can't let him. Protecting me from them would compound the original sin.
They've carried their daughter's death for fourteen years.
If they need to eviscerate me in a ballroom to ease their guilt and grief, that's a penance I'll pay.
The guilt sits heavy in my chest. Each word they speak is a deserved blade.
I note their pain. The way Mrs. Lin's hand trembles, how Mr. Lin can't quite look at me directly, like I'm too bright or too wrong to focus on.
This is what I made: two people hollowed out by loss, asking questions I can't answer without confessing to something I'm not even sure I did.
My hand stays flat on his chest, holding back whatever retaliation he's planning.
This is my penance, to absorb their contempt like communion, each word a deserved wound.
Behind their anger, I see the shape of their loss.
The empty bedroom they probably haven't changed.
The photos they can't look at. The future that ended on a summer day when their daughter didn't come home.
I protect them from Adrian because it's the only protection I can offer now, fourteen years too late.
"Nothing to say?" Mrs. Lin asks. "You always had so much to say when you were young. Meiling thought you were so clever, so brave. She'll be fascinated to see what you've become."
Her daughter's name in present tense, like she might walk in any moment. Like she's just running late, not fourteen years dead.
The ballroom walls close in. Their faces blur with memory. Meiling between them at her thirteenth birthday, laughing at something I'd said. Now they stand here asking how I bought my way up while their daughter rots in the ground.
I can't breathe. Can't speak. Can't do anything but stand there taking their accusations while my chest caves in.