Chapter 19 - No Tears
Daniel hung up the phone.
He stood in the darkness of his office for a very long time. He waited for a sense of grief, or mourning, or even a complicated, twisted sadness to arrive. He waited to feel the loss of a mother.
Absolutely nothing came.
There was only a vast, empty, peaceful void where his fear used to live.
The woman had died in his heart the exact moment he realized she had ordered his wife to be buried alive. Her physical death tonight was nothing more than administrative paperwork finalizing a reality he had accepted years ago.
He didn't shed a single tear. He didn't pour a glass of scotch.
He simply stood up, turned his back on the darkness, and walked back down the hallway into his warm, heavily guarded bedroom.
"Who was that on the phone?"
Elena murmured sleepily, rolling over and reaching out for him as he slipped back under the heavy duvet.
"Nobody important,"
May you like
Daniel answered truthfully, pulling her warm, soft body tightly against his chest, burying his face in the crook of her neck.
"Go back to sleep, my love."
