Chapter 4 - THE GRIP ON THE COAT
The words hung in the warm, sunlit air like heavy blocks of ice.
Clara went ghostly pale, her lips parting in distress as she looked down at the three little girls sitting among the flour on the floor. She took a slow, agonizing step backward away from the children, her hands shaking as she pulled her apron tight against her waist.
Valentina’s clapping stopped instantly. She reached out with a trembling hand and grabbed Mia’s tiny wrist, pulling her sister closer.
Mia squeezed her stuffed rabbit so tightly her knuckles turned white, her small eyes brimming with fresh, frightened tears as she looked up at her father’s towering, cold silhouette.
Lucia’s beautiful smile vanished entirely, replaced by a expression of intense, desperate panic.
Dominic turned his back to the kitchen, gesturing toward the main hall to signal to his security team that the maid was to be escorted off the property immediately.
Before he could take a step, a sudden, frantic rustle of fabric echoed across the marble floor.
Lucia jumped to her feet. Ignoring the flour on the ground, the tiny four-year-old girl sprinted across the room in her blue floral dress. She launched herself at Dominic, her small hands reaching out and grabbing the heavy black wool fabric of his suit coat with all her strength.
She tugged on his jacket violently, her small body trembling, refusing to let him turn away.
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Dominic stopped instantly. He felt the tiny, desperate pull at his waist and looked down, startled by the sudden physical contact from a child who had avoided touching anyone for over a year.
"Lucia...?" Dominic murmured, his voice softening by a fraction as he looked down into his eldest daughter's frantic dark eyes.
