Chapter 7 - The Silver Mirror
Roman felt the ground beneath his feet shift. The polished marble floor, the soaring gilded columns, the distant hum of the city—all of it seemed to dissolve into absolute irrelevance.
He stared down at the child’s face, his heart hammering against his ribs with a sudden, violent force he had not felt in years. The visual resemblance was not subtle; it was undeniable. Looking at her face was like looking into an old mirror—a clean, innocent reflection of his own features, unmarred by decades of crime, violence, and heavy responsibility.
Slowly, almost involuntarily, Roman crouched back down. He brought his face mere inches away from hers, his pale gray eyes searching hers with a desperate, silent intensity.
His voice trembled slightly—a microscopic crack in an otherwise flawless veneer of absolute authority.
“How old are you?” he asked softly.
The girl did not pull her hand away from his sleeve. Her pale gray eyes met his without fear, holding his intense stare with a calm, unnatural poise.
“Seven,” she answered clearly.
Seven years.
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The number struck Roman like a physical blow. Seven years ago was the exact window of time when Elise Mercer had walked out of his life without an explanation, leaving behind an empty apartment, an unreturned keycard, and a void that Roman had tried—and failed—to fill with power, wealth, and territory.
Roman froze. The truth was assembling itself in his mind with terrifying clarity, piece by piece, like a puzzle he had spent almost a decade unknowingly trying to solve.
