It was a vow.
Behind them, Viven stood perfectly still, and the chandelier’s elegant light caught the edges of her smile as it slowly died.
Fernando rose from his knees like a man climbing out of deep water.
Elena’s trembling toe was no longer just a sign of hope.
It was an alarm.
And now that it had sounded, he couldn’t pretend he hadn’t heard it.
He turned toward Viven.
“You kept telling me the same story,” he said, voice hoarse. “Specialists. Treatments. Follow-ups. Names I never met. Places I never saw.”
His eyes flicked to Elena, then back to Viven.
“And I… I never asked for a single document.”
Viven’s posture stayed elegant, but her fingers curled against her thigh for a second like she was restraining something sharp.
“Because you were grieving,” she said softly. “Because you needed someone to handle the details.”
“The details are my daughter,” Fernando snapped.
His voice broke like glass.
“So tell me, Viven. Right now. What clinic? What doctor? What medication? Give me one name that isn’t smoke.”
“I told you,” Viven began, but the sentence thinned under his stare.
Immani cut in, quieter than both of them, somehow louder.