Yet he followed part of it.
He waited.
Seven months.
Elena looked at him.
“Your uncle needed both of you isolated.”
“He succeeded because he knew where each of you was vulnerable.”
Alejandro looked away.
“My weakness was pride.”
“Yes.”
Elena did not soften it.
“And hers?”
“Fear.”
“Pregnancy.”
“Financial dependence created by the marriage.”
“And the belief that your power meant you could do what the forged
letter threatened.”
Alejandro closed his eyes.
That was worse.
Lucía had believed he could destroy her because, technically, he could.
Maybe not legally without resistance.
But wealth could make resistance exhausting.
He had never threatened her that way.
But he had lived inside a system where such a threat sounded plausible.
That realization changed something in him.
The next day, Alejandro returned to the Gran Imperial alone.
He did not ask Gabriel to summon Lucía.
He waited until her break.
