I’m Not His White Rose Anymore Chapter 20
Lorenzo left the deli with the pen and scarf in his hands.
Suddenly, he was afraid to go home.
Afraid to face that little woman. Afraid to face his own past neglect.
He remembered the faint, mocking smile that would sometimes touch her lips, and the memory was like a knife in his gut.
Most of all, he was afraid she would bring up the divorce again.
If she did, he felt he wouldn’t even have the right to say no.
He wandered the streets for hours, until it was dark, before he finally stepped through his own front door.
“Vivian, I’m home.”
He pushed the door open to a dark, cold house.
There was no lamp left on for him, no familiar smell of a home-cooked meal, and no sign of the little woman he was so desperate to see.
“Vivian?”
No answer.
A strange chill enveloped him.
Lorenzo finally realized what was missing from the house.
The small mountain of books on her desk was gone.
Her clothes were gone from the closet.
The bed was neatly made, the sheets and comforter folded as if no one had ever slept there.
The entire house was scrubbed clean of her presence.
It was as if she had never existed here at all.
An overwhelming fear crushed him.
“Dad!”
Lorenzo rushed back to the Moretti estate.
Lina and Isabella were the first to greet him, but he didn’t even see them, heading straight upstairs.
“Dad!”
The old Godfather was sitting in his study, calmly reading a newspaper. He didn’t even look up as his son burst in without knocking.
“Dad, where did Vivian go? You have to know, right?”
Only after finishing a section did the old Godfather lower the paper and look up.
“Five days.”
“What?”
“She’s been gone for five days, and you’re only just now noticing.”
The old Godfather almost laughed at the absurdity of it.
“Originally, if you had shown any heart, I might have tried to talk her into reconciling. But now, I see there’s no point.”
He threw a document onto the desk. “Sign it.”
When Lorenzo saw what it was, his mind went blank.
“These past few days, I’ve been watching you with that mother and daughter. And I’ve finally realized just how much that girl has suffered all these years.”
“It’s the Moretti family that has wronged her. It’s you who has failed her!”
“Sign it. Let her have a clean break!”
