Chapter 10 - STILL A MAN
Degan had never spoken of a sister. Anna knew he had grown up in a household where family history was treated like a weapon, but she had assumed there had been no one else. The photograph showed a woman in her late thirties with dark hair, a straight back, and eyes that matched his exactly.
“Her name was Elise,” he said. “She was sixteen when the family told us she died in a boating accident. I was twenty. I saw the wreckage, but never a body.”
“Could the photograph be old?”
“It was taken today. The investigator verified it.”
“Then why would she stay away?”
Degan stared at the table. “Because she knew what my father was doing. She tried to leave the family before I was injured. I thought she had been killed for it.”
Anna wanted to ask a dozen questions, but she recognized the look in his eyes: the old impulse to turn fear into a plan before he had understood what he was afraid of.
“We’re not going after her tonight,” she said.
His jaw tightened. “If she’s alive, she may be in danger.”
“Then we’ll contact the investigator. We’ll make sure she can choose whether to speak to you. We will not turn her into another mission.”
Degan looked at her for a long moment, then nodded. The restraint was difficult for him, but it was real.
In the months that followed, the Curado empire fractured. Some of its legitimate companies survived under independent oversight. Others were sold to pay restitution. Degan gave testimony about the family’s criminal operations, including parts of his own role, and accepted that cooperation did not erase responsibility. He was no longer protected by fear, and he did not try to rebuild it.
His rehabilitation progressed unevenly. There were days when muscle spasms left him exhausted and days when he could transfer with less assistance. His spinal cord injury remained complete, and Anna never promised a miraculous recovery. Instead, they measured progress in practical victories: better balance, fewer complications, improved strength, and the confidence to ask for help without feeling diminished by it.
Tommy stayed in treatment and found work at a neighborhood auto shop. He began paying Anna back in small installments, not because she demanded the money, but because he wanted to stop treating apologies as a substitute for change. Their relationship remained imperfect. It was also more honest than it had been in years.
Greta recovered enough to move into an assisted-living apartment near Anna. They spoke often about Marianne, about the family they had lost, and about the years stolen by people who had believed secrets were a form of protection. Anna did not get every answer. She learned to live without pretending that unanswered questions were proof she had failed.
One spring evening, Degan invited her to the estate’s old gym. The room had been renovated, the heavy equipment rearranged to make space for a standing frame and a wide, clear path for his wheelchair. He had asked the staff to leave them alone.
“I have something to say,” he told her.
“That sounds ominous.”
“I’ve been told I have a talent for making simple things sound like threats.”
“You do.”
He smiled. “I’m still learning.”
He rolled to the center of the room and held out his hand. A slow song played from a small speaker.
“You once told me that I was a patient with tight hamstrings and severe clonus,” he said. “You were right. You also told me I didn’t get to decide who I was in every room just because people were afraid of me.”
“I remember.”
“I’m trying to be a man who doesn’t need fear to feel safe. I don’t know if I’ll get it right every day. But I want you to know that I see you as a person who can say no to me, who can leave, who can disagree with me—and still be someone I care about.”
Anna’s throat tightened. “That’s a better beginning than most.”
He offered his hand again. She took it, and they moved together in the small space between the equipment. Degan could not stand, and Anna did not ask him to pretend otherwise. She adapted her steps to his reach and let him guide the rhythm when he could. It was not a dance from a fairy tale. It was two people paying attention.
When the song ended, he looked up at her.
“I’m still a man,” he said quietly. “Not because I can hurt someone. Not because I can control a room. Because I can choose what I do with what’s left of my life.”
Anna rested her forehead against his for a moment. “Then keep choosing.”
They kissed, gently, without a promise that either could not keep. Outside, the rain began again, soft against the windows. The same weather that had brought Anna to the Curado gates now sounded almost peaceful.
Her phone buzzed on the bench. The investigator had sent a message: Elise Curado had agreed to a meeting. She wanted to speak to Degan privately, but she had added one condition.
No lawyers. No security. And Anna must come with him.
Attached was a recent photograph of Elise standing beside a man whose face had been deliberately scratched out.
On the back of the photograph was a single sentence:
*Ask your father why he kept one child and let the other disappear.*
Degan’s face went still. Anna felt the old chill return, but it no longer swallowed her whole. She slipped her hand into his.
“Tomorrow,” she said. “We ask her together.”
He nodded.
May you like
The future was still full of danger, and the past still held secrets neither of them could predict. But this time, no contract had brought them together. No debt had decided what Anna owed. No one had taken away her right to choose.
They left the gym side by side, carrying the mystery with them—not as a chain around their lives, but as a question they would face on their own terms.
