Chapter 87: The Denial of Truth

The kitchen was the only place that felt warm after the cold silence of the library. It smelled of roasted garlic and rosemary. Dmitri was there, his back to me, meticulously chopping vegetables with a rhythm that never faltered. He looked like a man who had never had a chaotic thought in his life.

I stood in the doorway for a long time, watching the silver knife rise and fall. My hand was shoved into my pocket, my fingers tracing the edges of a scrap of paper where I had scribbled the page number and the date from the ledger.

"You’re hovering, Leo," Dmitri said without turning around. "If you’re hungry, the soup will be ready in ten minutes. If you’re troubled, the tea is already steeped."

"I'm not hungry, Dmitri," I said. My voice sounded heavy to my own ears.

Dripped stopped chopping. He wiped his hands on his white apron and finally turned. He looked at me with that calm, grandfatherly expression that had comforted me so many times before. But today, it felt like a mask.

"Sit," he said, gesturing to the small wooden table in the corner. "You look like you’ve seen a ghost."

"I think I did," I replied, sitting down. My legs felt weak. "I found something in the library. An old ledger from twenty years ago. My father's name was in it."

Dmitri didn't flinch. He didn't blink. He just moved to the stove and poured a cup of dark tea, placing it in front of me. "The library is full of old things. Most of them are better left to the dust."

"It wasn't just a name," I said, my voice rising as the frustration bubbled up. "He was listed as an acquisition. Under the same list as warehouses and construction firms. Dmitri, you were here back then. You saw everything. Tell me the truth. Did the old man destroy my father's life on purpose?"

Dmitri sighed and sat across from me. He folded his large, scarred hands on the table. He looked me straight in the eye, and for a second, I saw a flicker of what looked like genuine pity.

"Leo, you have a good heart," Dmitri began softly. "And because you have a good heart, you want the world to be simple. You want there to be a villain and a victim. But business back then... it wasn't like it is now."

"Don't give me a lecture on business," I snapped. "I saw the word 'Acquisition.' That means he was bought. Or taken."

Dmitri shook his head slowly. "You’re misinterpreting a word from a different era. Your father, Vance... he was a proud man. Too proud, perhaps. His company was failing. He had made mistakes with his investors, and he was sinking. The Volkovs didn't push him under, Leo. They threw him a rope."

I stared at him. "A rope? The twins just told me their father didn't believe in handshakes, only ownership."

Dmitri smiled sadly, a tired, knowing smile. "The twins were children then. They heard their father shouting on the phone and they made up stories in their heads to match his temper. They want to believe their father was a monster because it makes them feel like better men by comparison. But the reality? The reality is much more boring."

He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a confidential whisper.

"The 'Acquisition' in that book referred to the technology patents your father held. The Volkovs bought the patents to keep the company from being liquidated by the banks. It was a legal term, Leo. A way to move money so your father could keep his house. So you could have a childhood."

I wanted to believe him. I wanted it so badly that my chest physically ached. If Dmitri was telling the truth, then my father wasn't a slave to this house. He was a partner who had been saved.

"But he was so unhappy," I whispered, thinking back to the dark rooms and the silence of my childhood home. "He looked like he was dying inside."

"He was a man who lost his independence," Dmitri said, his voice full of conviction. "That is hard for any man. He blamed himself for needing help. He didn't hate the Volkovs for helping him; he hated himself for needing it. You’re looking at an old ledger and seeing a crime, but I lived it, Leo. I saw the checks being signed. I saw the relief on your father's face when the debt was cleared."

He reached out and patted my hand. His skin was rough and warm. He felt so real, so honest.

"Don't let the twins' guilt poison your memory of your father," Dmitri continued. "They are broken boys who see shadows everywhere. They want you to stay, so they tell you stories that keep you tied to them, even if those stories are ugly. They want you to think you belong here by blood and debt. But your father was a free man who made a choice for his family."

I looked down at my tea. The steam was rising in thin curls. I felt a strange sense of vertigo. Who was lying? The twins, who seemed terrified of what I’d found? Or Dmitri, who was sitting here offering me a version of history that felt like a warm blanket?

Maybe I am just seeing what I want to see, I thought. Maybe I'm so desperate to hate this place that I'm turning a business deal into a kidnapping.

"You're sure?" I asked, looking for any crack in his expression. "You're sure he wasn't forced?"

"I give you my word, Leo," Dmitri said, his eyes clear and steady. "On my life. Your father was a man the Volkovs respected. That ledger is just a book of numbers. It doesn't hold the soul of the man."

Dmitri stood up to return to his vegetables. "Drink your tea. It’s getting cold. And stay out of the library. It’s a place for the dead, and you have too much life in you to be wandering those halls."

As I walked out of the kitchen, I felt a weight lift off my shoulders, but a small, cold voice in the back of my mind wouldn't stay quiet. Dmitri had answered every question perfectly. Too perfectly.

I walked toward my room, passing a mirror in the hallway. I looked at my reflection. I looked like someone who wanted to be lied to. And in this house, that made m

e the easiest target of all.