Claude looked down at the baby cradled in his arms. Iris couldn't be more than a year or two old—small, fragile, her tiny frame so delicate that he felt as if a slight squeeze could shatter her bones like brittle glass.
And a part of him wanted to do exactly that.
Maybe to Enzo, he had appeared composed, collected, a ruler in control.
But deep inside, rage coiled within him, a seething urge to crush every last shred of happiness that man had found.
'Is it because I despise the way he lived in comfort while my mother and I fought to survive outside?'
'Or is it because he discarded us so easily… without an ounce of remorse?'
Feelings were such a complicated, fickle thing.
Claude would have preferred to feel nothing at all.
Iris eagerly sucked on the milk bottle, blissfully unaware of the horrors she had just witnessed. Her tiny hands curled, unbothered, unaffected.
