Damián searched for Tetsu with the watchful eyes of an investigator, scanning the surroundings and weighing his options.
If that man really was who he believed him to be, any rash approach could cost him his only advantage: Tetsu had no reason to suspect him.
Damián had little time. He needed to confirm his suspicions before the opportunity disappeared.
Since the attack on Clarice, Oliver, and Taylor, Jared Phillips had tightened security around the family. By a coincidence too strange to ignore, Tetsu had been hired to coordinate the work, a position that let him move freely through the estate, oversee the men under his command, and track the movements of residents and guests without raising suspicion.
It was a sound professional choice. A man with his experience didn't need to stand by a door to control a room.
Damián watched him carry out his duties.
Tetsu didn't stand out from the other guards through showy gestures or unnecessary displays of authority. His competence showed in the way he organized the team, delegated responsibilities, and checked that security measures were being followed. He asked brief questions, listened to the answers, and moved on without dragging out conversations that didn't need his attention.
To an inattentive observer, he was simply a professional doing his job.
Damián, however, recognized the signs.
Tetsu chose positions that let him keep an eye on different access points. Even while talking to someone, part of his attention stayed on his surroundings. Before moving to another area, he seemed to have already mapped out the route and the people he'd encounter along it.
It was the behavior of someone who had learned to survive in places where one moment of carelessness could be fatal.
Damián knew that language, because he had mastered it too.
In his other life, he had taken a contract to kill Tetsu. It hadn't been a personal grudge or a chance meeting between criminals. Josh had been given a name, a task, and a payment. He had studied the target, done the job, and closed the file.
Tetsu had died.
Damián had no doubt about that.
What unsettled him wasn't the memory of the kill, but the impossibility of reconciling that death with the man's presence on the Phillips estate.
A resemblance could deceive. Memory, too, could turn a suspicion into a certainty when evidence was lacking.
So he kept watching, attentive to both Tetsu's behavior and the circumstances around him. He needed to find out whether he was looking at the man he'd killed, or at someone who merely stirred up an impossible memory.
The sun had begun to set when the movement in the gardens thinned out.
Golden light filtered through the treetops, reaching the stone paths and the carefully kept flower beds. Further along, the vegetation thickened around an old ornamental grotto built from stones darkened by time. A small waterfall slid through an opening in the rock and fed a shallow pool.
The place offered some privacy without being completely cut off from the mansion.
Damián knew the gardens, and he knew that part of the grotto's entrance was hidden by the vegetation when viewed from the main path. At that moment, the detail became part of his assessment of the surroundings.
Then he saw Tetsu step away from the area where the guards had gathered.
The man spoke briefly with one of his subordinates, gestured toward the side wing of the property, and set off down the path that led to the trees.
Damián didn't move.
That trip could well be routine inspection. As head of security, Tetsu had plenty of reasons to walk the gardens. Still, Damián noted the direction he'd taken and the moment he'd left.
He waited a few moments, watching the rest of the team. No one seemed concerned by the coordinator's absence. The men stayed at their posts, which suggested Tetsu had organized the work before stepping away.
It was then that Damián noticed Aster a short distance off.
Their eyes met.
Aster didn't ask anything, but he lingered a moment longer on Damián's face. He had noticed the shift in his attention and recognized that focused silence, though he didn't know what had caused it.
Damián looked away. He didn't want to involve him before understanding the situation. If his suspicions were right, any interference could jeopardize what he was trying to find out.
He turned his attention back to the path.
Tetsu still hadn't reappeared.
Damián waited just long enough that his reaction wouldn't look obvious, then left his position. He followed the same direction, without quickening his pace or searching for the man's figure at every turn.
The grotto appeared among the trees, half-hidden in the shadows of late afternoon.
Damián slowed down.
The sound of the water was steady enough to mask smaller noises. Behind him, he heard a faint movement.
He stopped.
He wouldn't go forward just because he believed he knew who was inside. Josh's memory offered references, not guarantees. He needed to separate what he could actually perceive from what his own expectation might make him imagine.
He raised his eyes to the dark opening between the stones.
If it really was Tetsu, the confirmation would settle one doubt and open a far bigger one.
Damián stood still, studying the entrance and listening to the sounds coming from inside.
The past might have found a way to reach him.
But he wouldn't walk into that grotto without being ready for what waited there.
Sarah Campbell watched the presentation from a distance, her attention split between what was happening in front of her and the guests scattered across the hall.
Elizabeth helped her manage things, greeting guests, handling quiet requests, and stepping in whenever a conversation threatened to run too long. Sarah was silently grateful for the help. Keeping up appearances sometimes took more energy than any formal responsibility.
Aster wasn't nearby. Maybe that was for the best. Sarah still didn't know how to bring up what had happened, and a conversation with Beatrice present could turn an already delicate situation into something much worse.
"Sarah."
Beatrice Phillips's voice broke through her thoughts.
Sarah turned to face her. Beatrice approached with the look of someone who had rehearsed this conversation and had no intention of letting the other woman change the subject.
"Aster pushed Clarice. He put her in danger." She didn't raise her voice, but she made no effort to hide her indignation, either. "Don't tell me you don't know how to respond to that. Look at Clarice. See how she is. What happened to you, Sarah? You watched her grow up. Clarice isn't a stranger to you."
Sarah followed the direction of her gaze.
Clarice stood among the guests, trying to take part in conversations as if nothing had happened. The effort to seem fine was unsettling. The girl seemed determined not to give anyone the satisfaction of seeing how much it had affected her.
Sarah felt a twist of guilt.
"I want to talk to Clarice, Beatrice. I want to hear what she has to say."
"That's your technique, isn't it?" Beatrice cut in. "Stay neutral, refuse to take a stand, let the situation drag on until everyone's too tired to demand an answer."
Sarah held her gaze.
"That's not what I'm doing."
"Then where is he?"
The question came fast, giving her no room to answer the previous accusation.
"Clarice is a good person. She doesn't deserve to be treated like this. I'm worried about her." Beatrice glanced at her daughter again, her expression hardening. "Pretty soon that bastard is going to try to bury her in the forest, and you'll still be looking for a graceful way to explain why no one did anything."
The word hit Sarah harder than she'd have liked to admit.
Bastard.
Anger rose in her chest. Not just at the insult, but at the way Beatrice had said it, as if Aster's origin alone were enough to determine what he was capable of.
Sarah knew how to recognize when someone was trying to provoke her in front of an audience. The conversation was private only in intention. Around them, guests kept circulating; it would take just one raised voice or one misread gesture to make the matter public.
A few sharp, immediate replies ran through her mind.
None of them should be spoken here.
Still, Sarah couldn't shake the guilt she felt toward Clarice. There was something she should have noticed sooner, something she might have handled differently. She didn't know if it would have changed the outcome, but the doubt remained.
Beatrice watched her silence.
"You don't care."
Sarah felt her face grow warm.
Damn traitorous face.
It was infuriating, the way the body could betray an emotion before the mind found an answer. She didn't want to show guilt, and even less did she want Beatrice to mistake it for indifference.
She straightened her shoulders.
"I'll deal with it. And I know what I'm going to do."
Beatrice stood still, waiting.
"I won't let that 'wicked omega' stereotype be used to excuse everything that happens," Sarah added. "But I also won't decide what happened before I've spoken with Clarice and understood the situation."
For a moment, Beatrice's expression seemed to lose some of its rigidity. Or maybe she was simply waiting for Sarah to finally take a stand.
"I hope so. And I hope it's not just another way of putting off the inevitable."
Sarah didn't answer.
Beatrice cast one last look at her daughter. This time, there was something harder to read in her face, something that could have been genuine worry or a resolve that wouldn't tolerate obstacles.
"Clarice needs us."
Then she walked away, leaving Sarah standing before the presentation and all the words she couldn't say out loud.
Sarah watched her go for a few seconds, carrying the weight of deep, unpleasant feelings.
She had no doubt Clarice needed care. What she still didn't know was whether Beatrice was willing to help her understand what had happened — or whether she had already decided, long before that conversation, who should pay for it.
Callum Campbell had noticed the stir as well.
From a distance, he watched Clarice among the guests. He knew the effort it took her to hold a calm expression when something was bothering her, though he could no longer say he understood everything behind that composure.
The argument with Aster still occupied his thoughts.
He hadn't been there for the whole incident and had no intention of drawing conclusions from what he'd heard secondhand. Clarice seemed hurt, and the guests' reactions were starting to turn the event into something bigger than an argument between two people.
Callum knew that world well. A story told at the right moment could take on the weight of truth before anyone bothered to check the facts.
For a moment, he thought about leaving her alone. Maybe it would be better to let her regain control of her own situation without adding one more conversation to the ones that surely already awaited her.
The doubt persisted, though.
Callum crossed the hall and approached once Clarice finished speaking with one of the guests.
"Clarice."
She turned to him.
"Callum."
The formality of the exchange didn't go unnoticed. There had been a time when neither of them would have needed so much caution to start a conversation. Now, every word seemed to require a small weighing before it was spoken.
Callum let the silence hold for a moment.
"I heard you had an accident. How are you feeling?"
Clarice hesitated for a fraction of a second.
"I'm fine."
He studied her face.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, Callum. You don't need to worry."
She answered too quickly, but he didn't push.
"I'm not trying to interfere. I just wanted to know you're okay."
Clarice held his gaze.
"I know."
The answer didn't clear up much.
Callum glanced at the movement around them. Some people still seemed interested in the incident, even as they tried to hide their curiosity. In that world, a genuine concern could give way to a convenient version, and eventually to a story no one felt obligated to question anymore.
"About what happened with Aster..." He looked back at Clarice. "I'm not going to ask you to tell me anything here. But I'd like to understand what happened, whenever you're ready to talk."
Her expression shifted slightly.
"Why?"
Callum realized that simply saying he was worried wouldn't be enough.
"Because I know you. And because I don't want other people deciding what it meant before you've had the chance to speak for yourself."
Clarice fell silent.
He didn't try to use the pause to press for an answer. He'd learned, maybe too late, that caring about someone didn't give him the right to steer their choices.
"You don't have to answer now," he added. "I just wanted you to know that."
He started to step back, leaving the decision in her hands.
"Stay, Callum."
Clarice's voice stopped him.
She shifted carefully, and for a moment her fingers brushed the sore spot. Then she lifted her chin and put the smile back on.
"I'm not going to say Aster pushed me. After all, who am I to say anything?" She tilted her head slightly. "And I imagine you're here to make sure everything gets smoothed over, aren't you? Draw attention away from the incident, head off any uncomfortable questions..."
Callum stood there, not interrupting her.
"Don't worry. People will forget soon enough." Clarice's smile took on an edge of irony. "And you can relax: I'm not going to run to the papers so the press can turn my accident into this week's headline. I'm not going to cry for the cameras. I think I can survive without that kind of publicity."
A short laugh followed her last words, but there wasn't enough joy in it to convince anyone.
Callum looked at her, surprised. He'd come to ask if she was okay; she'd answered as if he'd come to negotiate her silence.
"Clarice, that's not what I—"
"You don't have to explain." She cut him off gently, which made the gesture land harder. "You've already made your position pretty clear."
Callum's brow furrowed slightly.
"I haven't said what my position is."
For a brief instant, her smile wavered.
Clarice looked away, as if she'd realized that, this time, her irony wouldn't give her such an easy way out.