Chapter 80 Hidden Truth!

Chapter 80 Hidden Truth!
Saintilia POV

We started talking, the way neighbors do. But the conversation quickly turned from the weather to something else. Her cheerful tone melted away, replaced by a quiet, heavy seriousness. Then she asked a question that sent a cold trickle through my veins.

“Saint, I know it’s been a long time. But have you ever thought about the man who hurt you?”

The question hung in the air between us. I shrugged, keeping my voice flat.

“Nope. At first, it was hard. But I decided not to waste my energy on such a despicable person.”

“I agree,” she said softly, her gaze steady on my face. “He is a despicable man. And I am sorry it happened to you.”

Her apology felt wrong.

“You shouldn’t be sorry,” I said, a little sharper than I meant to. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know,” she whispered, looking out over the water. “But it does not matter now.”

A long pause stretched between us, filled only by the river’s murmur. Then she turned back to me, her eyes searching.

“Have you thought about what you would do if you found him?”

A familiar, cold anger tightened in my chest.

“I do not dwell on it much,” I said. It was mostly true. “But I can assure you, he will never forget me.”

“Why is that?” she asked, her voice barely above a breath.

“Because I left him with a souvenir.”

The memory flashed through me, the taste of salt and blood, the give of skin beneath my teeth. A fierce, dark pride sharpened my voice.

“And there is no way he will not remember me when he looks at his right arm.”

She went very still.

“What do you mean?”

“I took a big bite out of his arm.” I held her gaze, letting the image settle between us. “And I doubt it healed without leaving a scar.”

Celia’s face tightened. Her shoulders dropped, and she looked down at her clasped hands. When she spoke again, her voice was thick with a grief I could not place.

“I am really sorry, Saint.”

But this time, her apology felt different. It did not sound like sympathy for a victim. It sounded like an apology for something else entirely. For the first time, I wondered what she already knew, and why she was really here by the river, asking me questions about a scar.

It seemed strange that Celia would bring up something from so long ago. We had never spoken of the incident and hearing her say she was sorry for what happened to me pinched my heart. But it came almost three years too late.

I made an excuse to leave. By then, everyone knew I was with Emilio and living under his roof, so using his name felt like the easiest way to get away. I said goodbye and continued on my way, but Celia’s questions stayed with me longer than I wanted them to.



I was in the kitchen preparing Emilio’s dinner when I heard footsteps in the courtyard. At first, I could not make out who it was. Then, as the figure drew closer, the silhouette became clearer.

“Oh, hey, Jacob. What brings you here?” I asked, wiping my hands.

“Hey, Titi,” he said, using the old nickname. “What are you doing?”

“Just preparing dinner. You are welcome to stay. I am sure Celia would not mind if you ate here.”

At that moment, Emilio stepped outside. He stood in the doorway, watching Jacob and me. A shadow passed over his face. It was clear he was not pleased to see me speaking with Jacob.

But what choice did I have? I had known Jacob and Celia since I was a child. They were the ones Jonas trusted to watch over me when he was away. They had been there for me more times than I could count. To shut the door on Jacob now would have felt like betraying a part of my own past.

“Jacob,” Emilio called out, his voice flat.

“Hey, Emilio,” Jacob replied, turning toward him. “I was at the cockfighting house. The keeper said you had not come today, so I figured you would be home.”

Emilio owned the local cockfighting venue. It was more than a place for fights. It was a gathering spot for the village, where men came to gamble, drink, eat, borrow small sums of money, or simply pass the time. Emilio sometimes joined the fights himself with his prized rooster, Rico.

After years of separation, Jacob and Emilio came full circle. Time had carried them far from the night that broke them apart, but it had not erased the wound between them. It was not until Jacob wandered into a new hangout in Boudins, unaware of who owned it, that the past he thought he had buried rose before him again.

He had gone there expecting noise, liquor, and strangers.

Instead, he found Emilio.

For a moment, the years between them vanished. They were no longer grown men standing in Boudins, but boys again, seventeen and nineteen, trapped in the silence of a night neither one had forgotten.

Emilio stood behind the counter, older now, broader in the shoulders, harder in the face. Jacob stopped where he was. His jaw tightened, and for a breath, it looked as if he might turn around and leave.

Emilio was the first to speak.

“Jacob.”

Jacob stared at him, as though deciding whether the name still had the right to reach him.

“Emilio,” he answered.

No apology passed between them. No explanation. Adrienne’s name stayed buried where both men had left it. Emilio only reached for a bottle, poured a drink, and set the glass on the counter.

Jacob looked at the glass for a long moment.

Then he took it.

That was how they began speaking again. Not through forgiveness. Not through peace. Only through time, pride, and the strange way life sometimes brings a man back to the very wound he thought he had outgrown.

Still, they were never what they had been. Whatever peace existed between them was thin, built over something cracked.

“Come inside,” Emilio said, motioning toward the house, his expression unreadable.

Jacob hesitated for the smallest moment before stepping inside. It was quick, almost nothing, but I saw it. Emilio saw it too.

The two men sat across from each other at the table, with the kind of politeness that did not feel peaceful. Emilio reached for a bottle and poured Jacob a drink without asking. Jacob looked at the glass, then at Emilio, as if trying to decide whether the gesture was kindness or something else.

“You still drink the same?” Emilio asked.

Jacob gave a short laugh, but it sounded forced. “Some things don’t change.”

“No,” Emilio said, watching him closely. “They don’t.”

A silence settled between them. It was not the silence of men with nothing to say. It was the silence of men who had too much to say and no safe place to begin.

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