Part 4 — Before our fifth anniversary, I overheard my husband’s secret conversation and his laughter suddenly stopped

My father’s second letter was found in Nino’s bag.

Luka was still sitting on the clinic chair. His phone rang every minute, but no one answered his calls anymore.

Merab moved to the window and watched the street for a long time.

“I will no longer pursue this case,” he said at last.

Luka raised his head.

“What are you saying?”

“I am telling you that I will no longer be your lawyer.”

“I will pay you.”

“Money will not help you anymore.”

Merab closed the folder.

“You asked me to cover up your lies, but this is already a financial crime and forgery. I am leaving.”

Luka stood up and grabbed his arm.

“You cannot leave me.”

Merab freed his hand.

“I am not leaving you. I am simply no longer covering for you for the first time.”

When the door opened, two investigators appeared in the corridor. Behind them stood a bank representative holding a sealed folder.

Luka immediately looked toward me.

“Elene, did you call them?”

“No.”

“Then who?”

Nino answered calmly:

“Your accountant.”

Something collapsed on Luka’s face.

The old David sat by the window and said nothing. There was so much weariness in his silence that for the first time, while angry at Luka, I felt sorry for him too.

But pity no longer meant returning.

The investigator told Luka:

“We will need to speak with you. We will also need the company documents and personal devices.”

“This is a misunderstanding,” Luka said.

“Then it will be clarified easily.”

Luka took one step toward me.

“Elene, tell them that this is all a family matter.”

“My family lived in your lie for five years.”

“I protected you.”

“No, Luka. First you protected me from your own plan, and then from yourself.”

He shook his head as if he had not understood my words.

“You will regret this.”

Nino looked at him sternly.

“Is that a threat?”

Luka swallowed his voice.

That same evening I arrived in front of my house with the investigators. The yard gate was half open. The door did not lock from the inside.

Everything in the living room stood as it had that morning, when I had expected to return with the watch box. Only the two glasses left on the table were gone. Someone had tidied up after Luka.

In his study stood a dark wooden desk. On it they discovered a small recording device. Nino turned it on.

Luka’s voice sounded in the room again.

“She will sign anything I tell her.”

Then his laughter.

“I have been teaching her since childhood.”

I stood by the door and heard my husband’s words for the first time as if they belonged to someone else.

Luka stood on the other side of the room.

His face changed.

“Turn it off,” he said.

“That is your voice,” Nino answered.

“I was young then.”

“But the words still belong to you today.”

“I did not want it to end this way.”

“You did not plan the ending, Luka,” I told him. “You planned my entire life.”

He put his hand on the chair. The chair scraped across the floor and a sharp sound rang through the room.

“I really did love you.”

“Love does not turn a person into a trap.”

I was left alone in the house when everyone had gone.

The sound of the refrigerator could be heard in the kitchen. A photograph from our wedding hung on the wall. In the picture Luka was smiling, while I had my head resting on his shoulder.

I did not take the photograph down.

I only turned his half toward the wall.

Then I entered the bedroom. Luka’s clothes had already been taken from the wardrobe, but one thing remained under the bed — an old, crumpled ticket from our first graduation evening.

The date was written on it.

That night he told me that our story had been written by fate.

I threw the ticket into the trash bin.

Of my things, I left only the burgundy velvet box on the table. The watch was still inside. I could not return it to the shop. Nor could I give it to Luka.

The copper compass on the handle had shifted slightly to the side.

All night I tried to straighten it.

But it kept turning back to the side.

Three days later the bank stopped the seizure of the house. Nino submitted the audio recording, my father’s will, the transfer statements, and the camera recordings to the court. Luka’s accountant confessed everything.

He said that Luka had been creating debt in my name for years, and then planned to blame it on me and drive me out of the house.

My mother’s second letter said:

“Elene, if you ever realize that the person beside you is using your trust as a weapon, do not try to save him. Your peace cost me more dearly than all the property.”

Luka’s accountant had this letter.

He had found it years earlier, but published it only when he realized that Luka would blame every crime on him.

Several weeks later the court left my house to me, the false debts were canceled, and Luka’s company accounts were frozen. The final decision was announced three months later. I was not happy about his imprisonment. His loss did not feel like a victory.

For the first time, I simply no longer had to pay for his consequences.

After being discharged from the hospital, David moved in with me. In the first days it was awkward to prepare a room for him. We were almost strangers, although we were carrying the loss of the same person.

One morning we drank tea in the kitchen.

“Did your father often tell you about me?” he asked.

“No. He only told me that you lived abroad.”

“He wanted you to have a peaceful childhood.”

“The truth does not destroy childhood, David. Lies do.”

He nodded.

“You are right.”

Four months later I opened a small architectural studio in the city center. As a child I drew houses, although Luka always told me that it was only a hobby and that real life required something else.

In the first week I received three orders.

I hung an old photograph of my father on the wall. Beside it I attached a small drawing made by Mari, my sister’s daughter. There was a house in the picture, a large sun above it, and a woman standing by the door.

“Is this you?” I asked.

“Yes,” Mari answered. “No one will lock you in your house anymore.”

The child’s words struck me more powerfully than any court decision.

I spent the first winter in the new part of the city. In the mornings I cleaned the studio windows, and in the evenings I corrected the clients’ drawings. Sometimes I had dinner alone, but loneliness no longer frightened me.

In May I received a letter from Luka.

“Elene, I know that I destroyed many things. I want you to listen to me at least once. I still love you. We can start again.”

I looked at the letter for a long time.

Then I called Nino.

“Should I answer?” I asked.

“Only if you need it for yourself.”

“I do.”

The answer was short.

“Luka, I cannot return to you. Not because I have forgotten everything, but because I remember everything. I will no longer save your life. I wish that one day you yourself take responsibility for your choices.”

I sent the letter and turned off my phone.

The next day I placed the burgundy velvet box on the studio shelf. The watch was no longer inside. I kept it separately, because I realized that the thing I had bought for love could no longer be a symbol of my pain.

But I left the copper compass on the handle.

This time I attached it correctly.

Mari ran into the studio and arranged the drawings on the table.

“Aunt Elene, do you know now where you should go?”

I went to the window. Outside, the first snow was falling. White flakes fell silently on the street lamp.

“Yes,” I told her. “Now I know.”

The compass needle stopped facing north.

This time I was choosing the direction.