Camilla picked up a silver fork and a sharp knife. She cut a small piece of the roasted chicken and put it into her mouth. It was delicious. She had not eaten since afternoon
and her body was exhausted from the fight in the tavern. She began to eat quickly, filling her empty stomach.
As she ate, Murry stood quietly by the wall. He watched her for a few minutes. Then, he decided to finish the story he had started in the hallway.
"The General is a very complicated man," Murry spoke softly into the quiet room. His deep voice mixed with the soft sounds of Camilla’s silver fork hitting the plate.
Camilla chewed her food slowly, listening to him.
"The General has lived completely alone since his early childhood," Murry explained. His eyes looked sad as he rembered the past. "He spent all his ti training with heavy swords and learning the harsh, brutal skills of a military general. He had no friends his own age to play with."
Camilla took a sip of her cool water. She nodded slowly.
"Because of his dangerous position," Murry continued, "he set a lot of strict principles and harsh rules for himself for guidance. He built high walls around his heart."
Murry looked directly at Camilla. His face was very serious.
"It is exactly this severe discipline that has sustained him from being dead till today," Murry said firmly. "Many people have tried to kill him over the years. His uncle. His rivals. He had to be cold to survive."
Murry took a slow step closer to the table. He looked at her with deep, pleading eyes.
"You were the very first person to enter his private world, My Lady," Murry whispered. "Before you, he only had the battlefield. Please, give him so ti. Do not give up on him. He is still learning how to be a husband."
Camilla stopped eating. She placed her silver fork down on the plate.
She looked at the hot food, but she did not see it anymore. Her mind drifted away from the grand dining room. She rembered reading these exact details in the earlier Chapters of the novel.
She thought to herself, reviewing Damon’s tragic backstory.
"When he was only ten years old," Camilla recalled the plot in her mind, "his parents died in a terrible carriage accident. After that traumatic loss, he absolutely refused to go live at the main estate with his extended family."
She understood exactly why a ten-year-old boy would make that choice.
"He refused to go," she thought, "because those sa family mbers were the people secretly trying to end his life as a young boy so they could steal his inheritance. So, he locked himself in this cold mansion. He has been living here all alone with Mrs. Ida for his entire life. He thought Ida was his only safe place, and then she betrayed him too."
Camilla looked down at her hands resting on the table. She gently rubbed her sore left arm where the gang leader had hit her.
"Thinking about it this way," Camilla realized, her eyes softening slightly, "his life is actually quite similar to mine."
A deep wave of mory washed over her. She also lived alone all her life.
"I had no one," Camilla thought, rembering her cold, empty apartnt before she beca rich. "I lived completely alone until I finally got my Winston. He was my only real family."
The mories of her past beca very sharp and painful.
"I spent my entire youth training," she thought, her hands slowly curling into tight fists on the table. "I did not go to parties. I did not make friends. I trained constantly, every single day, to learn how to fight, how to shoot, how to be a ghost. I trained to get revenge for my parents."
Her eyes grew cold and hard, staring blankly at the silver water glass. The mory of the worst night of her life played in her head like a dark movie.
"My parents were innocent victims of a brutal hit-and-run case," Camilla rembered. She could still see the flashing police lights in her mory. "We were just walking ho from dinner. A speeding car hit them and never even stopped."
She felt the old, familiar burning anger rising in her chest.
"The driver was not so random criminal," she thought bitterly. "He was the rich, spoiled son of a very powerful politician. He was drunk driving. Everyone knew he did it."
She rembered sitting in the cold courtroom. She rembered the judge banging his wooden gavel.
"He was found completely not guilty," Camilla thought, her internal voice filled with pure, cold rage. "The politician used his money and his power. The evidence disappeared. The witnesses were paid off to keep quiet. And my parents’ death was just swept completely under the rug like it was nothing but dirty dust."
That was the exact day her heart had turned to stone. That was the day the innocent girl died and the Black Widow assassin was born. She had taken justice into her own hands. She had trained and hunted that politician’s son down and made him pay for his cris.
Camilla took a deep, shaky breath. The grand dining room of the Benson mansion slowly ca back into focus. The sll of the roasted chicken filled her nose again.
She looked at Mr. Murry, who was still standing quietly nearby, waiting for her to speak.
She realized that she and Damon were basically the sa person. They were both orphans. They were both betrayed by the world. They both had to beco terrifying, dangerous people just to survive in a cruel society. They both built massive walls to protect themselves from getting hurt again.
But then, a completely different thought entered Camilla’s mind. It was a very sudden, very clear realization.
Her somber, sad mood completely evaporated in an instant. The heavy mories of her past faded away.
Camilla picked up her silver fork again. She stabbed a piece of chicken.
"Wait a minute," Camilla thought to herself. She chewed the chicken, her mind working quickly.
She compared herself to Damon again. Yes, they had the exact sa tragic childhood. Yes, they both beca ruthless killers.
But there was one major, glaring difference between them.
"I went through all of that terrible trauma," Camilla argued internally, pointing the silver fork slightly at her own chest. "I lost my parents. I beca an assassin. I lived alone."
She swallowed the food and smiled a bright, highly amused smile inside her own mind.
"But I still turned out perfectly fine!" she concluded proudly. "I still had a good, fun personality! I like jokes. I like enjoying myself. I like my Winston. I know how to relax and enjoy a good al. I am a very charming person!"
She looked toward the open dining room doors, thinking about the grumpy General sitting upstairs in his room.
"So," Camilla thought, her internal voice filled with genuine, highly critical confusion. She shook her head in disbelief. "If we had similar sad backstory... how on earth did he beco so incredibly bad and boring?"
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