The week after Viktor's message is the hardest of Allie's life.
Dom is distant, haunted, moving through his days like a ghost. He smiles for the twins, performs for the board, makes decisions and signs contracts. But at night, when it is just them, he breaks. He talks about his mother, memories flooding out, questions he never thought to ask.
Allie holds him. She listens. She does not push, does not demand, just stays present and steady.
But she is also planning. While Dom grieves, she investigates. She uses his resources, his contacts, his shadow network. She looks for another way to the truth.
She finds the doctor's family. A wife, children, grandchildren. They live quietly in Florida, protected, hidden. Allie reaches out, carefully, through intermediaries. She offers protection, safety, a new life. In exchange, she asks for what they know.
The wife talks. Her husband, the doctor, was a good man once. Then he was recruited, threatened, forced to serve the Volkovs. He treated Sergei's wife, watched her die, knew it was poison but said nothing. For twenty years, he has carried the secret, drinking himself to sleep, waiting for death.
He wants to tell the truth, the wife says. Before he dies. Before it is too late.
Allie arranges a meeting. Secret, safe, far from Viktor's reach. She does not tell Dom. Not yet. Not until she is sure.
She flies to Florida alone. Tells Dom she is visiting a vendor for the wedding. Lies, for the first time since they promised honesty, because she must protect him from himself.
The doctor is old, frail, terrified. He meets her in a park, public, surrounded by her security.
"You are the fiancee," he says, studying her. "The one who changed him. Who made him soft."
"I made him strong," Allie corrects. "Strong enough to choose mercy over revenge. Tell me what happened. Tell me the truth."
And he does. The whole story. How Sergei discovered his wife was planning to leave, to take Dominic, to run from the Bratva. How he could not let her go, could not risk her exposing secrets, could not bear to lose her to the world outside.
The poison was slow. Undetectable. A tragic illness, everyone said. The doctor signed the certificate, took the money, buried his conscience.
But he kept proof. Letters, recordings, evidence hidden against the day he might need it. He gives it to Allie, trembling, weeping.
"Tell him," the doctor begs. "Tell Dominic I am sorry. That I was weak, afraid, that I failed him. Tell him his mother loved him. That she was going to take him away, make him safe, give him a normal life. She was good, Ms. Bennett. Better than all of us. She did not deserve what happened."
Allie takes the evidence. She holds the old man while he cries. She promises protection for his family, safety, peace.
Then she flies home, the truth heavy in her bag, and she wonders how to tell the man she loves that his father murdered his mother.
Dom is waiting when she returns. He knows. Somehow, he knows. The security team reports to him, always, and he has learned to read her face.
"You went to him," he says, quiet and terrible. "You found the doctor. Without me. Behind my back."
"I was protecting you," Allie says. "You were not ready. You would have gone to Viktor, walked into his trap, died for revenge. I could not let you."
"You lied to me."
"I did. And I am sorry. But I am not sorry for what I found." She sets the bag on the table between them. "The truth is here, Dom. All of it. What you do with it... that is your choice. But you do not have to go to Viktor. You do not have to die for this. You can choose. Live with knowing, or live without. But live."
Dom stares at the bag. He does not touch it. He looks at Allie, and his face is wrecked, betrayed, grateful, furious, loving, all at once.
"You should have told me."
"I know. I was wrong. But I was also right, and I cannot regret that." Allie steps closer, close enough to touch. "I love you, Dom. I love you enough to lie, to manipulate, to be the villain in your story if that is what keeps you alive. I will not apologize for that. But I will apologize for breaking my promise. For not trusting you to choose wisely."
Dom is silent for a long time. Then he pulls her into his arms, holds her so tight she can barely breathe.
"I would have gone to him," he whispers. "I would have died. You knew that. You saved me."
"I hope so," Allie says, muffled against his chest.
"You did." He pulls back, looks at her with wonder and pain. "I am angry. I am grateful. I do not know how to feel. But I know... I know I love you. Even when you drive me mad. Even when you are right and I am wrong. I love you."
They hold each other for a long time. The bag sits on the table, the truth inside it, waiting.
Finally, Dom picks it up. He carries it to his study, closes the door. Allie does not follow. This is his choice, his moment, his grief.
She waits in the living room, listening to the silence, praying she has done the right thing.
An hour later, Dom emerges. His face is calm, settled, resolved in a way she has never seen.
"I read it all," he says. "Listened to the recordings. The letters. She was going to leave him, Allie. My mother. She was going to take me away, give me a normal life. And he killed her for it."
"I am sorry," Allie whispers.
"Do not be. It was twenty years ago. He is dying now, his own body betraying him. Karma, perhaps. Justice, of a sort." Dom sits beside her, takes her hand. "I am not going to confront him. Not going to accuse, to demand answers, to destroy what is left of my family. I am going to let him die in peace. And I am going to be different from him. Better. The man she wanted me to be."
"How?" Allie asks.
"By choosing love over possession. By letting you go, if that is what you need. By raising our children to be free, to be safe, to be happy. By building something she would be proud of."
Allie's eyes fill with tears. "You are already that man, Dom. You have been becoming him since I met you. Since before I met you, maybe. She would be so proud."
Dom kisses her, soft and grateful and full of promise. "Marry me," he whispers. "Not in thirty days. Tomorrow. Tonight. As soon as we can. I do not want to wait anymore. I want to be your husband. I want to be their father. Officially, forever, without doubt."
"Yes," Allie says. "Yes to all of it. Whenever, however. I am yours."
They plan through the night. A small ceremony, immediate, legal. The big wedding can follow, the public celebration, the syndicate spectacle. But first, this. Just them, the twins, a witness, a vow.
They marry at dawn, in the garden of the safe house, with the city waking around them. A judge Allie has never met, paid well for discretion. Leo and Luna in pajamas, confused but excited. Luna throws flower petals she picked from a nearby bush. Leo holds the rings, serious and proud.
Dom speaks his vows simply, without preparation. "I love you. I will protect you. I will choose you, every day, for the rest of my life."
Allie responds in kind. "I love you. I will stand with you. I will fight for us, for our family, for the future we are building."
They kiss. The twins cheer, Luna loudly, Leo with a small smile that means everything.
They are married. Finally, officially, truly. And nothing can take that away.