Chapter 6
After the recess, Goran’s counsel portrayed Navina as a bankrupt heir exploiting babies to recover status.
She did not defend her character. She opened the first archival box and rebuilt the timeline of Burk Holdings’ collapse transaction by transaction. Shell company purchases. Triggered defaults. Suppressed appraisals. Transfer of the patents. Marco’s approval. The marriage proposal.
“The six hundred million was not generosity,” she testified. “It was less than one quarter of the value extracted from my family through transactions concealed during our marriage. I accepted it because the agreement classified it as settlement of my claims — not because I sold access to my children.”
Voychek introduced independent valuations and certified court records. A former Gerbick accountant authenticated the ledgers under subpoena. The evidence converged from documents, expert analysis, and live testimony.
Goran’s narrative collapsed in public.
Marco studied the approval bearing his signature as if it belonged to a stranger.
“You knew,” Navina said during a brief cross-examination permitted by the court. “You knew those patents came from my father.”
“I knew the acquisition was aggressive,” he answered.
“I did not know the appraisals were falsified.”
“Because you did not ask.”
His eyes closed for half a second. “Because I did not ask.”
The same failure. The same wound. This time, everyone saw it.
The judge denied emergency custody and unilateral security authority. The twins would remain with Navina as their primary residential parent. No genetic testing could occur without a court-supervised procedure protecting the infants’ privacy. Any future contact would begin gradually under a child specialist’s plan — and only after threat assessments separated legitimate safety needs from family control.
The court also referred the Burk transaction evidence for civil review and ordered both parties not to disclose the children’s images or location.
It was not the impossible fantasy of erasing a biological parent with one contract clause. It was better. It was a public declaration that wealth, blood, and fear did not outrank a mother’s evidence or a child’s welfare.
Outside, reporters shouted questions. Navina walked down the courthouse steps while Goran’s allies quietly abandoned him and Gerbick shareholders demanded an independent audit.
Marco followed alone.
“Nevana?”
She stopped but did not turn.
“What do you want?” he asked. His voice was rough. “Name anything.”
She faced him. The wind had loosened his hair and pulled his tie crooked. The immaculate don who had rushed her signature now looked like a man who had finally understood the cost of certainty.
“You still don’t understand,” she said. “I already have what I want. The money. My name. My work. My children. A house no Gerbick guard can enter without permission.”
He moved one step closer. “And me?”
The question was almost inaudible.
“Once,” she said, “I would have traded everything for it. But you were never something I could have. You offered protection but withheld partnership. You touched me like I belonged to you and spoke to me like I was temporary.”
“His eyes burned.” “You were never temporary.”
“Then you should have behaved as if I mattered — before I learned to live without you.”
“I was wrong.”
The mafia don said it in front of cameras, attorneys, enemies, and men who believed apology was weakness.
Navina felt the words enter the old wound. They did not erase it.
“Yes,” she said. “You were.”
Her car arrived. On her phone, Sanja had sent a photograph of Luca and Mila facing each other on a padded mat, both trying to seize the same silver rattle. Navina smiled. Marco saw the photograph over her shoulder. His breath caught. She locked the screen.
“Will you ever let me know them?” he asked.
“The court created a path. Whether you can walk it without turning it into a conquest is your choice.”
“And whether you forgive me?”
May you like
“That is mine.”
She entered the car and went home.
