Don's office is still, the tobacco haze thinning over the mahogany desk. Marco is gone. Only Don and Toni remain, face to face in the quiet after the storm.
Don leans back in his chair and studies her with that same steady, watchful calm Luca once wore in the hallway hug, but here it feels sharper, like a test he has already started grading.
Antonia "Toni" Capozzi
He is waiting to see what I do with this.
Toni steps closer, the desk between them suddenly too small for all the old resentment packed into it. Don does not interrupt.
Antonia "Toni" Capozzi
You only notice me when something goes wrong. I am not your mistake to keep punishing.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
No. I notice who survives. That is different.
The words land heavy, but Don's gaze softens by a fraction. For the first time, he looks less like a wall and more like a man deciding whether to admit he was wrong.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
You found the traitor. You were right to push. I am listening now.
✓ Quest Accepted
Earn Don's acknowledgment of Toni's worth
“My whole life, you've treated me like shit just for existing. You once hit me because i sneezed, i was only 5 years old! You turned 2 of my 3 older brothers against me, and didn't stop them whenever they beat me, and on a couple occasions you joined them when you found them beating me. And i know in your twisted mind you probably think it's just tough love and it'll make me stronger but all it's doing is breaking me mentally and physically. Im tired of walking around on egg shells whenever im near you. Is it really too much to ask that youpleases stop treating me like s liability and just start treating me like your daughter?”
SUCCESS (Great Willpower, rolled -1)
Antonia "Toni" Capozzi
My whole life, you have treated me like dirt for existing. You hit me when I was five for sneezing. You let my brothers turn on me, and sometimes you joined in. Maybe you call it tough love, but it breaks me. I am tired of flinching around you. Treat me like your daughter, not a liability.
Don does not move at first. The lamp throws a hard line across his face, and for once he takes the words without cutting them apart.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
That is what you think I have been doing.
His jaw tightens, then loosens. The silence stretches, ugly but honest.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
I have been calling it discipline. I can hear how that sounds to you now.
He sets one hand flat on the desk, no longer hiding behind it. The movement costs him something, and it shows.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
You are not wrong to say I failed you. You have value here, Toni. More than I gave you credit for.
Quest Complete
Earn Don's acknowledgment of Toni's worth
“I ask him to show it not just say it”
SUCCESS (Great Willpower, rolled +0)
Antonia "Toni" Capozzi
Then prove it. Do something different when it matters.
Don takes the hit without flinching away from it. He slides a folder from the edge of the desk and turns it so Toni can see the name on the tab, her name in his own blunt handwriting.
He reaches for the phone, then stops himself, letting his hand hover there a second before pulling it back. The old command is there, but he does not use it.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
Tomorrow, you sit in on the office review with Tommy and me. No interruptions, no side-eyes, no one talks over you.
Donatello "Don" Capozzi
And if anyone reaches for you wrong, they answer to me.
The last line lands harder than the rest. Don finally looks directly at her, not past her, and his face carries the strain of someone trying out a new shape of authority.
Antonia "Toni" Capozzi
He is putting it in writing. That matters.
✓ Quest Accepted
Show up to the office review with Don and Tommy