Gianna Vitiello POV:

The air in the penthouse still carried his scent. Cedarwood and expensive scotch.

It was supposed to be our sanctuary. We had closed on it six months ago-the top floor, commanding the Chicago skyline.

I had hand-picked the Calacatta marble for the counters. I had chosen the silk drapes. Now, I was here to gut it.

"Take the paintings," I directed the movers, my voice flat. "Clear the furniture in the master bedroom. And burn the mattress."

I stood in the center of the living room, clutching a crystal tumbler of water. My grip was white-knuckled, but my hand was steady. I needed to be hollow. If I let myself feel, I would shatter.

The private elevator chimed.

The doors slid open, and Luca stepped out. He wasn't alone; two of his soldiers flanked him, but he waved them off the moment he saw me.

"What are you doing?" he asked. His gaze swept over the chaos, landing on the boxes strictly labeled 'Vitiello'.

"Evicting myself," I said. I set the glass down on a side table that was already tagged for removal. "Unless you want to buy me out? But we both know your liquidity is tied up in your new... family expenses."

He walked toward me, looking like a man who was drowning but trying to convince himself he was swimming. The exhaustion was etched into every line of his face.

"Gianna, please," he rasped. "I didn't want this."

"You walked out of the church, Luca. You made your choice."

"I couldn't let her grow up like I did," he pleaded, his voice cracking. "You know what this world does to bastards. You saw how they treated me. I couldn't condemn my little girl to that life. Elena threatened to go to the Commission with proof of paternity. They would have blacklisted the kid before she even started kindergarten."

"So you saved the child," I said, cold as ice. "And in the process, you destroyed me."

"I love you," he whispered. He reached for me.

I didn't flinch. I let his fingers graze my arm. The touch that used to set my skin on fire now felt cold. Clammy. Wrong.

"Don't lie to me," I said.

"It's not a lie. I married her for the paper. For the name. It means nothing."

"It means everything!" I screamed. My composure snapped. The rage that had been simmering in my gut for weeks finally boiled over. "You humiliated me! You made me a joke to the entire outfit! You chose a whore over a Vitiello!"

I swung my hand.

Crack.

The slap echoed through the empty apartment like a gunshot. My palm stung violently. His head snapped to the side, a red mark blooming instantly on his high cheekbone.

He didn't move. He didn't strike back. As a Made Man, he could have killed me for laying a hand on him. But he stood there, taking it. Accepting his penance.

He looked back at me, his eyes shimmering with unshed tears.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"Sorry doesn't fix honor, Luca," I spat. "And it doesn't pay debts."

I brushed past him, marching to the elevator and jamming the button.

"Keep the apartment," I said, refusing to look back as the doors slid shut. "It's haunted anyway."

Gianna Vitiello POV:

Moretti Shipping Logistics.

It was the sanitized face of Luca's operation. The front for his legitimate income. The clean money.

This was the cash flow that paid for the penthouse, the private school, and the designer coats for his new wife. And half of the contracts that kept this building running belonged to my father.

I walked through the glass doors. I didn't have an appointment. I didn't need one.

Two of my father's enforcers, mountains of muscle encased in dark Italian wool, flanked me.

The receptionist, a young girl who looked pale with terror, reached for the phone.

"Don't," I said.

Her hand froze. She dropped the receiver back into its cradle with a clatter.

I marched straight to the double doors at the end of the hall. I didn't knock. I pushed them open.

Luca was behind his desk, reviewing a manifest. He looked up, startled.

But he wasn't alone.

Elena was there. She was sitting on the edge of his desk, her legs crossed, her skirt hiked up high on her thighs.

She had a pen in her hand, playing with it idly. Her hair was messy, her lipstick smudged. The air in the room was thick with the musk of sex and the cloying sweetness of cheap perfume.

She jumped off the desk when she saw me, smoothing her skirt down frantically. But she didn't look ashamed. She looked annoyed.

"Do you ever knock?" Elena asked. Her voice was grating. "This is a private office."

I ignored her entirely. I looked only at Luca.

"We're pulling the contracts," I said. "The North Side distribution. The harbor access. All of it. My father signed the termination papers this morning."

Luca stood up, panic flashing in his eyes. "Gianna, you can't. That's sixty percent of my revenue. That's the clean money. The IRS will be all over me if that cash flow drops."

"Should have thought of that before you breached our alliance," I said.

I tossed a blue folder onto his desk. It slid across the polished wood, stopping inches from Elena's hand.

Elena picked it up. She opened it, pretending to read, pretending she understood the complexities of a syndicate contract.

"You can't do this," Elena said, glaring at me. "We have a family to support. My daughter needs security."

I laughed. It was a cold, sharp sound.

"Your daughter isn't my problem," I said. "And neither is your mortgage."

"Luca!" Elena whined, turning to him. "Tell her to get out. Tell her she can't bully us. I'm your wife."

She grabbed his arm, digging her nails into his suit jacket. She was marking him. Like a stray dog pissing on a fire hydrant.

Luca looked at me. He looked at the contracts. He knew I was cutting his throat financially. He knew I was right.

But Elena was there, playing the victim, playing the mother.

"Gianna, leave," Luca said. His voice was hard, but forced. "We'll discuss business through the lawyers."

"Lawyers," I scoffed. "Since when do we use lawyers, Luca?"

"Since you became an outsider," he said.

He chose her again. To save face in front of his men. To keep the peace in his broken home.

"Fine," I said. I turned to leave. "Enjoy the paperwork."

I paused, my hand on the door handle.

"And Elena?"

She looked at me, her eyes narrowing.

"Try to keep your legs closed during business hours," I said. "It's unprofessional. Even for a rat."

Gianna Vitiello POV:

They say revenge is a dish best served cold, but sometimes, you have to go out and buy the ingredients first.

I had started by freezing his personal accounts. My father had the banking connections to put a hold on Luca's liquidity for 'irregularities pending audit.' It wouldn't last forever-maybe a week-but it was enough to squeeze the air out of his lungs.

I was standing inside the hushed sanctuary of the Hermès boutique on Oak Street. The boutique director, Jean-Luc, didn't just know me by name; he knew my purchase history, my aesthetic, and, most importantly, my credit limit.

"The Birkin," I said, my finger hovering over the glass. "The Himalayan Crocodile. The one you kept in the vault."

"Excellent choice, Ms. Vitiello," Jean-Luc beamed, the tension in his shoulders relaxing as he realized he was making his monthly quota in a single sale.

I was mid-signature on the receipt when the door chimed.

Elena walked in. She was pushing a stroller, her hair slightly askew, looking like a woman holding onto her sanity by a thread. She marched up to the counter, her eyes sliding right past me as if I were part of the furniture.

"I'm here for the bag," she told the sales assistant, breathless. "My husband called yesterday. The Kelly. In rose gold."

The assistant looked uncomfortable, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. "Mrs. Moretti... I'm afraid there's been a problem with the card on file. It was declined."

Elena's complexion shifted from flushed to a blotchy crimson. "Declined? That's impossible. It's a Black Card."

"It's frozen," I said, my voice low and smooth, not bothering to look up from my receipt.

Elena spun around. She saw me. Then, her gaze dropped to the bag on the counter. The Himalayan. The Holy Grail of handbags, worth ten times the leather she was trying to buy.

"You," she hissed, venom dripping from the syllable. "You did this."

"I'm just shopping, Elena."

"He promised me that bag," she said, her voice rising an octave, cracking with hysteria. "For the stress. For dealing with you!"

She pulled out her phone, fingers trembling as she stabbed at the screen. She dialed Luca and put it on speaker.

"Luca! The card isn't working! And she's here!" Elena screamed into the phone, shattering the boutique's carefully cultivated silence.

"Put her on," Luca's voice sounded heavy, tired.

Elena shoved the phone at me like it was a weapon.

"What do you want, Gianna?" Luca asked.

"I want the North Side lot," I said calmly, leaning against the glass counter. "The empty one near the railyard. The one you bought last year for expansion."

"That's prime territory," Luca snapped. "It's worth millions."

"And your wife is currently making a scene in the most exclusive store in Chicago," I said, keeping my tone conversational. "She's crying, Luca. The baby is crying. It's very... low class. People are staring."

I could hear him breathing on the other end, a ragged, frustrated sound.

"Unfreeze the accounts," he demanded.

"Give me the deed to the land," I countered. "And I'll authorize the transaction for her bag. Just the bag. The accounts stay frozen until the audit is done."

"You want a piece of land for a purse?" he asked, incredulous.

"I want to see what you're willing to trade," I said. "Your legacy for her vanity. Make the choice."

Silence stretched between us, heavy and suffocating.

"Give the phone to Jean-Luc," Luca said finally.

I handed the phone to the manager. Jean-Luc listened, nodded, and then hung up, looking pale as he wiped his brow.

"Mr. Moretti has authorized the transfer of the deed to the Vitiello trust," Jean-Luc announced, his voice tight. "And he has authorized the purchase of the Kelly bag for Mrs. Moretti."

I smiled. It was a sharp thing that didn't reach my eyes.

He had actually done it. He had traded a strategic asset, a piece of land that secured his foothold in the North, just to stop his wife from crying over a handbag.

I picked up my purchase. I walked past Elena, who was clutching her rose gold bag like a lifeline, oblivious to the fact that she had just cost her husband his future.

"It's a nice color," I told her, pausing at the door. "Matches the red ink on his ledger."

I walked out into the biting Chicago air. I had the land. I had the victory. But as I sat in the silence of my car, the triumph tasted like ash. I felt a hollow ache in my chest.

He was destroying himself. And I was just handing him the shovel.