Elena Rossi POV

I had become invisible again.

I moved through the penthouse like a phantom, spiriting my belongings away into boxes whenever Dante wasn't looking.

He interpreted my silence as sulking. He believed I was finally "learning my place."

I was in the hallway, my hand hovering over the study door, when the sound of his voice stopped me cold.

"She's calming down, Mother," Dante said, his tone dismissive. "Yes, I know about the trip. She thinks it's a vacation."

I froze.

"Isabella," he continued, the name rolling smoothly off his tongue, "Elena agreed to go to the villa in Tuscany for a few weeks. Just until the wedding heat dies down."

He was lying to his mother. Or perhaps, Isabella was lying to him.

"She signed the papers, Dante," Isabella's voice drifted faintly from the speakerphone, tinny but unmistakable. "She knows she's leaving for good."

My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs.

If he knew I had signed the exit deal...

Dante laughed, a dark, rich sound that used to make my knees weak. "She signed the NDA to secure the allowance, Mother. She's not going anywhere. She's obsessed with me. She'd never leave."

He actually believed it.

His arrogance was my shield.

I backed away into the shadows, silent as the grave.

*

That night, he threw a party.

"For you," he said, pressing a velvet box into my hand. Inside lay diamond earrings, cold and heavy. "For your birthday. I know I missed the actual day."

My birthday was last week. The same day he had abandoned me on the side of the road.

The Estate ballroom was suffocating, filled with the same vultures who had watched me bleed at the auction.

They whispered as I walked in, their voices like the rustling of dry leaves.

*The mistress. The kept woman. The charity case.*

Dante kept a possessive hand on my lower back, branding me.

Then, the double doors swung open.

Sofia entered.

The air left my lungs in a rush.

She was wearing a gown of pale blue silk, embroidered with delicate silver vines that shimmered under the chandeliers.

It was a custom design.

I knew this because I had watched Dante sketch it.

Three years ago, when his vision had just begun to return-when he could see nothing but shadows and me-he had drawn it on a cocktail napkin.

*For you,* he had promised, tracing the lines. *When I can see again, I want to see you in this.*

Now, Sofia was wearing it.

She glided across the room, the crowd parting for her like the Red Sea.

She walked straight to us.

"Happy Birthday, Elena," she chirped, her voice dripping with faux sweetness. "Dante told me he designed this dress. It's exquisite, isn't it? A bit tight in the chest, but I made it work."

She smiled, a predator baring its teeth.

Dante shifted uncomfortably. He wouldn't meet my eyes.

"I have a gift, too," Sofia announced.

She snapped her manicured fingers.

A servant stepped forward, carrying a wicker basket.

Inside was a puppy. A German Shepherd.

Its ears were perked, its teeth sharp and white.

I took a sharp step back. My breath hitched in my throat.

When I was ten, the head of security's dogs had gotten loose in the servant quarters. One of them had torn my calf open. I still bore the jagged, silvery scars.

Dante knew this.

He *knew*.

"His name is Ari," Sofia said, thrusting the basket toward my chest. "Take him. He's a protector."

The puppy barked, a high-pitched snap.

I flinched violently, knocking into a passing waiter.

"Take it, Elena," Sofia pressed, her eyes gleaming. "Don't be rude."

"I... I can't," I stammered, my palms slick with sweat.

"Dante," Sofia pouted, turning to him. "She's refusing my gift."

Dante looked at the crowd. They were watching. Waiting to see if the mistress would defy the future Donna.

"Elena," Dante said, his voice tight with warning. "Take the dog. It's a gesture of peace."

"Dante, please," I whispered, pleading with him to remember. "You know."

"Just take the damn dog!" he snapped.

I reached out with trembling hands.

The puppy, sensing my terror, lunged.

It didn't bite, but it scrambled frantically out of the basket.

It bolted.

It ran straight into a towering pyramid of champagne glasses.

*Crash.*

The sound was deafening as hundreds of glasses shattered.

Dante moved instantly.

He threw his body over Sofia, shielding her from the falling shards.

Glass rained down like jagged hail.

A large shard sliced across my forearm. Another grazed my cheek.

I stood there, blood welling on my skin, watching him hold her.

He checked her face. Her arms. Her hair.

"Are you okay?" he asked her, his voice frantic.

"I'm scared," she whimpered, burying her face in his chest.

Only then did he look at me.

He saw the blood running down my arm, dripping onto the marble floor.

For a second, regret flashed in his eyes.

But then the crowd murmured.

"Get her to the ER," Dante barked at a nearby soldier, his mask slamming back into place. "Clean this mess up."

He turned back to Sofia.

"Come on," he said softly to her. "Let's get you out of here."

He walked her out.

Again.

I stood in the ruins of the party, bleeding, while the guests laughed behind their hands.

The soldier grabbed my uninjured arm roughly. "Let's go, Miss Rossi."

I looked at the shattered glass glittering on the floor.

It looked exactly like my life.

"No," I said, yanking my arm free.

"I'll take myself."

I walked out into the night alone.

Seven days left.

And I was going to make every single one of them count toward his destruction.

The apartment was eerily quiet.

I stood in the middle of the living room, listening to the silence. There was no traffic noise from the street below, no hum from the refrigerator. Just the sound of my own breathing.

I walked into the bathroom and flipped on the light.

The woman in the mirror was a stranger.

My hair was a disaster-tangled, soaked, plastered to my scalp in some places and sticking out in others. My eyes were red and swollen, yet completely dry. As for my face... my face was a living record of exactly what I'd been through over the last few hours.

The cut on my cheek had stopped bleeding, leaving a dark red trail from my cheekbone down to the corner of my mouth. It wasn't deep enough to need stitches, but it would definitely scar.

Good.

I wanted a scar. I wanted something permanent to remember the night I finally woke up.

I found the first-aid kit under the sink-a pristine white box that looked like it had never been opened. Everything inside was perfectly organized, the bandages still wrapped in their plastic film.

Did Dante even know where the first-aid kit was? I wondered. Probably not. He had people for that. He had me.

With trembling hands, I wrapped a bandage around my forearm. I wasn't a nurse, but over the years, I'd patched up enough of Dante's men to pick up the basics.

It was ironic, really. I'd spent so much time taking care of everyone else, yet I'd never learned how to take care of myself.

I was just securing the bandage with medical tape when my phone buzzed on the nightstand, shattering the quiet.

The sound was so sudden, so jarring in the empty apartment, that I nearly dropped the scissors.

I walked into the bedroom and picked up the phone.

Sophia.

Her name glared on my screen like an accusation.

She had unblocked me just to send a text.

I almost didn't open it.

Sophia: Sweetie, so sorry about your dress. But honestly, white isn't your color anyway. It's for brides. You looked like a stain standing next to Dante. Have fun hanging out with the dog. Or did it run away too?

A photo came next.

It was a selfie. She was sitting in the passenger seat of a Maybach-my husband's car.

Her hair was immaculate, her makeup flawless, and her smile dazzling. She looked like she had just won the lottery.

Dante was driving. His hand rested casually, yet possessively, high on her thigh.

I stared at that picture for a long time.

My eyes traced the lines of his face-his sharp jawline, his dark hair, the intense focus in his eyes even when he was just driving.

But it was the face of a stranger.

Because the Dante I knew wouldn't do this. The Dante I knew wouldn't have his hand on another woman's thigh while his wife was bleeding in an alley. The Dante I knew wouldn't let his mistress send me pictures of them having fun.

But that Dante didn't exist.

He never had.

He was a figment of my imagination. I had taken a broken, angry boy and molded him into something he was never meant to be. I had written a love story in my head, casting him as the hero, when in reality, he was just the villain.

I didn't cry.

I was done crying.

I set the phone down and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows. The rain had finally stopped. The city sprawled out beneath me, glittering yet cold and unforgiving. Somewhere out there, people were sleeping peacefully. Somewhere, couples were curled up together, dreaming of forever.

It was 2:00 a.m.

I threw on a plain black hoodie and slipped out of the penthouse without a backward glance.

The elevator ride felt endless. The lobby was deserted. The doorman barely glanced up as I walked past.

Outside, the air smelled of wet concrete and infinite possibilities.

When I reached the gates of the Vitiello estate, the guards recognized me.

"Bit late for a visit," one of them noted, his tone flat and disinterested.

"I forgot something," I said. "I'll be quick."

He waved me through without another look.

I walked the familiar paths, but with foreign eyes.

I crossed the damp grass toward the rear gardens, walking past the rose bushes I'd pruned countless times, past the fountain where I used to sit and read, past the bench where Dante had kissed me for the first time.

The old peach tree stood at the edge of the property, its branches gnarled yet steadfast.

Seven years ago, on Dante's eighteenth birthday, we had buried a time capsule among its roots.

I still remembered that day vividly. The party had been extravagant-hundreds of guests, a live band, and catering from the city. But Dante had quietly slipped away from the crowd. He found me hiding out in the gardens and asked me to help him bury something.

"I want to remember who I am," he had said.

He wasn't the Godfather then. And I was already in love with him.

I had loved him so much it ached.

I dropped to my knees in the mud.

The rain had soaked the earth, making it soft, but that didn't make digging any easier. I didn't bother looking for a shovel; I dug with my bare hands. The dirt was freezing, heavy, and gritty. It wedged under my fingernails and stuck to the cuts on my palms.

My fingers scraped against rocks-small pebbles at first, then larger stones. I pried them out and tossed them aside. The fresh bandages on my arm were soaked through, black mud mixing with bright blood. The cut on my cheek throbbed with every heartbeat.

I didn't care.

I was desperately searching for answers. I was searching for proof that I hadn't just imagined it all. I was searching for the girl I used to be-the girl who believed in wishes, promises, and happily-ever-afters.

My fingers hit metal.

The sound was dull and hollow.

I scraped away more dirt until I saw it-the rusty tin box we had buried. Most of the paint had peeled away, exposing the corroded metal underneath.

I yanked it out of the ground and set it on my lap.

I pried open the lid.

Inside were two folded pieces of paper and a tarnished silver locket.

The paper was yellowed with age, its edges soft from the dampness. They were still folded exactly as we had left them-neat little squares carrying our deepest desires.

I unfolded my paper first.

My own handwriting stared back at me-loopy and childish, written by someone who still believed in fairy tales.

I will serve and love Dante Vitiello until the end of my days. I will be his light.

I stared at those words.

I had written them in blood. Literally. I had pricked my finger on a rose thorn and used the blood as ink. It felt so romantic, so poetic at the time. A blood oath. A promise written with the only thing I truly owned.

What a stupid, naive girl I had been.

What a waste of blood.

I traced the words with my fingertips, feeling the faint indentations on the paper, the physical marks of everything I had given up. Seven years. Seven years of devotion. Seven years of loving a man who had never loved me back.

And for what?

So I could sit in a mud puddle at 3:00 a.m. and dig up the proof of my own stupidity?

I set my note aside and unfolded Dante's.

His handwriting was neater, sharper than mine. He had pressed down hard on the paper, leaving grooves that were still clearly visible all these years later.

I wish to see again. I wish for my family to be strong. I wish for Sophia to be safe.

Sophia.

Even back then. Even when she ignored him, even when she dated other boys, even when I sat beside him every single day, listening to his dreams, reading to him, loving him-he had still used his wish to pray for her safety.

Not mine.

Never me.

I was never part of his plan. I wasn't even a footnote. I was just the shovel he used to bury me.

I read the words again, letting them really sink in. I wish for Sophia to be safe. Not happy. Not to be with him. Just safe. Even at eighteen, he knew he couldn't have her. He knew she was out of reach. But he yearned for her anyway.

And I had yearned for him.

How pathetic was that?

I picked up my piece of paper-my bloody oath, my bygone promise-and tore it to shreds.

Then I walked over to the drainage grate near the fountain.

The water rushing below was dark and swift, carrying the night's rain down into the sewers. I let the fragments fall, watching them drift down like dead leaves. They hit the water and scattered; some floated, while others sank immediately.

I watched until the very last scrap vanished into the darkness.

Swept down the sewer, exactly where they belonged.

Then I picked up the locket.

He gave it to me the night his sight was restored. I still remembered that night clearly-the way he looked at me, really looked at me, for the very first time.

His gaze had focused on my face; he was seeing me, not just hearing my voice. And he had smiled.

"This is for you," he had said, pressing the locket into my palm. "It was my grandmother's. She always said wearing it brought good luck. I want you to have it."

For years, I had worn it every single day.

I had slept with it under my pillow. I had kissed it for luck before his surgery. On the nights he didn't come home, I clutched it tightly, believing it would keep him safe.

I popped it open-for the first time in years.

Inside was a tiny photograph-so small I had almost forgotten it was there. It was a picture of us taken before the accident, before he lost his sight.

We were just teenagers, sitting right under this very tree. He was laughing at something I was saying. I was looking at him like he hung the moon.

I snapped the locket shut.

I went back to the tree and dug a new hole, deeper this time.

I dropped the silver chain into the muck.

It landed with a soft thud and disappeared into the shadows. I shoved the dirt back in and packed it down with my hands. I patted the earth flat until the ground looked completely undisturbed.

I wasn't just burying a necklace.

I was burying Elena Rossi.

The girl who believed in wishes. The girl who wrote oaths in blood. The girl who thought love could fix a broken man.

She was dead.

I had killed her.

I stood up and brushed the dirt from my knees. My hands were caked in mud and blood, my arm ached dully, and my cheek stung with a fiery heat. I looked like I had just crawled out of a grave.

Maybe I had.

My phone vibrated.

I pulled it out. The screen was cracked-I couldn't remember dropping it, but there it was, a spiderweb of shattered glass webbing out from the corner.

Dante: Are you okay? Luca said you refused the ride.

I stared at the screen.

Three hours. It took him three hours to check on me. It had been three hours since I walked away from him, out of that alley.

Three hours of him driving Sophia around with his hand on her thigh, while I was bleeding, digging, and burying.

I typed a reply.

Me: I'm fine. I don't need you.

I hit send before I had the chance to hesitate.

Then I turned and walked out of the garden, leaving my heart to rot beneath the peach tree.