Alessia's POV:

Bianca approached me as the crowd began to disperse, the five-million-dollar pendant clutched like a trophy in her hand. The moment Marco was out of earshot, her tearful, fragile mask instantly dissolved.

"We don't have to pretend when he's not looking," she sneered, her eyes glittering with triumph.

"Give it back," I ground out, my voice low and dangerous. "I've given you everything else. I want my mother's pendant."

She let out a sharp, ugly laugh. "You didn't give me anything, Alessia. I took it."

She saw Marco approaching, and her entire demeanor shifted in an instant. Her face crumpled, her shoulders slumped, and the carefully orchestrated tears welled in her eyes.

She grabbed my hand, her grip surprisingly strong. "I just wanted to look at it," she wailed, her voice thick with manufactured sobs. "And she started yelling at me! She said I wasn't worthy!"

I tried to pull my hand away, but she clung to it, using the momentum to artfully stumble backward, right into Marco's chest, sobbing as if her heart would break.

Marco's face darkened. Bianca held the pendant out to him, her hand trembling.

"Lia loves it so much," she cried, looking up at him with wide, innocent eyes. "I can't take it. It wouldn't be right."

I held out my hand, my heart pounding with a desperate, foolish hope. I expected him to give it to me. He had promised.

Instead, he took the pendant from Bianca, his expression hardening as he looked at me. He unclasped the chain and fastened it around Bianca's neck.

A tremor ran through me, a cold dread washing over me. "What are you doing?"

"This is an apology gift," he declared, his voice a frigid declaration. "To Bianca. For your appalling behavior tonight."

My control shattered. The poise, the calm, the carefully constructed walls-they all crumbled into dust. A raw, guttural sound tore from my throat, and I lunged for Bianca, my fingers already clawing for the heirloom at her throat.

"Are you insane?" Marco snarled, shoving me away with brutal force. He shielded Bianca with his body as if I were a rabid animal. "She would never lie to me."

I crashed into an empty chair, pain shooting up my back as I hit the ground. The last flickering ember of hope inside me died, leaving nothing but cold, black ash.

I got to my feet, my body aching, my very soul numb.

"Keep it," I said, my voice broken.

I turned and walked away.

I heard him call my name, a note of confusion in his voice. "Lia!"

He started to follow, but Bianca clung to him, her sobs escalating. "Marco, I don't feel well. The baby..."

He chose her. He always chose her. He dismissed me with a curt command to "cool off."

Outside the hotel, the cold night air hit my face. I stood on the curb, waiting, a pathetic part of me still clung to the hope of his car pulling up, of him offering one last, hollow placation.

He never came.

He wasn't even going to pretend anymore. It was over. Truly, finally over.

Alessia's POV:

Back at the estate, I didn't even bother going upstairs.

I stood in the cold marble foyer, pulling out my phone, my fingers moving with a steadiness that felt entirely alien.

A hotel room downtown.

That's all I needed.

I refused to spend another night under his roof.

I hauled my single suitcase downstairs.

The house was eerily quiet.

Marco was out, probably still comforting his weeping mistress.

But Bianca, it seemed, was very much present.

I saw her heading for the garage, a triumphant smirk twisting her lips.

Maria, the head maid, scrambled after her.

"Miss Sugden, please, you mustn't! You don't have a license.

Mr. Bellini would not want you driving his cars."

Bianca casually shoved the older woman aside.

"I'll have whatever I want soon enough," she purred.

She slid into the driver's seat of Marco's silver Aston Martin, the engine roaring to life.

Just as I stepped out of the front door, her eyes met mine through the windshield.

The smirk vanished, replaced by a mask of pure, unadulterated hate.

She floored the accelerator.

There was no time to think, only to react.

I hurled myself to the side, the motion clumsy and desperate.

The car's fender clipped my leg, sending me tumbling into a bed of thorny rose bushes.

A sharp, searing pain blazed from my knee to my hip.

My hands and knees were scraped raw.

"Are you crazy?" I screamed, pulling myself out of the dirt, thorns clinging to my dress.

Bianca leaned out the window, her hair wild.

"Yes," she admitted, her voice giddy, a manic light in her eyes.

"And I regret not hitting you harder."

The words stole my breath.

She put the car in reverse, the tires screeching against the pavement.

Suddenly, a black sedan screeched to a halt behind her.

Marco.

He was here.

Bianca slammed on the brakes.

Her expression shifted in a blink, the madness replaced by panicked concern as she scrambled out of the car and rushed to my side.

"Lia! Oh my god, are you okay?"

I got to my feet, my body shaking with adrenaline and rage.

Without a word, I swung my hand and slapped her hard across the face.

The sharp sound cracked through the quiet courtyard.

She burst into tears, her hand flying to her cheek, a perfect picture of victimhood.

I pointed a trembling finger at the car.

"She tried to run me over."

Bianca immediately spun her story, her voice a pathetic wail as she turned to Marco.

"She came at the car! She tried to attack me! I got scared!"

Marco's eyes, which had been wide with shock, narrowed into slits on me.

He believed her.

Without a flicker of doubt.

Instantly.

"What the hell have you done now?" he bellowed, striding purposefully toward me.

"Are you trying to terrorize a pregnant woman?"

Maria tried to intervene, stepping forward cautiously.

"Sir, I saw it.

Miss Sugden-"

"Silence!" he roared, and the maid flinched back as if struck, her face paling.

He turned his furious gaze back to me, his eyes raking over my scraped knees and torn dress with utter disgust.

"You're not dead, are you?" he snarled, his voice laced with contempt.

The words hit me with the force of a physical blow, knocking the air from my lungs.

A laugh, high and chilling, bubbled up from my chest, unbidden and brittle.

"I was blind," I whispered, looking at the monster he'd become.

"Utterly blind to ever love you."

I slapped him, too.

The sting on my palm was deliciously satisfying.

His face contorted with rage.

He shoved me backward, hard.

"You're unhinged," he spat.

He turned his back on me, scooping the weeping Bianca into his arms and carrying her inside, cooing promises of comfort and safety.

He didn't give me a second glance, not even a flicker of acknowledgment.

Maria rushed to my side, her face pale with concern.

"Mrs. Bellini, your leg..."

I looked down.

A thin trickle of blood was making its way down my shin, staining the pristine white of my sock a stark crimson.

"We're divorced," I told her, my voice final and steady.

"I'm not coming back."

I picked up my suitcase, turned my back on the ruins of my marriage, and walked away, never looking back.

Marco's POV:

I saw Bianca settled with a glass of water and a cold compress for her cheek, which was already turning crimson from Lia's slap.

Bianca sobbed the whole time, recounting how terrified she'd been, how Lia had looked at her with such raw hatred.

When I finally went back downstairs, the foyer was empty. Lia's suitcase was gone.

"Where is she?" I demanded from the staff, who were huddled discreetly by the kitchen door.

The head maid, Maria, stepped forward, her face carefully blank. "Mrs. Bellini-formerly Mrs. Bellini-left with her luggage, sir. She said she would not be back."

Bianca, who had followed me down, smirked behind her hand.

I scoffed, a knot of irritation tightening in my gut. "Let her go. She's throwing a tantrum. We'll see how long she lasts without me."

She had nowhere to go. No money of her own. Her family, I'd always assumed, were simple country folk. She'd come crawling back.

Two days later, my irritation had grown into a steady, simmering anger. She hadn't called. Hadn't texted.

I finally caved and sent her a text: Come home. Apologize to Bianca and bring her the lemon cake she likes.

No reply.

I sent another. Lia, this is ridiculous. Stop acting like a child.

Nothing.

I called her. It rang twice before hanging up. I called again, only to be sent straight to voicemail. She'd blocked my number.

My rage, a useless, impotent thing, boiled over. I hurled my phone against the wall, the screen spiderwebbing on impact.

Alessia's POV:

The warm sun kissed my skin. For the first time in years, I felt the tension in my shoulders begin to melt away.

I was luxuriating at an exclusive seaside resort two hours down the coast, a place so private and expensive I knew Marco would never think to look for me here.

I savored the freedom, the quiet, the simple taste of my lemon-infused water.

Then I heard a familiar name.

"Marco is just the best, isn't he? He's going to buy me a whole new wardrobe for the baby."

I opened my eyes. Bianca, flanked by two of her vapid friends, stood at the velvet rope that separated the general pool area from the private, members-only cabanas where I was lounging.

The resort staff was politely denying them entry. "I'm sorry, miss. This area is for premium members only."

"Do you know who my boyfriend is?" Bianca huffed. "The entry fee is a million dollars a year! Let me in."

The staff member didn't budge.

Just as Bianca reached for her phone to call Marco, her eyes landed on me. They widened in recognition, then narrowed into venomous slits.

"You," she spat. "How did you get in here?"

The staff member turned to me. "Is there a problem, Miss Romano?"

Bianca's jaw dropped.

"No problem at all," I said, my voice calm, and closed my eyes again.

"Spending Marco's money, are we?" she sneered, her voice dripping with venom. "Enjoy it while it lasts. I'm going to make sure he cuts you off completely."

She pulled out her phone and dialed, her whining voice immediately launching into a tirade about the staff, about being excluded.

A moment later, Marco's voice, unmistakable even from a distance, came through. He was already arranging her entry, eager to prove he could provide anything she wanted. He was paying the one-day guest fee, a staggering fifty thousand dollars, just so she could sit by the same pool as me.