Dante, my fiancé and heir to the Moretti family, was at his family's nightclub, flaunting his affair with his mistress, Carina, while I was debilitated by morning sickness.
While I was doubled over in pain, he was on the dance floor with his singer-mistress, lost in each other's arms.
On the way back to the manor after the party, we were ambushed by a rival family.
My arm was grazed by a bullet, bleeding profusely, but Dante shoved me away coldly.
"You can handle yourself. Don't waste a security detail on you."
With that, he ordered his bodyguards to first escort Carina, who was merely shaken up, to safety.
When we arrived at the family's private clinic, everyone was fawning over Carina.
I walked alone to the obstetrician's office.
"Hello, please schedule the procedure for me."
"The baby... I'm not keeping it."
————————
1
I had just changed into a surgical gown when Dante burst in, his face a mask of fury. He threw a charm engraved with the family crest at my head. "Isabella, how could you be so careless with this?"
Dante never cared about these little trinkets.
Even the talisman I had once prayed over for his protection was tossed onto a desk with disdain.
I picked up the lucky charm and answered calmly, "I wasn't the one who lost it."
Hearing this, Dante immediately snatched the charm back and quickly fastened it to his wrist.
I knew it was Carina who had found it.
What she had prayed for was a lifetime with Dante, to become the Donna of the Moretti family.
At this thought, I suddenly grabbed his hand.
Under his guarded gaze, I adjusted the loose chain for him, tightening it securely.
The chill of my fingertips made Dante pause. "Why are you in a patient's gown?"
I replied nonchalantly, "I'm having a minor procedure later."
Dante's brow furrowed, his lips twisting into a sneer, ready to accuse me of faking an illness for attention again.
The next second, a nurse came in to draw my blood.
He opened his mouth, about to ask the nurse about my condition, but his phone rang at that exact moment.
Unsurprisingly, it was a video call from Carina.
On the screen, the girl whimpered that her private room was cold and empty, that the nights at the clinic were terrifying without him.
Hearing this, Dante lowered his voice to patiently soothe her, then strode out without a backward glance.
He bumped into the nurse, and the needle instantly slipped, causing blood to ooze from my arm.
He didn't even turn back at my cry of pain.
Just then, the doctor walked in with the surgical consent forms.
I ignored the risk disclosures, signing my name without a flicker of hesitation.
Half an hour later, the surgery was a success.
I had just gotten off the operating table when I received a text from Dante:
*Wait for me at the clinic entrance.*
The wind outside was bitingly cold. Dressed only in a thin gown and fresh from the procedure, I sat on a freezing plastic bench for two full hours.
He never showed up.
As I felt myself about to faint, two bodyguards walked past, murmuring about the scene inside the clinic.
"I've been with the Capo for years, and I've never seen him dote on a woman like this."
"Tell me about it. He was coddling her the whole time. The woman had a scraped knee, and the Capo scrambled a helicopter to fly her to the best private hospital in Manhattan."
Hearing this, I opened my phone and saw that Dante had changed his social media background.
On his arm, where the initials of my name should have been tattooed, was now a glaring letter "C."
Carina's "C."
I closed my texts and opened a travel app to book a flight. Due to the bad weather, the earliest flight home was in two days.
I placed the order, paid, and after confirming the ticket, I returned to our empty apartment.
At three in the morning, Dante finally came home. He pushed open the bedroom door, lay down beside me, and reached for my abdomen in the dark.
But I rolled over, leaving him with my cold back.
Dante tsked in annoyance, got up, and stormed into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.
In the nine years we'd been together, a single hint of his displeasure would have sent me into a panic, chasing after him to apologize.
Tonight, however, when he came out of the shower, he found me lying on the bed, completely still.
"Putting on an act." With that parting shot, Dante stalked out of the master bedroom and went to another room, his face like stone.
The next morning, I saw a wine glass stained with lipstick on the living room coffee table.
I didn't wake Dante to question him hysterically, as I would have in the past.
Instead, I calmly made breakfast. Just as I was about to sit down, I heard Dante, who had just woken up, say from the doorway:
"Don't wait up for me tonight, there's a family dinner."
He opened the fridge and chugged two mouthfuls of ice water.
He turned to look at me, his expression suspicious. I didn't nag him about how cold water was bad for his stomach, nor did I ask who would be at the dinner.
Through the kitchen's glass partition, Dante's figure was a distorted blur. "Isabella, are you listening to me?"
Swallowing the food in my mouth, I grunted an "Mm-hmm" and continued eating.
Seeing my indifference, he tossed a garment bag containing a custom-made mink coat at me.
"Birthday present."
The oversized coat, reeking of a cloying perfume that wasn't mine, perfectly concealed my now-flat stomach.
Under his gaze, I pulled a jewelry box from the coat pocket.
I opened it. A sapphire necklace, symbolizing the status of the future Donna of the family, lay gracefully on the black velvet inside.
Before I could speak, Dante snatched the necklace back, his face grim with annoyance.
"You took the wrong one. Yours is in the other pocket."
In the other pocket was a diamond-encrusted bracelet.
I only glanced at it before smiling and pushing it back toward him.
Then I said politely:
"The bracelet is beautiful, but I don't have an occasion to wear it. Besides, my birthday was three months ago. You should give it to Carina, along with the other one."
Dante was silent for a long moment, then reluctantly said:
"There's a family charity gala in a couple of days. You can come with me."
This was the first time he wanted me to appear publicly as his partner.
But for the past six months, it had always been Carina accompanying him to various events.
Even at a private party on his yacht with his closest confidants, the two of them were arm-in-arm in the group photos.
The memory of it made the man standing before me seem utterly laughable. "No, thank you. I don't need anything."
"Are you sure?" Dante asked, toying with the necklace as he looked at me.
I nodded. "It's best if Carina accompanies you."
My honesty made his face darken instantly.
"Isabella, take a good look at yourself. You look ridiculous, acting so petulant and ungrateful."
In the past, if he had said that, I would have started a huge fight with him.
But now, I couldn't be bothered to argue.
Just as I rolled my eyes and prepared to go back to my room, Dante's phone rang. It was Carina's special ringtone.
The girl was crying her eyes out, saying the heating in her apartment was broken.
"What am I going to do, Dante?"
"Silly girl, stay put and don't move. I'm coming to get you right now." After hanging up, he started for the door.
I called out to him. "The winter clothes you asked me to prepare for Carina last week are in the walk-in closet. Don't forget to take them to her."
Dante's expression shifted. He seemed to want to say something, but just then, Carina sent another voice message.
She mewled like a kitten, asking him to bring her a cup of hot cocoa on his way.
At her request, Dante had the butler clear a section of the walk-in closet and load a trove of winter clothes into his car, leaving with a smile on his face.
I glanced at the baby clothes he had casually tossed on the floor, then stood up and walked into the study.
On the mahogany desk was a blatant, intimate photo of Dante and Carina. Carina's eyes were bright, her teeth pearly, her smile captivating.
I went straight to the safe.
I tried Dante's birthday, and then mine. Wrong.
I tried our anniversary. Still wrong.
It wasn't until I entered Carina's birthday that the lock clicked open.
As I took out my fake passport and the escape fund I had prepared, a photo tucked inside fell out.
It was a picture of us with the first bullet casing he had given me when we first got together.
I tore the photo to shreds and tossed the pieces in the trash.
