Thud!

It was a heavy, dull sound, followed by the sickening crack of bone hitting a hard surface.

My waist slammed violently against the edge of the club’s solid marble bar.

In that instant, a jagged flash of pain shot through my spine like a dozen steel needles, paralyzing my entire body.

I slid clumsily down the side of the bar, collapsing onto the floor.

One hand clawed at the ground, my fingernails scraping against the marble with a piercing screech.

But the man who had once sworn to take a bullet for me didn't even look back.

Dante was cradling Sophia with a level of care I’d never seen.

His face was a mask of terror and raw anxiety—emotions he had never once shown for me.

"Hang on, Sophia! I’ve got you!"

Dante’s voice was trembling. He rushed toward the exit, his leather shoes thudding frantically against the floor.

Just before reaching the door, he seemed to remember I existed.

He paused for a fraction of a second, but he didn't even turn his head.

"Wait for me to get back and explain this to you, Elena!"

I lay there on the freezing floor, watching his silhouette run for another woman, and let out a low, self-mocking laugh.

When I finally woke up, it was the dead of night.

The private hospital wing of the Moretti family was deserted, save for the monotonous, cold beep of the heart monitor.

The bruise on my waist throbbed with a white-hot pain.

I tried to shift my weight, but the agony made me gasp, and tears started streaming down my face involuntarily.

My phone vibrated on the pillow. It was a video from Sophia.

In the footage, the Moretti family’s private luxury suite was bathed in warm light.

Dante’s mother—the Dowager who had always treated me with such polished respect—was now hovering over Sophia’s bed, fussing over her.

The old woman held Sophia’s hand, her face lit up with a massive smile.

"Good girl, you need to rest for the baby. This is the first grandson of the Moretti family; he carries Dante’s blood.

"As for that Elena... once the wedding broadcast is over, I’ll have Dante announce she’s 'retreating for her health.'

"Then we’ll ship her off to the old house in Sicily and lock her away. She’ll never cross your sight again."

Sophia leaned shyly into Dante’s chest, her voice sickeningly sweet. "Mother, Dante is so good to me."

The camera panned. Dante was sitting by the bed.

His long fingers were toying with a massive, breathtaking sapphire—the Star of the Abyss.

In that moment, I felt my heart stop beating entirely.

Six months ago, in order to help him secure his grip on Eastern Europe, I had infiltrated the black markets of Prague alone.

I was nearly blown to pieces in a hail of gunfire just to retrieve that raw stone.

I had planned to give it to him at the wedding, set into his scepter, as a symbol of "Eternal Protection and Loyalty."

"The color of this stone is top-tier Caucasian blue."

Dante stroked the blue diamond gently, but his eyes looked hollow, as if he were looking through the gem at someone else.

He whispered to Sophia, "I’ll have them turn it into a necklace. A baptism gift for the baby."

I shut the video off and hurled my phone against the wall with everything I had.

But what he didn't know was that I had already carved a tiny, hidden groove into the base of that blue diamond.

Dante Moretti, you knew exactly what that stone meant to me.

You knew I almost died in the snow of a foreign land to get it for you.

And yet, just to soothe your mistress and bury your cheap guilt, you gave it away like it was nothing.

Fine.

On the wedding day, I’ll give you exactly what you want. I'll give you your "happily ever after."

Over the next few days, I was unnervingly compliant. I didn't ask a single question about the day he whisked Sophia away.

I stayed at the estate, supposedly "recovering," and stopped involving myself in the family business altogether.

Every time Dante came home, he looked haggard. His handsome face was a mask of hypocritical guilt.

He started buying me expensive gifts at a frantic pace—Cartier high jewelry, rare Hermès skins, even a limited-edition Ferrari.

He was trying to use cold, hard cash to patch the holes in his own conscience.

In the dead of night, he would hold me tight from behind, burying his face in the crook of my neck and breathing me in.

"Elena," he’d rasp, his voice thick with exhaustion.

"The family business has been overwhelming lately. I haven't been there for you. Once the wedding is over, I’ll make it up to you. I promise."

I stared into the darkness with my back to him, my hands clenched into fists under the silk sheets, nails digging deep into my palms.

"I know," I whispered, my voice as soft as a hallucination. "I'm counting the days."

The hype for the wedding was massive.

To flex his status as Don, Dante poured astronomical amounts of money into the national media.

He even brought in a global live-streaming crew; he wanted the whole world to witness the coronation of the Moretti Queen.

Meanwhile, in the shadows, I had already finalized the handoff.

The Cleaner had secured a body for me—someone with my exact height and build, a Jane Doe who had been declared brain-dead after a gang shootout.

He’d even rigged it so the DNA would pass a short-term test.

I didn't head to the opulence of St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Instead, dressed in a ten-million-dollar gown encrusted with hand-stitched diamonds, I drove alone to the cliffs overlooking the Hudson.

This was the exact spot where, ten years ago, Dante had first taught me how to fire a gun.

I set up the camera and hijacked the wedding’s live-stream signal.

Right then, hundreds of millions of people across the globe were glued to their screens, waiting for the bride to appear.

In the cathedral, the massive screens suddenly cut to the footage of me standing on the edge of the abyss.

Dante was standing at the altar, checking his watch anxiously.

When he saw the feed change to my silhouette on the cliffside, he looked like he’d been struck by lightning.

His face went ghostly white in a heartbeat.

He tore out of the cathedral like a madman, racing toward the summit.

By the time he arrived, breathless and drenched in sweat, I was standing on the very lip of the drop.

The gale-force winds whipped my hair into a frenzy, and the diamond-studded gown billowed around me, a sight of breathtaking tragedy.

"Elena! What the hell are you doing? This is our wedding day! Get away from the edge!"

Dante’s voice was filled with a raw terror and despair I had never heard before.

He tried to step closer, but hesitated, terrified he’d spook me.

I looked into the camera, and then at him, flashing the most brilliant, most desolate smile of my life.

"Dante Moretti, the biggest regret of my life was meeting you—and then falling in love with you."

"Now, I’m giving this life back to the Moretti family. From this moment on, the blood debt is settled."

"No! Elena! Please!"

I didn't give him a second more. Without hesitation, I turned and threw myself into the bottomless depths of the Hudson.

In that split second, I heard Dante collapse at the edge of the cliff, letting out the howl of a wounded animal.

And as the weightlessness took hold, I closed my eyes and felt something I’d never known before: freedom.

This is only the beginning, Dante.

I want you to see me jumping every time you close your eyes for the rest of your life.

I want you to rot in your power, stuck with that hollow woman, living like a stray dog in a prison of endless regret.

Goodbye forever.