I didn't get in the car.

Instead, I bolted toward the tree line, vanishing into the woods.

I spent three agonizing days holed up in a cheap motel on the edge of the city, waiting for him to hunt me down.

But he didn't come.

He sent a text.

Stop playing games. Come home when you're done throwing your tantrum.

He thought this was a tactic.

He thought I was maneuvering for his attention.

He simply couldn't conceive of a world where I wasn't desperate for his approval.

I watched the news from my cramped, dimly lit room.

The headlines were screaming about the charity gala tonight.

It was the event of the season.

It was also where Dante was rumored to announce his engagement.

A cold, hard resolve settled in the pit of my stomach.

I wasn't going to hide anymore.

I wasn't going to let him believe he had broken me.

I used the last of my emergency cash to buy a dress.

It wasn't one of the modest, elegant black numbers Dante preferred me to wear.

It was red.

It was bold.

It was a declaration of war.

I arrived at the hotel ballroom an hour late.

The air was thick with the scent of expensive perfume and crisp champagne.

I walked in, and the silence rippled outward.

Heads turned.

People whispered behind manicured hands.

They knew exactly who I was.

They knew I was Dante's shadow.

But they had never seen me like this.

I spotted him across the room.

He was wearing a tuxedo that fit him like a second skin, a glass of whiskey loosely gripped in one hand.

His other arm was around her.

Sofia.

She possessed the kind of flawless beauty that only old money could buy.

Her skin was porcelain perfect.

Her dress was a pristine white.

She looked like an angel.

And I? I looked like the devil coming to collect a debt.

Dante saw me.

His eyes narrowed into slits.

He didn't look happy to see me; he looked lethal.

He murmured something to Sofia and began to stalk toward me.

The crowd parted for him like the Red Sea.

He stopped inches from my face.

I could feel the heat radiating off his body.

"I thought you were smarter than this," he hissed, his voice pitched low so only I could hear the venom.

"Smarter than what, Dante?" I asked, forcing my voice to remain steady.

"Showing up here. Trying to embarrass me."

He gripped my arm.

His fingers dug painfully into my flesh.

"You think this dress changes anything? You're still just my soldier, Elena."

"I resigned," I said flatly.

He laughed.

It was a cruel, dry sound void of humor.

"You don't resign from this family. You leave in a pine box."

Sofia drifted up to us.

She slipped her hand into Dante's free hand, staking her claim.

She looked at me with pity.

It was worse than hate.

"Is this the help you told me about, Dante?" she asked.

Her voice was light, airy, and laced with poison.

"She looks... distressed."

Dante didn't look at me.

He looked down at her, and his eyes softened instantly.

"Don't worry about her, Sofia. She's just leaving."

Sofia stepped closer to me, invading my space.

"You know," she whispered, "Dante told me how hard you worked. It's sweet, really. But some people are born to lead, and some are born to serve. You should go find someone in your own tax bracket."

The people standing nearby chuckled.

I felt the heat rise in my cheeks.

I felt stripped naked in front of the entire elite of the city.

They were looking at me like I was a stray dog that had wandered into a palace.

Dante raised his glass.

"To the future," he boomed, addressing the room.

"To the union of our families."

He pulled Sofia close and kissed her cheek.

The room erupted in polite, thunderous applause.

I stood there, frozen.

He was erasing me.

He was doing it publicly.

He was doing it with a smile.

I looked at him.

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to tell everyone about the blood on his hands.

About the blood on my hands.

But I didn't.

I took a deep, shuddering breath.

I plucked a glass of champagne from a passing waiter's tray.

"Congratulations," I said.

My voice didn't shake.

Dante looked surprised.

He expected tears.

He expected a scene.

He didn't expect dignity.

I raised my glass to them.

"I hope you deserve each other."

I downed the drink in one swallow and turned around.

I walked out of the ballroom.

My head was high.

My back was straight.

But inside, I was screaming.

I walked out into the cool night air.

I thought the worst was over.

I was wrong.

I spent the next week buried inside a safe house I had prepared years ago.

It was a cramped, nondescript apartment in the Bronx.

I didn't go out. I didn't even turn on my phone.

In the silence, I tried to figure out who I was if I wasn't Dante's weapon.

I didn't have an answer.

Then Sofia found me.

I don't know how. Maybe she had her own spies, or maybe I wasn't as hidden as I thought.

She knocked on my door on a gray Tuesday afternoon.

She was wearing oversized sunglasses and a pristine trench coat that looked out of place in this hallway.

"We need to talk," she said.

I let her in.

I didn't have a weapon on me, but my eyes darted to the kitchen knife on the counter.

She looked around my small apartment with open disdain, her nose wrinkling slightly.

"Cozy," she said flatly.

"What do you want?" I asked, keeping my distance.

"I want to know if you're pregnant," she said.

I laughed.

It was a bitter, hollow sound.

"No."

"Good," she said, relaxing slightly. "Dante is sentimental about bloodlines. It would complicate things."

"There is nothing between us, Sofia. You won."

She looked at me closely, searching for a lie.

"I know I won. I just want to make sure you know it too."

Suddenly, the window imploded.

Shards of glass flew everywhere, turning the air into shrapnel.

I hit the deck instinctively.

"Get down!" I screamed.

Sofia stood there, frozen in shock, a deer in the headlights.

Gunfire erupted from the street below, tearing through the drywall.

It was a drive-by. A rival family making a move.

I crawled toward Sofia on my elbows.

I grabbed her ankle and yanked her down just as a bullet embedded itself in the wall exactly where her head had been a second before.

The door burst open.

It wasn't the shooters.

It was Dante.

He had been following her.

He saw us on the floor. He saw the shattered glass. He saw the blood smearing the wood.

He didn't look at me.

He lunged for Sofia.

"Are you hurt?" he yelled, his voice frantic, laced with a panic I had never heard before.

He gathered her in his arms, checking her desperately for wounds.

He shielded her body with his own.

I was lying two feet away.

A jagged piece of glass was stuck in my shoulder.

Blood was pooling under me, soaking my shirt.

He didn't see it.

Or he didn't care.

"Dante," I whispered.

He looked up.

His eyes were wild.

He looked right through me, as if I were part of the wreckage.

"Cover us!" he shouted to his men who were pouring into the room.

He picked Sofia up bridal style.

She was crying, clinging to his shirt like a frightened child.

He ran for the door.

He stepped over my legs to get her out.

His boot grazed my wounded shoulder.

Pain exploded in my arm, white-hot and blinding.

I watched his back as he disappeared down the hallway.

He didn't look back.

Not once.

I was the one who had pulled her down. I was the one bleeding.

But I was invisible.

The room started to go dark at the edges.

My vision blurred.

I saw Marco, the old family doctor, rush in from the hallway, lagging behind the guards.

He looked at the empty doorway where Dante had vanished.

Then he looked at me.

His face crumpled in pity.

"Oh, child," he whispered.

He knelt beside me.

He put pressure on my wound, his hands warm against my cold skin.

"He left me," I mumbled.

It was a statement of fact.

"He saved her."

"Stay with me, Elena," Marco said, his voice urgent. "Don't close your eyes."

But I wanted to close them.

I wanted to sleep.

I realized then that the bullet three years ago hadn't killed me.

But this moment had.

The realization hit me harder than the loss of blood.

I wasn't just disposable.

I was already forgotten.

I let the darkness take me.

It was warmer than Dante's love ever was.

I woke up to the sharp, chemical sting of antiseptic and the rhythmic, steady beep of a monitor.

I was in the private wing of the family hospital.

My shoulder throbbed with a dull, heavy ache, and my head felt like it was packed with lead.

I tried to sit up, but a wave of nausea and dizziness shoved me back against the pillows.

The door clicked open.

Dante walked in.

He looked exhausted. His dress shirt was rumpled, the top button undone, his hair a mess.

For a second, a foolish, microscopic part of me hoped that the disarray meant he had been worried about me.

"You're awake," he said flatly.

"Where is she?" I asked, my voice raspy.

"Sofia is resting. She's in shock."

"She wasn't hit," I said, confused.

"She was traumatized," he snapped, his eyes flashing with sudden anger. "She's not like you, Elena. She's not built for war."

"And I am?"

"You chose this life."

He walked to the window, staring out at the grey sky. He wouldn't look at me.

"Why were you with her?" he asked, his back to the room.

"She came to me."

"Don't lie to me."

He turned around slowly. His face was a mask of cold fury.

"Sofia said you lured her there. She said you tipped off the Russians."

My mouth fell open. The accusation was so absurd it took me a moment to process.

"What?"

"She said you wanted to get her out of the way."

"That's insane," I choked out. "I saved her life!"

"Did you?"

He walked to the bed, his movements predatory. He loomed over me, blocking out the light.

"Or did you set up a controlled hit to play the hero? To make me owe you?"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. He was twisting reality to fit her narrative, erasing my sacrifice completely.

"Check the security cameras," I pleaded.

"There were no cameras in that dump you were staying in."

The door opened again.

Sofia walked in.

She was wearing a pristine silk robe. She looked pale, yes, but perfectly groomed, her hair falling in soft waves.

"Dante," she whined, her voice pitching high and fragile. "I can't sleep."

He went to her immediately, his posture softening. He wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders.

"It's okay, baby. I'm here."

She looked at me over his shoulder.

Her eyes were hard, glittering with malice.

"Is she going to hurt me again?" she asked, her voice trembling with a practiced fear.

It was a performance. An Oscar-worthy performance designed to bury me.

"No," Dante said, his voice low.

He looked back at me, and the softness vanished.

"She's not going to hurt anyone."

He marched back to the bed.

"Get up."

"Dante, I just had surgery," I said, pressing a hand to my bandage.

"Get up!"

He grabbed my good arm and yanked me out of the bed.

I stumbled, my legs giving out.

The IV line ripped out of my vein.

Hot blood splattered onto the linoleum floor.

"Dante, stop!" Marco yelled from the hallway, sprinting toward us.

"Stay back!" Dante ordered, his voice thundering off the walls.

He dragged me out of the room. He hauled me down the corridor, ignoring my stumbling feet.

He dragged me out into the courtyard.

It was raining again. A cold, relentless downpour.

There was a large decorative fountain in the center of the garden. The water was dark, churning with the rain.

He pushed me toward it.

I fell to my knees on the wet pavement, the impact jarring my wounded shoulder.

"You want to play dirty?" he yelled over the sound of the rain. "You want to act like a thug?"

He grabbed the back of my neck in a vice grip.

He forced my head down toward the black water.

"Dante, please," I gasped.

"You touched what is mine," he snarled close to my ear. "Sofia is off-limits. Do you understand?"

He shoved my head under the water.

The cold shock paralyzed me instantly.

Water flooded my nose. I couldn't breathe.

I thrashed. I clawed at his wrist, my nails digging into his skin.

He was too strong. He held me there like I was nothing.

Five seconds.

Ten seconds.

My lungs burned as if they were on fire. Panic exploded in my brain, a primal scream for air.

He pulled me up.

I gasped, choking, sputtering water and air.

"Did you hear me?" he screamed.

"I... didn't... do it," I coughed, water spilling from my lips.

He pushed me under again.

This time, he held me longer.

The darkness started to creep in at the edges of my vision, narrowing the world to a pinprick.

I stopped fighting.

I went limp.

He pulled me up again and threw me backward.

I landed hard on the concrete, coughing up water, shivering violently.

My shoulder wound had reopened. Fresh, bright red blood was mixing with the rain and the fountain water, swirling around me in a pink puddle.

Dante stood over me, his chest heaving.

He looked down at the blood.

For a split second, his mask slipped. He looked horrified at what he had done.

But then he looked up at the balcony above us.

Sofia was watching.

He hardened his jaw, killing whatever pity had sparked in his eyes.

"If you ever go near her again," he said, his voice devoid of emotion, "I won't stop next time."

He turned and walked away, leaving me in the storm.

I lay in the rain, too weak to move.

I watched the blood flow away from me, draining into the gutter.

It was draining out of me, and with it, the last drop of love I had ever held for him.

Through the haze, I saw a service gate near the back of the garden.

It was slightly ajar.

The guard was gone, likely distracted by the commotion Dante had caused.

I knew I couldn't walk.

I had to crawl.

But I knew one thing for certain.

If I died tonight, I would die outside these walls.