Elena POV

The bathroom mirror in the hospital lobby was cracked.

It fractured my reflection, splitting my face into two jagged, irreconcilable halves.

One half was the Mafia Queen, pale and defeated.

The other was the street rat from the Bronx, bleeding but stubbornly alive.

I pulled a shard of glass from my shoulder with tweezers I had stolen from a supply cart. I didn't flinch.

The pain was grounding. It reminded me that I was still in a body, even if my soul felt hollowed out, like a building gutted by fire.

I wrapped my arms in gauze, hiding the cuts from the champagne flutes, from the nails of the women who used to call me a friend.

I had work to do.

I checked my burner phone. The transfer was complete. The safe house in Germany was paid for in cash. A medical transport team was on standby, waiting for my signal to move Luca.

We just had to survive the night.

I pulled my coat tight around me and took the elevator up to the fourth floor. The private wing. The Vitiello wing.

The air grew colder the higher I went.

When the elevator doors dinged open, I heard the shouting. It wasn't the hushed tones of doctors. It was the shrill, entitled screech of a woman who had never known hunger.

I ran.

I rounded the corner to Luca's room and froze.

The hallway was full of black suits. Dante's men.

Inside the room, chaos reigned.

A middle-aged woman with blonde hair-Sofia's mother-was shoving the night nurse.

"Get away from him!" the woman yelled. "My daughter says this vegetable is draining the family resources!"

Sofia stood by the window, checking her nails. She looked bored, as if she were waiting for a manicure rather than a murder.

"Do it, Mom," Sofia said, her voice flat. "Just pull the plug. Dante said I could redecorate this wing for my studio."

"No!" I screamed.

I launched myself into the room. I didn't think. I didn't plan. I was ten years old again, fighting for a scrap of bread in the alley.

I grabbed Sofia's mother by the shoulder and threw her back. She stumbled, her expensive heels slipping on the linoleum.

"Don't you touch him!" I roared, standing between them and Luca's bed.

The beep of his heart monitor was the only rhythm I knew.

Sofia's mother looked at me, then at Sofia. Then, with the dramatic flair of a soap opera actress, she threw herself onto the floor.

"Help! She's killing me!" she wailed, clutching her hip.

Sofia let out a high-pitched scream. "Dante! Help! The crazy bitch is attacking my mother!"

The heavy oak doors swung open.

Dante filled the frame.

He took in the scene in a single second. His mistress's mother on the floor. His mistress screaming in terror. And me, wild-haired, bleeding through my coat, standing over them like a demon.

He didn't look at Luca. He didn't look at the terror in the nurse's eyes.

He looked at me with cold, judicial fury.

"Enough, Elena."

He didn't ask what happened. He didn't care.

"She tried to kill him, Dante!" I pointed at the woman on the floor. "They were going to unplug him!"

"Liar!" Sofia sobbed, rushing to Dante's side. "She's jealous! She attacked my poor mother because she hates me!"

Dante's jaw tightened.

"Remove her," he ordered the guards.

Two men stepped forward.

"No, Dante, please!" I begged, dropping to my knees. "Not this. Anything but this."

"Disconnect the ventilator," Dante said to the doctor behind him, his voice devoid of emotion. "We need this room cleared for Sofia's studio by morning."

The world stopped.

He wasn't just removing me. He was executing my brother.

"No!" I screamed, a sound that tore my throat raw.

I lunged for the emergency alarm on the wall. My hand slammed against the red button.

Alarms blared. Code Blue lights flashed. Doctors from the main hallway rushed toward the door.

Dante stepped into the doorway. He blocked them with his broad shoulders.

"Family matter," he growled at the chief surgeon. "No one enters."

"Dante, he needs oxygen!" I shrieked.

The guards grabbed my arms. They dragged me backward. I kicked. I bit. I clawed.

I watched the numbers on Luca's monitor drop.

90.

80.

Dante stood like a statue, guarding the door, ensuring his wife's punishment was absolute.

I broke free from one guard and ran for the stairwell, thinking I could get another doctor from the floor below.

I tripped.

My knees hit the concrete stairs. I tumbled down a flight, my head cracking against the railing.

Black spots danced across my vision.

But I crawled.

I crawled back up the stairs, blood dripping into my eyes. I dragged myself back to the hallway.

Silence.

The alarm had stopped. The screaming had stopped.

I looked into the room.

The monitor was a flat, green line.

Dante was checking his watch.

Sofia was smiling at her mother.

And Luca.

My Luca.

He was gone.

Dante looked down at me, sprawled on the floor.

"It's done, Elena. Go home."

Elena POV

I didn't cry.

Tears are for the living.

Tears are for those who still hold onto the hope that things can be fixed.

I walked into the room.

The silence was heavy, pressing physically against my eardrums.

I picked up a washcloth from the basin.

I dipped it in the water.

I wiped Luca's face.

I cleaned the soot of the city from his forehead.

I straightened his hospital gown.

Then, I pulled the white sheet up over his face, shrouding the eyes that would never open again.

Dante watched me for a moment, then left with Sofia.

He probably thought I was in shock.

He probably thought I would break down later, that he could comfort me then, and I would be pathetic and grateful.

He didn't know he had just killed the only reason I stayed.

I rode in the hearse alone.

I sat in the crematorium waiting room for four hours.

Finally, they handed me a heavy ceramic urn.

It was warm.

That was all that was left of my brother. A warm jar of ash.

I took a taxi to the cemetery.

It was raining-a cold, miserable New York drizzle that seeped into everything.

I found the plot.

It was a pauper's grave, the only one I could afford with the cash in my pocket.

I dug the hole myself with a garden trowel I had bought at a convenience store.

I buried the urn.

I sat there in the mud.

One hour.

Five hours.

Twelve hours.

The sun went down. The sun came up.

The rain soaked through my clothes, chilling me to the bone, but I felt nothing.

I was dead, too. I was just waiting for my body to catch up.

When I finally stood up, my legs were stiff.

I walked back to the main road and hailed a cab.

"To the Villa," I said.

I walked through the front door of the house that had been my prison.

The air smelled of lilies and sex.

I heard them in the living room.

Giggles. Moans. The friction of skin on skin.

I walked past the open archway.

Dante was on the sofa, Sofia straddling him.

Her head was thrown back in ecstasy.

His hands were gripping her hips.

He looked up as I passed.

His eyes widened slightly, seeing my muddy, soaked clothes.

"Elena?" he called out, his voice rough with passion.

I didn't stop.

I didn't blink.

I walked up the stairs, my muddy footprints ruining the pristine white carpet with every step.

I went to my room and closed the door.

I stripped off my wet clothes.

I stood in the shower until the water ran cold, scrubbing the grave dirt from my skin.

The door handle turned.

Dante entered.

He smelled of her.

Cheap perfume and sweat.

My stomach lurched. I dry heaved, clutching my towel.

"Don't," I rasped.

He crossed the room in two strides.

He grabbed my face, forcing me to look at him.

"Where have you been?" he demanded. "You disappeared for twenty-four hours."

"I buried him," I said flatly.

Dante paused. "Who?"

"Luca."

He frowned. "Don't be dramatic. I just had the machines turned off to teach you a lesson. He's fine."

He didn't know.

He hadn't even checked.

I looked at this man. This monster I had loved for a decade.

If I told him Luca was dead, he would lock me up.

He would put me on suicide watch.

He would never let me leave.

He needed to believe he still held the leash.

"You're right," I lied. My voice was hollow, devoid of life. "I'm sorry, Dante. I was dramatic."

He relaxed.

He leaned in and kissed me.

It was a possessive, bruising kiss. A brand.

I forced myself not to vomit.

I stood still, letting him take what he wanted, like a doll.

"See?" he whispered against my lips. "You need me. If you ever try to leave again, I'll make sure Luca suffers for real."

I nodded.

"I can't live without you, Dante," I whispered.

He smiled. It was the smile of a predator who had caught his prey.

"Good girl."

He left to go back to Sofia.

I waited five minutes.

My phone buzzed.

ID Ready. Flight LH404 departs in 3 hours.

I didn't pack clothes.

I didn't pack jewelry.

I went to the closet and pulled out a small, velvet bag.

Inside was a handful of soil from Luca's grave.

That was all I took.

I walked out the back door.

I climbed the fence.

I ran into the night, and I didn't look back.

Dante POV

The atmosphere of the art gallery was suffocating.

White walls. White wine. White noise.

Sofia was clinging to my arm, her manicured nails digging into my suit jacket as she dragged me from one canvas to another.

"Look at this one, Dante!" she squealed, gesturing wildly. "It represents the duality of man's soul."

It looked like someone had vomited red paint on a canvas and had the audacity to charge fifty thousand dollars for it.

"It's exquisite," I lied, taking a long sip of champagne to wash away the taste of boredom.

I checked my watch.

It had been three days since Elena had come home covered in mud.

Three days of silence.

She was either in the Penance Room or her bedroom. I hadn't checked.

I had told the guards to let her stew. She needed to learn that her tantrums had consequences.

But the silence was... loud.

Usually, I could feel her presence in the house. A tension. A warmth. A simmering resentment.

Now, the Villa felt sterile.

"Dante?" Sofia pouted, tugging at my sleeve. "You aren't listening."

I looked down at her.

She was beautiful, objectively. Perfect symmetry, perfect skin.

But her voice grated on my nerves like sandpaper.

She was needy.

Elena was never needy.

Elena was steel wrapped in silk.

Even when she knelt in the snow, her eyes had burned with defiance. I missed that fire.

Suddenly, panic seized my chest. It was a sharp, cold grip around my heart, tightening until I couldn't breathe.

I looked across the room.

I saw a flash of dark hair. The familiar curve of a neck.

"Elena?" I said aloud.

I pushed Sofia aside and strode through the crowd, ignoring the gasps as I shoved past patrons.

I grabbed the woman's shoulder and spun her around.

A stranger looked up at me, terrified.

"I'm sorry, Don Vitiello!" she stammered, shrinking back.

I let her go, my hand dropping to my side.

My heart was hammering against my ribs.

What the hell was wrong with me?

"Dante!" Sofia was back, hanging on me like a parasite. "What is it?"

"Nothing," I snapped.

I looked at Sofia.

I saw the greed in her eyes. The vanity.

I felt a sudden wave of repulsion.

I wanted to go home.

I wanted to see Elena.

I wanted to see her glare at me.

I pulled out my phone and glanced at the screen.

Calendar: 10th Wedding Anniversary. Tomorrow.

Guilt, sharp and unfamiliar, pricked me.

I had pushed her too far this time.

The business with Luca-it was a bluff, of course. I'd never actually kill the vegetable. But she didn't know that.

I needed to fix this.

"Matteo," I barked at my Consigliere, who was shadowing me from a discreet distance.

"Yes, Don Vitiello."

"Prepare the Villa. Tomorrow night."

"I want lilies," I commanded. "Thousands of them. Stargazer lilies."

Matteo raised an eyebrow. "For the mistress?"

"No," I growled. "For my wife."

"I'm going to buy her that diamond necklace she looked at in Milan. I'm going to reinstate her."

"I'll send Sofia to the Hamptons for a week," I added, already walking toward the exit.

Elena will cry. She will thank me. We will start over.

I smiled, imagining the look of relief on Elena's face.

She would be waiting for me. She always was.