Elena Rossi POV

The hospital room smelled of antiseptic and stale neglect.

Dante had visited exactly once.

He stayed for ten minutes.

He spent nine of them on his phone, his thumbs flying across the screen, a soft, indulgent smile playing on his lips.

It was the same smile he used to give me when I burned the toast.

"Is she okay?" I asked, my voice flat.

He didn't bother to look up. "Mia is fragile, Elena. The stress isn't good for the procedure. You need to be more careful."

"I have a broken arm and a concussion, Dante."

"And your father has leukemia," he countered, finally locking his phone and sliding it into his pocket. "Priorities."

He left before the nurse could even change my IV.

I was discharged three days later.

It was my birthday.

I didn't expect him to remember.

But when I walked into the Penthouse, the lights were dimmed. Soft jazz played from the hidden speakers.

Dante stood by the fireplace, holding a glass of scotch.

"Happy Birthday," he said.

For a second, just a fraction of a second, my heart stuttered.

Then I saw her.

Mia sat on the velvet sofa.

She was wearing white.

It was a white lace dress that looked disturbingly like the one I had worn to my rehearsal dinner five years ago.

"I told Dante we couldn't let you celebrate alone," Mia chirped, standing up. She twirled slowly, showing off the fabric. "Do you like it? Dante bought it for me. He said white symbolizes purity."

The irony tasted like bile rising in my throat.

"It's lovely," I said, walking past them toward the kitchen.

"Dante promised to teach me to dance," Mia said, grabbing his hand possessively. "For the gala next week. Since I'm the guest of honor."

Dante looked at me, his expression unreadable. "Just one song, Elena. Then we'll cut the cake."

I leaned against the marble island, clutching my cast to steady myself.

"Go ahead."

Dante placed his hand on Mia's waist.

He pulled her close. Too close for a dance lesson.

They moved to the rhythm. Mia rested her head on his shoulder, her eyes finding mine over the fabric of his suit.

She smirked.

It wasn't a subtle victory. It was a declaration of war.

Dante's chin rested on top of her head. He closed his eyes, swaying.

He looked peaceful.

He looked like a man in love.

The staff stood in the shadows of the hallway. The maids, the guards. I saw them exchanging pitying glances.

They knew.

The Underboss had a new queen. The old one was just waiting to be discarded.

I looked at the cake on the counter.

*Happy Birthday Elena.*

The frosting was already melting under the warm recessed lights.

I didn't say a word.

I turned around and walked to the elevator.

The music swelled. Dante spun Mia, her laughter ringing out like breaking glass.

Neither of them noticed I was leaving.

I pressed the button for the lobby.

As the metal doors slid shut, cutting off the sight of my husband holding another woman, I whispered to the empty car.

"There won't be a next time."

Elena Rossi POV

I needed air. Desperately.

I hailed a yellow taxi outside the building, my hand trembling as I reached for the door handle.

I didn't have a destination. I just needed to be away from the suffocating scent of Mia's perfume that seemed to cling to the walls of my home, choking the life out of me.

"Where to, lady?" the driver asked, eying me in the rearview mirror.

"Just drive," I said, leaning my head back against the worn vinyl. "Anywhere but here."

A flash of movement caught my eye.

Mia ran out of the lobby entrance. She wasn't wearing a coat, despite the chill in the air.

"Elena! Wait!" she shouted, waving her arms overhead like a stranded castaway.

She looked frantic. But I knew better. It was another performance.

I slammed the taxi door shut, locking out her voice.

"Go," I told the driver. "Now."

The taxi pulled away from the curb, merging into the flow of traffic.

Mia didn't stop.

With a glance back at the garage, she ran into the street.

She didn't stumble; she calculated. She threw herself directly into the path of the taxi.

The driver slammed on the brakes. Tires screeched against the asphalt, burning rubber filling the air.

The car jerked to a halt inches from her legs.

Mia collapsed onto the hood, screaming as if she'd been hit by a freight train. It was Oscar-worthy.

Then I heard the roar of an engine.

Dante's black sports car peeled out of the garage exit, like a beast released from a cage.

He saw the taxi. He saw Mia draped dramatically on the hood.

But he didn't see the brake lights.

He saw his wife in a car that had just "hit" his precious donor and was trying to flee.

The engine roared louder.

"Crazy bastard!" the taxi driver yelled, looking in the rearview mirror, his eyes widening in panic.

Dante rammed us.

The impact was deafening. Bone-jarring.

Metal crunched. Glass exploded in a glittering shower.

My head slammed against the partition.

Stars burst behind my eyelids, bright and blinding.

The world tilted sideways.

The taxi spun, careening out of control until it crashed into a parked delivery truck with a sickening thud.

Silence followed the chaos. A heavy, ringing silence.

My vision was blurry. Blood ran warm down my neck, soaking into my collar.

Through the shattered side window, I saw Dante leap from his car.

He didn't run to the taxi.

He ran to Mia.

She was standing by the curb now, miraculously unharmed, dusting off her white dress as if she had simply tripped.

Dante fell to his knees in front of her, his hands checking her face, her arms, her legs, frantic with worry.

"Did he hit you?" Dante roared, his voice shaking with rage. "Did she tell him to hit you?"

Mia was sobbing, pointing a trembling finger at the wreckage I was trapped in.

"She told him to keep going, Dante! She saw me and told him to drive!"

Dante stood up.

He turned toward me.

His face was a mask of pure, unadulterated hatred. A stranger's face.

"Don't you dare touch her," he screamed at me through the broken glass. "If you hurt one hair on her head, Elena, I will end you."

I sat there, pinned between the seat and the crumpled door.

My head was bleeding. My arm was throbbing in rhythm with my heartbeat.

And my husband was threatening to kill me for a crime I didn't commit, to protect a monster in a white dress.

A bubble of laughter rose in my throat.

It started low, a rasping sound, scraping against my windpipe.

Then it grew.

I laughed.

I laughed as the blood dripped onto my lap. I laughed until my ribs ached and tears streamed down my face.

It was the sound of a mind finally snapping under the weight of a lie.

The taxi driver looked at me in horror. "Lady, are you okay?"

I stopped laughing. The sound cut off abruptly.

I reached into my purse with shaking hands. I pulled out a stack of cash—emergency money I'd been hoarding for a rainy day. I just didn't realize the storm would look like this.

I threw it into the front seat.

"For the damage," I said, my voice eerily calm.

I kicked the door open, ignoring the protest of twisted metal.

I didn't look at Dante. I didn't look at Mia.

I walked down the street, blood dripping from my fingertips, flagging down another cab to take me to the ER.

Alone.

Elena Rossi POV

Dante didn’t come home for three days.

He claimed he was "handling the legal fallout" of the accident.

Translation: he was paying off the taxi company to bury the evidence and comforting Mia between the silk sheets of a five-star hotel.

I spent those seventy-two hours packing.

Not clothes. Not jewelry. Nothing that would be missed at a glance.

I packed the essentials: my mother’s gold locket, the first edition of *The Great Gatsby* my father gave me—bulky, but non-negotiable—and my passport.

I wedged the duffel bag deep into the ventilation shaft behind the guest closet, screwing the grate back in place with trembling fingers.

When Dante finally returned, he strolled into the bedroom as if he hadn't run my taxi off the road just days ago.

"Get dressed," he commanded, tossing a heavy garment bag onto the bed. "We're celebrating."

"Celebrating what?" I didn't look up from my book, though the words blurred before my eyes.

"Mia's donation. The surgery is scheduled for next week. We're having a private dinner at Le Coucou."

"I'm not going."

Dante moved in a blur.

He gripped my chin, his fingers digging into my jaw with bruising force, tilting my head back.

"You are going. You will sit there, you will smile, and you will thank her for saving your father's life. Do you understand?"

I searched his dark eyes for a flicker of the man I once knew.

There was no love left there. Only possession. Only control.

"I understand," I whispered.

The dinner was a torture chamber disguised in velvet and crystal.

Mia sat at the head of the table—my place—surrounded by Dante's captains and their wives.

She was glowing, radiant with false modesty. She held court like a queen, recounting the "accident" with dramatic flair, painting herself as the brave survivor who had endured so much stress.

Dante hand-fed her an oyster, a slick, intimate display that made my stomach turn.

I sipped my ice water, trying to numb the phantom ache radiating from my fractured arm.

"Let's play a game," one of the wives suggested, her voice slurred by expensive vintage. "Truth or Dare."

The empty wine bottle spun on the crisp white tablecloth, a dizzying blur of green.

It slowed, wobbled, and stopped.

Pointing directly at me.

"Truth or Dare, Elena?" Mia asked, her eyes gleaming with predatory delight.

"Truth."

The chatter at the table died instantly.

"What's the best gift you've ever given Dante?" Mia asked, leaning forward, a challenge in her smile.

Dante smirked, swirling the red liquid in his glass. He expected me to say my virginity, my unwavering loyalty, or some other pathetic offering he felt entitled to.

I looked him dead in the eye, my gaze steady and cold.

"I haven't given it yet," I said.

"Oh?" Dante raised a dark eyebrow. "Is it a surprise?"

"You could say that." I forced a smile. It felt like a blade between my lips. "I am giving you a very large, very permanent gift soon."

The table murmured in approval. They thought I meant a Ferrari. Or maybe a child—an heir to his empire.

Dante looked pleased, his ego sufficiently stroked. "I look forward to it."

I picked up my glass.

"To gifts," I toasted.

I drained the wine in one swallow.

It tasted like freedom.

He didn't know the gift was my absence.

And by the time he unwrapped it, I would be nothing more than a ghost.