Chapter 3

After Victor left, I sat dead on the floor.

My empty eyes dropped to my flat stomach. A violent wave of nausea rushed up my throat.

I did five rounds of IVF to give him this so-called Costello heir. My belly was horribly covered in thick clusters of needle marks. Purple and blue, hard lump after hard lump. Not a single inch of intact skin.

On the operating table, the sharp pain of cold metal tools scraping inside me brought out buckets of cold sweat.

Every time I shook from the pain and bit my lip bloody, Victor would hold my hand tightly. He would look at me with those deep, loving eyes and kiss the sweat off my forehead.

"Hold on a little longer, Vivienne," he used to tell me in his deep, magnetic voice. "I want a child with both our blood so badly. It's proof that we saved each other."

Saved each other.

Now, those sugar-coated lies turned into the most wicked curse!

I stared at the bruises on my belly, trembling violently. When he watched me endure a living hell, ruining my own body for him, what the hell was he thinking? Was he thinking about how jealous Dominic would be when he saw me pregnant?

I actually threw half my life away for a madman's revenge game!

Memories crashed in like a broken dam. They tasted like rust and blood, tearing at my fragile nerves.

It was fifteen years ago in the Brooklyn slums. Dominic wasn't a Mafia Don back then. He was just a low-level thug who could get hacked to death in the streets at any moment. Rainy nights in New York were always freezing. I will never forget that abandoned garage.

Dominic was hunted down by enemies. He lay in a muddy puddle, covered in blood, coughing up blood.

It was me. I starved myself every day, saving all my lunch money to buy expensive black-market antibiotics and bandages. To protect his pathetic pride, I slipped the meds under the crack of the garage door in secret. I did it for three whole years.

One winter, an enemy’s knife aimed straight for his heart. I threw myself in front of him, taking the blade meant for his heart! My back still has an ugly ten-inch scar to this day.

I thought risking my life would earn me his true love.

But what did I get at our high school graduation?

I stood in a dark corner of the hall, clutching a greeting card I bought for him. I watched with my own eyes as Dominic, in a cheap suit, grabbed Chloe's hands excitedly.

"Chloe, I found out everything. For the past three years, if you hadn't secretly slipped me those meds, I would’ve died in that gutter." Dominic's eyes were full of crazy gratitude. "You saved my life."

And my so-called "best friend" Chloe just blushed shyly and leaned into his arms.

"I just wanted you to be safe, Dominic."

Hiding in the shadows, my heart was ripped to shreds.

But I was too stupid. I thought if I stayed by his side, he would eventually see who really loved him. Later, they broke up. Dominic fought his way up in the mob. I stayed with him in unheated basements, washing the blood out of his shirts.

He finally made it. He became the Boss of the Russo family and married me.

I thought I had finally won.

But the very first thing he did after reaching the top was bring Chloe into our home.

I bit my lip hard, tears streaming down my face.

Neither of them ever loved me. Dominic loved Chloe, his so-called "savior" from his darkest days. And the safe haven Victor built with everything he had was also for Chloe, the woman who betrayed him.

The three of them were tangled in a twisted, sick game—but they dragged me down to skin me alive.