Chapter 1

Saint Antonio Pier should have been buzzing today.

With the legendary, mysterious Don Lorenzo de Santis due to arrive, the entire Rossi family was on edge.

"No outsiders! Get lost!"

Marco, the gate supervisor, shoved me aside roughly.

I lost my balance completely and stumbled backward, crashing into someone's solid chest.

"Sorry, I—"

"Vito Rossi?"

I turned to apologize, then froze the second I saw who it was.

Seeing me, Vito Rossi's eyes flashed with surprise, but he quickly masked it.

He frowned slightly and stepped back, cold.

Marco caught his expression and went pale.

"Mr... Mr. Rossi!"

"Don't be angry, sir. There's some woman here causing trouble. I bet she figured out someone important was coming today. Probably trying to get inside to seduce you, or maybe crawl straight into your bed! I'll get rid of her right now!"

He waved his baton at me threateningly.

Vito's face darkened. He raised a hand to stop him. "Enough."

I was a little surprised.

Vito let out a cold laugh and looked at me.

"Three years. Cecilia, I thought after you left me you'd make something of yourself. Turns out you're here staging some reunion stunt? If you walked away without a word back then, why come back now? Begging for my pity? Or begging me to take you back?"

In that instant, every memory from three years ago came flooding back.

Vito Rossi used to be my fiancé.

Because of some bullshit betrayal charge, he locked me in a moldy dungeon.

Hunger. Whip marks. Guards humiliating me.

While Vito danced with socialites upstairs in the ballroom, I was curled up in damp straw, trying to count my own ribs just to stay alive—that time taught me one thing for sure: I didn't need him.

But I wasn't that orphan begging for his mercy anymore.

I was the long-lost daughter of the Hernandez family. I was the wife of Lorenzo—the Don whose name alone made Vito tremble.

Before I could speak, Vito went on. "Cecilia, don't stand here making a scene. I spent three months begging for this meeting with Don Lorenzo. In a minute I have to treat his wife like royalty. I don't have time to hear your excuses about running off three years ago."

I looked at Vito's face—arrogant and fawning at the same time—and couldn't help but smile coldly.

So he knew Lorenzo worshipped his wife, but he had no idea the "royalty" he was about to grovel to was standing right in front of him, getting insulted.

"Say something. Don't play dead."

Vito saw my expression and frowned harder.

I took a deep breath. I didn't feel like digging up old dirt, so I just looked at him and said, "Aren't you here to pick me up? Let's go."

With that, I turned coldly and tried to step around him.

But he stretched out his arm and blocked my path.

"Pick you up?" Vito sounded like he'd just heard the joke of the year, his tone dripping with mockery. "Cecilia, haven't seen you in three years and you still can't lie for shit."

"Vito, darling? What's going on?"

A sugary voice drifted over from behind him.

I looked up.

Isabella, dressed in a white lace gown, clung to Vito's arm, her thin heels clicking as she walked over. She looked like some kind of saint, wearing that sickeningly graceful smile.

"Cecilia? Is that you?" She saw me and covered her mouth in exaggerated shock. "I thought you'd been dead for three years. Vito, why didn't you tell me she was still alive?"