Chapter 2

The next day, before dawn, the moment I cracked open my door, a brutal force slammed me back against the wall.

"Why do you have to be so damn cruel?" he hissed, his voice raw and reeking of whiskey. "Is this what makes you happy? Sending Sofia to her death in Ashpoint?"

His large, bony hand tightened on the collar of my sleep dress, twisting the fabric. My skin burned where it scraped against the wall.

A maid cried out in alarm and tried to intervene. Without turning his head, he shot her a venomous look.

"Get out."

The maid scrambled away, trembling.

Dante's eyes were bloodshot, the stench of alcohol rolling off him. He had clearly spent the night drowning himself in a bottle.

"Sending her to be tortured by that mad wolf, is that what you wanted?" he snarled. "Was this your plan all along?"

"Dante, let go," I said, my voice tight with pain.

But his grip only tightened.

"This is the real you, isn't it?" he spat, his voice laced with derision. "Selfish. Cold-blooded. You'd sacrifice your own sister just to get what you want."

His face was so close his breath was a hot, vengeful whisper against my ear.

"Did you really think that just because the Don forced a ring on my finger, I would ever bow to you?"

I froze.

The raw, undisguised hatred on his face was the same look he gave me right before he took those bullets for me in our past life.

He shook me again, the force of it sending me stumbling back into the dressing table.

With a loud clatter, the only thing my mother had left me slid toward the edge.

I lunged for it, but in his drunken rage, he was too strong. He grabbed my wrist and pinned it against the wall.

With a sickening crash, the crystal box hit the floor.

The broken melody stopped abruptly on its last, fragile note. Shards of crystal scattered across the floor.

I watched the glittering fragments fly and broke free with all my might to gather them. The moment my hand touched the floor, a sharp piece drove deep into my palm. Blood seeped from between my fingers, trickling onto the shattered remains.

I didn't make a sound, but he froze.

His bloodshot eyes lowered to the blood on my hand, to the pieces on the floor that could never be whole again, to the only memento from my mother he had just destroyed.

His Adam's apple bobbed.

For a fleeting moment, regret flickered in his eyes.

"...I'm sorry," he said, his voice low. "I drank too much."

I turned away, hiding my bleeding hand in the sleeve of my dress.

"The marriage with Ashpoint was the Don's decision," I said. "But the outcome is exactly what you wanted."

As I spoke those last words, a dull ache scraped at my chest.

Behind me, he let out a low, bitter laugh.

"With you in this family," he said, "what chance does Sofia even have?"

I spun around, but he was already gone.

I let the blood drip from my palm, my fingers clenching.

Don't worry, Dante, I thought. This time, I won't cling to you anymore.

Less than half an hour later, one of his men nervously handed me a small black box.

Inside was a jar of hemostatic ointment. It was an expensive, custom-made salve available only to the family's inner circle. Only Dante kept it in his safe.

I didn't touch it. I knew this kind of cheap atonement had nothing to do with love.

When his parents died in a firefight years ago, my father brought the boy into our home. He grew up alongside us, the Falcone children.

In his eyes, I had always been the spoiled, arrogant eldest daughter.

The one who saw him as her future husband, mistaking his deference for affection. I had been mistaken my whole life.

I closed the lid and tossed the box into the trash.

I could have made him stop hating me. I could have stopped us from torturing each other.

But I didn't.

The blood of the mafia runs in my veins, and with it comes a stubborn, vengeful streak.

If he was so determined to see me as the villain, then I would let him stew in his misguided hatred for a few more days. Three more days.

In three days, a private jet to Ashpoint would be on the tarmac. In three days, the bride's true identity would be revealed.

When that day comes, he will face the truth.

I told myself I had let him go.

The path I had laid out was clean and decisive, with no lingering attachments and no turning back.

But that night, lying in bed and staring at the unlit chandelier, I understood something. Even though I had resolved to tear him from my heart, a part of me was still waiting.

Not for his love or his apology. I just had a morbid need to know what expression he would wear when he finally discovered the one being sent to her death was me.

Would he feel liberated? Would he think fate had finally righted itself, that Sofia was safe and he could now protect the one he held so dear?

Or would there be a flicker of remorse? For pinning me against the wall, for the vicious words he threw at me, for that ounce of warmth he always refused me?

I didn't know which would hurt more.

I only knew that no matter the answer, my chest ached with a suffocating pain.

But I bit my lip, forcing the emotion down. I told myself none of it mattered anymore.

Whether it was his wish come true or his deepest regret, in this life, I would not be the one to pay the price.