Chapter 5

I denied it immediately. "I didn't do it."

Then, I glanced at the maid beside us. She lowered her head and scurried away.

I reached out to take the medical spray from Bianca, but she deliberately stepped back.

The pain made it impossible for me to breathe. I collapsed onto the ground and began crawling toward her, inch by inch. If I could get the medicine, it wouldn't hurt this much anymore.

But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't reach Bianca. That short distance stripped away every shred of dignity I'd had over the years.

Bianca sneered down at me and raised the medical spray in her hand. "Sofia, this is proof that you switched the medicine to hurt me. Don't even think about destroying the evidence."

At last, I crawled close enough to grab her ankle. I begged her desperately to let me have it.

However, she twisted the cap open and poured the contents of the entire bottle into the nearby drain.

My blood rushed to my head. I sprang up instinctively, screaming as I grabbed her hand to stop her.

Suddenly, someone yanked me backward. Like a rag doll, I was flung into the muddy flowerbed. My face slammed into the dirt. The pain was so overwhelming that I couldn't make a sound.

All I heard was Bianca's mocking laughter.

When I finally wiped the mud from my eyes, I saw who had dragged me away.

It was Mario. He stood in front of me holding the medical spray.

"Bianca had an allergic reaction. How could you deliberately switch her medicine?" he asked furiously.

"No! That's not true! That's my medicine!" I explained hoarsely.

No one listened.

Bruno and Giuliano had already called for a private doctor as they escorted Bianca away.

They called out to Mario, "Bianca said she won't take the medicine unless all of us are there."

I struggled to my feet in the mud, desperately hoping that someone would reach out a hand to help me. But at my most helpless moment, Mario turned his back on me and ran toward Bianca.

"It wasn't me!" I shouted after him.

Mario didn't even turn his head as he barked, "If anything happens to Bianca, I won't let you get away with it!"

"That's my medical spray! I can't do without it!" I cried.

Giuliano shouted back in annoyance, "Why do you have to make a scene and pester us at a time like this? Are you deliberately trying to stop Bianca from getting better?"

Bruno glanced at me, but the look in his eyes was utterly foreign to me.

I collapsed back onto the ground and picked up the medical spray from the muddy ground. To my dismay, it was empty.

The private doctor and all the maids were fussing over Bianca. No one was around to help get me another bottle of medicine.

If I waited until the private jet arrived, I might die from the pain before it even touched down.

So, I called Matteo. "Can I have the skin graft surgery earlier? Please come get me at dawn tomorrow."

I packed a small carry-on bag and took nothing else with me.

At daybreak the next morning, a helicopter took me away from the castle.

I received countless calls from the three Vipera brothers. They said I had to apologize to Bianca after she recovered. They kept stressing that I owed her my life and that I should know how to behave.

I turned off my phone, removed the SIM card, and threw it into the trash.

On the private jet, my back was drenched with cold sweat because of the intense pain. I clenched my teeth and endured it.

Once I went home, I would begin an entirely new life—one with no ties whatsoever to the Vipera famiglia.

From this moment on, I was the Principessa of the Ferro famiglia—only daughter of Vittorio Ferro, the Don of the most powerful famiglia.