Chapter 1

He whispered her name nine hundred and ninety-nine times in his sleep.

Never mine.

Those numbers carved themselves into me, sharp as glass. They were proof of everything I had refused to admit—that no matter how much I gave, I would never be enough. Alessia was not a shadow I could erase. She was his beginning and his end.

But I didn’t reach that truth in one night. It came slowly, quietly, building with every evening I spent in silence inside the Bonanno estate.

Every night was the same. I set his favorite dishes on the table—seasoned exactly how he liked them, steaming at the perfect moment. I drew his bath with rose petals and lit the candles he once said he liked. I polished his slippers until they gleamed by the door.

And then, at nine o’clock sharp, the front door opened. Vincent Bonanno—heir to one of the most powerful mafia dynasties in Europe—stepped inside. His presence filled the hall, but his eyes never found me.

I slipped his jacket from his shoulders, placed his shoes at his feet, and asked softly,

“Dinner first, or a bath?”

“Bath,” he murmured, eyes locked on his phone.

Later, when he emerged in a robe, I handed him his clothes, laid the table again, and carried the food out once more. He scrolled, distracted, the glow of the screen reflecting in his dark eyes. And then I saw it—just for an instant—the name flashing across the top.

Alessia.

I turned away, pretending not to notice, just as my own phone buzzed. The name froze my breath: Madam Bonanno.

“Valentina,” her voice came low and tired. “Are you truly leaving Vincent?”

My gaze slipped toward the garden, where a white lily bloomed under the night sky. My voice trembled, but I forced the words out.

“You know the truth, Madam. I loved him from the very beginning. That’s why I married him. But love alone isn’t enough. Not when his heart has always belonged to someone else.”

She sighed, guilt heavy in her voice.

“I know the pain you’ve endured. I had hoped your devotion would move him, but… his heart never wavered. If you still want to study abroad, or start again elsewhere, I’ll arrange it. You’ve wasted enough years on him.”

Five years. Five years of sacrifice, of pouring myself into a marriage built on shadows. I closed my eyes and whispered, “Yes. Please help me leave. I want this to be over.”

When the call ended, the lily outside had already begun to wither, collapsing into the night air—just like the vows I had fought so desperately to keep alive.

I was never meant for Vincent. I was the poor girl whose scholarship had been paid by the Bonanno family, plucked from nothing as a favor. I had come to thank them—naïve, sincere. But when I saw Vincent Bonanno for the first time—golden, untouchable, admired—I fell in love.

When Alessia abandoned him, I was the one who stayed. I thought if I loved enough, gave enough, I could fill the void she left behind.

So I cooked, cleaned, remembered every stray detail. Once, he told me he had never seen the stars fall. I found the highest mountain, the perfect place to watch meteors streak the sky. I waited for him under the cold heavens.

But he never came.

He was with Alessia.

And later, when her marriage collapsed, he flew across oceans to bring her gifts in secret—flowers, trinkets, little gestures to make her smile. I knew. I always knew.

When he crashed his car racing to see her return, I sat by his hospital bed for three sleepless nights. And when he stirred at last, his lips parted, whispering her name—again and again.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine times.

Never once mine.

Now, Alessia has returned. Vincent is whole again.

And I?

I am finally free to leave.

But after five years of sacrifice and silence, could I really walk away from the man I once loved more than my own dreams—

and never look back?