Chapter 2

Damon waved his hand, signaling for everyone to leave. Only after everyone else, including Mama and Aurora, had left did he take my hand and press a kiss to the back of it.

"My Liliana, Aurora has been away for too long, and she doesn't know what's happened here. She's always been kind and innocent, albeit a bit blunt, but trust me that she means no malice. Please don't blame this on her."

I coldly shook off his hand.

"Don't you normally detest women fighting each other for love or power, Don Rovelli?" I asked. "So why is it that when it comes to Aurora, you lose all sense of what's right and wrong and just dismiss it like that?

"I guess true love does make you go blind, doesn't it?"

Damon's eyes darkened. A look of pain welled up in them as he replied, "Is that how you see me, Liliana? You're still blaming me for what happened years ago, aren't you?"

Back when I led his Soldata to rescue him from his enemies five years ago, he hadn't exactly been left with no means to fight back. Just as both sides were battered and exhausted, the leader of the enemies suddenly seized me.

The Underboss, Ivan Consoli, had already arrived with reinforcements. Damon only needed to give the order, and I could have been saved immediately.

Instead, he told everyone to hold their positions.

The enemy then began torturing me and subjected me to extremely brutal violence. It wasn't until I was on the verge of death that Damon finally ordered his men to storm in, subdue the leader, and rescue me.

I clutched weakly at his chest, weeping as I demanded to know why he'd just stood by and watched me suffer like that. He simply held me close, tears streaming down his face as he said, "I'm sorry, Liliana, but that deal was a very crucial one.

"If we'd taken them out too early, we wouldn't have been able to secure all of the intelligence we needed to get the deal and establish a stronger foothold in Sivilly."

His reasoning was flimsy at best, but I knew how much he coveted the position of Don, so I chose to believe him then. Besides, it was also the first time that I'd ever seen Damon cry.

But one night, as I passed by Damon's study, I overheard him speaking with Ivan in hushed tones.

"Do you think that Liliana will hate me for what I did?" he asked. "But I promised Aurora that she would be the only one allowed to bear me an heir, the next Don, for the Rovelli family."

I couldn't believe my ears.

That night, I'd returned to my room in a daze, consumed by grief and disbelief. I felt the chill all the way into my bones.

I gazed at our wedding portrait on the wall and broke down in tears.

Until now, everything that I'd sacrificed for him, everything that he'd given me—be it status, money, or love—suddenly seemed like nothing but a cruel, absurd joke. Those sweet promises and tender gestures had been nothing but a slow-acting poison, fed to me just to lull me into a false sense of security.

When Damon saw that I wasn't responding to him, his expression grew distant. He twirled the ring on his finger before slipping it into his pocket, saying, "I need you to calm down, Liliana. Don't act out of spite."

He then turned around, seemingly to step outside for some air. However, someone was already waiting for him at the doorway.

His Capo bowed his head and said, "Don Rovelli, Signorina Aurora is waiting for you in the lounge."

Damon froze and said nothing. I couldn't see the expression on his face as his back was to me, but I knew that he would go to her. After all, I knew all too well just how deeply he had once loved Aurora.

He had lost her at the height of his love and affection for her. Now, there was a chance for him to reclaim what he'd lost, so it was impossible for him to just let it slip away like that.

He suddenly turned around and walked back toward me again, looking like he wanted to say something to me. But before he could get a word out, I cut him off coldly.

"You don't have to tell me where you're going or what you're planning to do with whom."

I was done listening to his lies. If I had to force myself to listen to another one of his lies, I was probably going to puke my guts out.

My cold attitude made Damon very displeased. He frowned and grabbed my chin, forcing me to look into his deep, dark eyes.

"Do you really not want to see me that much?" he demanded. "Have you been itching to leave this place immediately and never come back the moment Aurora returned?"

Damon's eyes roiled with rage and disappointment as he locked gazes with me for a long while before finally letting go abruptly. He then turned on his heels and stormed out, slamming the door behind him with a bang.

I closed my eyes, finding the whole situation absurd.

He was the one whose resolve had wavered first, and yet, now it was as if I were the one who betrayed him first.

Tears finally spilled over uncontrollably and wetted my dress, but I quickly wiped them away fiercely.

Just then, my Mama, Rosalia Pietro, entered the room quietly. She sighed and took my hand.

"Liliana, Aurora won't listen to a word I say. I had no choice but to ask Don Rovelli to speak with her instead.

"Just be more patient with her. She may be a bit stubborn, but she has a kind heart. She would never hurt you—"

I scoffed, my expression impassive.

How could Aurora even be associated with a kind-hearted person at all?

Papa, Mama, and Damon had told me that countless times. But if she were truly the kind-hearted person they all said she was, wouldn't she have considered the consequences of running away from the wedding?

A marriage alliance was not a joke. Once both sides of the families agreed to it, it became a transaction and an alliance between two families, and it was not to be taken lightly—especially not if it involved the Mafia.

If Damon or the forces behind him were to harbor even the slightest dissatisfaction toward the sudden runaway bride, they could have completely destroyed the entire Moretti family with just a snap of their fingers!

I pulled my hand away and looked at Mama coldly.

"Mama, I never imagined that after all these years, you would still favor Aurora so much. You've never truly acknowledged me as your daughter, have you?"

Since I was frail at birth, Papa and Mama sent me away to live with my Nonna. And even though both Aurora and I were their daughters, I wasn't brought back to live with them until I was 18 years old.

Papa and Mama had always doted on Aurora, and she took their exclusive affection for granted. She saw me as superfluous and an eyesore and hated me with all her guts.

Ever since I returned to the Moretti family, she had never stopped trying to frame me for things I never did and making my life miserable. I tried to defend myself and cried out in protest, but Papa and Mama always took her side and punished me every time, no matter who was in the wrong.

No matter how flimsy Aurora's excuses were, they always believed her unconditionally. They'd even often locked me up in the cold, damp basement as punishment just to force me into obeying Aurora's orders.

It wasn't until Aurora ran away from the marriage that they finally remembered me, their younger daughter, languishing in the basement.

Technically speaking, I had only lived six months with Papa and Mama in the Moretti family, and all six of the months were filled with abuse and zero affection.

"Liliana, do you really have no feelings for your Mama at all?" Mama asked, looking me in the eyes, her own filled with sorrow and disappointment.

I just found her question ridiculous. Had she already forgotten everything that happened in the past?

After all the years of neglect, abuse, and favoritism I faced upon returning home, what kind of feelings did she expect me to harbor toward her?

"Have you already forgotten, Mama?" I asked, looking at her calmly. "I'm nothing but a mere substitute for Aurora."