They All Planned My Death, I Wrote My Own Ending

After Victor left, I sat by the window for a long time.

The syringe lay on the tea tray, the cap still on the needle.

If I pushed the plunger all the way, my heart would stop for ten hours.

Once the coffin was out of the city, someone would open it and send me on to Switzerland.

Victor had even taken care of my new passport.

Irene Harper. Twenty-four. Single. A spotless record.

Luna, my maid, was packing away the couture wedding dress I was supposed to wear tomorrow night. Her tears splashed onto the silk skirt.

"You were up past midnight trying it on, Ms. Ada. You said one bead was crooked and insisted on taking it off and sewing it back on."

She was right.

Just last night, Victor had been down on one knee, fixing the crystals on my hem.

He'd said that once tomorrow night's ceremony was over, no one would ever dare whisper about me behind my back again.

I'd looked at the scar on his shoulder from the bullet he'd taken for me, and I'd actually believed him.

For three years, the whole underworld had said cold-blooded Victor had lost his mind over me. There was nothing he wouldn't let me get away with.

But there was one line he never crossed.

He had never actually slept with me.

I used to think it was because he was a gentleman at heart and didn't want to force me.

Only today did I understand.

He'd known all along that Leo was alive. Of course he wasn't going to touch his most valuable capo's fiancée.

I was just a bloodstained prop he'd put on display for the FBI. Bait.

Now Leo was back with his medals, the show was over, and it was time to sweep me out like trash.

High heels clicked in the hallway.

Vera came in with two maids, sat right down on my chaise, and lifted the wedding dress with one finger.

"French lace, hand-sewn. How extravagant.

"Too bad you'll never get to wear it down the aisle, sweetie."

She was the youngest daughter of an Italian mafia elder and, on paper, the woman Victor was supposed to marry to secure an alliance.

From the moment I arrived at the estate, she'd fought me over everything.

Ever since I'd been locked up there, she'd found one way after another to torment me.

She'd never dared go too far before because she was afraid of Victor's temper.

Today, though, she was smiling like she'd won.

"Victor says this suite is mine now."

She snapped her fingers lazily.

"Throw out all of this filthy woman's things. Especially the dress.

"I don't want my room reeking of a dead whore."

Luna snatched the dress back.

"The Don had a designer in Paris make this especially for Ms. Ada!"

Vera burst out laughing.

"The wedding's off. What's the point of keeping it?

"Pry off all the diamonds. They'll look perfect on my evening gown."

The maids stepped forward at once.

I pinned the dress down with my hand.

"Don't touch it."

Vera leaned down to taunt me, her red lips nearly brushing my ear.

"You really thought Victor would marry secondhand goods like you?

"Last night over drinks, he told me himself that you're still Leo's woman.

"Pretending is one thing. But he'd never touch the fiancée of an undercover hero."

She bent closer, and her smile only got sharper.

"Tell me, sweetie. In three years, has he slept with you even once?"

My knuckles went white.

That first year, I hated Victor.

I swallowed sleeping pills. I cut my wrists. I even drove a broken bottle clean through his collarbone.

He was covered in blood, but he never reached for his gun. He just wiped himself off and said he'd wait until I calmed down.

Later, I finally stopped fighting him. One stormy night, I curled up in his arms of my own accord.

He went rigid. In the end, he only pulled the blanket tighter around me and promised in a rough voice that we had all the time in the world.

I used to cry under the covers, touched by how much he held himself back for me.

Now I understood. He hadn't been waiting for me to come around.

He'd been waiting for Leo to close the net.

Right then, the door swung open.

Victor walked in.

Vera hooked her arm through his at once.

"Victor, nobody's going to use this dress anyway. Can I have the diamonds? Please?"

Victor glanced coldly at the dress.

"Do what you want."

One of Vera's maids whipped out a pair of scissors and cut straight through the expensive lace.

Victor had spent three months in Paris going over sketches with me before we settled on that dress.

The day of the fitting, he asked if I liked it.

Just to be difficult, I said it was too much. That night, though, I had Luna draw the curtains and twirled in front of the mirror again and again.

I looked at him.

"You never touched me. Was that because Leo was alive?"

Victor was quiet for a moment.

"He put his life on the line for the family. I couldn't actually steal his fiancée."

Vera leaned against his shoulder and gave me a smug look.

Victor didn't push her away. He said gently, "Ada, I know this feels unfair.

"But I treated you well for three years.

"Once you're in Switzerland, you'll have more money in your account than you could ever spend. You'll be set for life."

He wasn't wrong.

When I ran a high fever, he stayed up with me all night. When I woke screaming from nightmares, he held me until dawn.

Even if all that kindness was fake, at least I hadn't known it then.

I'd even secretly vowed to wear that dress and stay by this mob tyrant's side all the way to hell.

So when I finally let go of Leo's death and turned to hold him, what had he been secretly laughing at?

He was probably thinking that the idiot had finally taken the bait, and now Interpol would believe every bit of it.

The scissors ripped through the fabric with a grating screech. Tiny diamonds from the skirt scattered across the floor.

Vera left on Victor's arm.

I stared at the diamonds at my feet and suddenly remembered that just last night, he'd talked about seeing me wear it to the altar.

So the tomorrow I'd been waiting for wasn't a wedding.

It was an obituary he'd written for me himself.