All Chapters of The Last Thing I Gave Him: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

Dante had truly loved me once. He had stayed up with me designing every floor plan for Il Nido, back when he still stayed up, back when he still said "we built this together." On the night Il Nido opened, he stood at the door with my hand in his and said he hoped our love would last as long as the club. The day I told him I was pregnant, his eyes went red, and he transferred every asset he owned into my name, announcing it in front of the entire family.We were the perfect union. Love and loyalty made flesh.Late that night, I went back to my room and found my phone lit up on the nightstand. Dante had sent two photographs. Serena, changing backstage, adjusting her dress in front of a mirror, her face unreadable. Beneath them, a message from him: "Which one do you think looks better? Serena has a big performance coming up, and you have a good eye. Let me know."I stared at those words until the screen went dark. I did not reply. Before, every photograph would have made me cry until morn

On the anniversary of my mother's death, I wore all black, a single white rose pinned to my chest and stood at the center of the estate's great hall. The guests wore dark colors and spoke in low voices.After paying their respects, they filed past the altar one by one. Members of the family, associates, old friends of my mother's. Everything should have ended quietly. But as I was guiding the staff to seat the guests, a voice came from the doorway, soft but pointed: "Oh... why is everyone wearing black?"I looked up and saw Dante standing at the entrance. Behind him stood a woman holding a cake box tied with a pale blue ribbon, folded neatly. She wore a light dress, her hair half-braided, small pearls hanging from her ears.She leaned forward to look inside. Her gaze moved across the room and stopped on my mother's photograph at the center of the altar, framed by flickering candles. "Oh... today... someone passed away?"She looked down at the cake box in her hands, as if only then real

A wave of absurdity washed over me.In this very room, he and I had drawn the floor plans for Il Nido together, calculated the first year's revenue, discussed which artists were worth signing. Back then, the desk did not have so many empty bottles on it, and the air did not smell like cigarette smoke. Now there were overturned glasses on the rug, and the ashtray was full.I turned and walked out, bent over the sink in the bathroom down the hall, and vomited until the tears and acid came up together.Over the next few days, I packed up everything for the baby. The small clothes, the hand-stitched blankets, the little leather shoes I had asked a friend to bring back from Florence. I wrapped them in paper, put them in boxes, and sent them to the house I owned in Europe. The house sat on a hillside, its windows facing olive groves, far from any Rossetti presence.Dante did not notice. He started sending things to the house instead. Expensive couture dresses, jewelry, boxes of designer chil

After I left the hospital, my car had barely turned off the main road when an unfamiliar dark sedan appeared in the rearview mirror.I did not think much of it at first. It was normal for cars to follow on a suburban road at night.But then I turned at the next curve, and the sedan surged forward, headlights filling the mirror. I pressed the gas, but the other car was faster, pulling alongside and forcing me toward the shoulder. The tires hit gravel.The car jolted and stopped. The door was pulled open, and a hand reached in, grabbed my arm, and dragged me out of the driver’s seat.My shoulder hit the door frame, and the back of my head struck something hard. Before I could react, another hand covered my mouth and pushed me into the back seat.The door slammed shut.A man sitting in the front passenger seat turned to look at me.“Your husband ruined my company. He caused me to lose everything. I want five million dollars as compensation.”He leaned closer.“If you cannot get the money,

The first few days after the hospital, Dante told himself she would come back. She always came back. Every time they had fought, every time she had left the house in the middle of the night, she had always returned by morning. He told himself she just needed time. She needed to cool down. She needed to be alone for a little while, and then she would call, and he would pick her up, and they would go home.He went to the estate. The house was quiet. Her shoes were not by the door. Her coat was not on the hook. He walked through the rooms, checking each one, and found nothing out of place except the absence of her. He told himself she was at the clinic, that she needed rest. He drove to the clinic. The nurse at the front desk looked at him with a face he did not recognize. "She checked out," the nurse said. "Three days ago. She left alone."He stood there for a moment, not understanding. "She left alone?""Yes. She did not leave a forwarding address."He called her phone. It went straight