Home / The Don Traded My Life for Her Baby / Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

All Chapters of The Don Traded My Life for Her Baby: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

14 Chapters

Chapter 1

The conversation behind the door went on.They were discussing how to break the news to the elders, how they might react, and what surname the baby would take.But not one word of it was about me.Like they were sure I'd just go along with it.I didn't open the door.Instead, I turned and went back to the main house.In the living room, a maid was carefully helping Aria down the stairs."The Don ordered us to make you fresh broth three times a day, for the baby..."I almost laughed.Everyone in the house had been openly fussing over Aria's pregnancy behind my back. Everyone knew except me.When Aria saw me at the foot of the stairs, she hurried to pull away from the maid."Donna, what are you doing here?"I should have been the one asking her that.I walked up to her slowly, staring at her stomach."How far along are you?"Aria's eyes widened and filled with tears."Donna, what are you talking about? I don't understand..."She was still pretending.I went to the cabinet, pulled out a h

Chapter 2

Leo was our first child, Niccolo's and mine. Our only one.He'd been sick since the day he was born.When the doctor said the words "narrowed airway," Niccolo went white as a sheet.That same day, he put all family business on hold, shut himself in the kitchen with nutrition books, and cooked every one of Leo's meals himself.Leo lived to see his third birthday. Every day, he grabbed his crayons and scribbled white daisies.There were crayon daisies everywhere: on the walls, on the table, even on the hem of my dress.I thought I'd get to watch him grow up.Until the day an enemy hurled a Molotov cocktail into our house.Niccolo threw himself over Leo and me and yelled, "Get out, both of you!"He grabbed the gun from his man and ran back into the fire.Leo was screaming. I held him tight and ran for my life. I didn't know how long I ran.Then I looked down, and he wasn't crying anymore.His face and body had turned a bluish purple. His lips were dark, and his little hands hung limp.I f

Chapter 3

The next day was the family meeting.Early that morning, Niccolo's men brought me to the meeting room and sat me down at the head of the table.Both sides of the long table were full. Everyone looked at me, some with pity, others with contempt.I gripped the arms of my chair and said nothing.The door opened.Giovanna walked in, leading Aria by the hand.Aria was wearing a black dress, with the Valeri snake brooch pinned over her heart.That brooch was the Donna's emblem.Giovanna looked around the room, then pointed at me."Aria, today is your day. Sit beside Niccolo and announce the news with him."Every eye in the room snapped to my face.I didn't move.Aria stood there looking lost, twisting the hem of her dress. She turned to Giovanna."Donna... maybe we should just forget it."Elena took me in and raised me like a sister. If she's not happy about this, I can leave."She turned as if to go.Niccolo shot to his feet. With everyone watching, he walked over and caught her by the wris

Chapter 4

They sent me back to the house.As I walked in, one of his men said to me, "Mrs. Valeri, the Don wants you to hand over the family ledgers. From now on, the Donna will keep them."Mrs. Valeri.I'd barely walked out of that meeting, and already they'd stopped calling me Donna.I shoved the ledgers into his hands."Tell Niccolo to leave me out of family business from now on. His new wife can handle it."Once he was gone, I started clearing out my things.I scraped Leo's drawings off the walls, one by one.Last of all, I poured Leo's ashes into a small cloth bag and tucked it inside my coat.It wasn't until I zipped it shut that I realized six years of my life had fit into one suitcase.I wheeled it out the front door.The night wind slipped through my collar. The wheels rattled over the gravel. Clack, clack.As if they were counting down the last seconds of those six years.Then I heard footsteps behind me.Before I could turn around, something slammed into the back of my head.And then

Chapter 5

The car bounced down the road.Aria was curled up in the back seat, both hands clutching her stomach. "Niccolo, the baby..."Niccolo sat beside her, bracing himself against the roof with one hand, his knuckles white.One of his men turned around in the passenger seat."Don, Ms. Aria's in really bad shape... Should we head to the hospital or go back to the warehouse?"For two seconds, nobody in the car said a word.Niccolo squeezed his eyes shut. The image of my numb, expressionless face flashed through his mind.Then he said, "Hospital first."The man hesitated."But the warehouse...""I said hospital first.""Yes, Don."...The fluorescent lights in the hospital hallway were painfully bright.A doctor came out, pulled off his mask, and sighed at Niccolo."We couldn't save the baby."Niccolo's nails dug into his palms.He'd lost another child.Leo had been dead for three years. This was the second.The first thing he felt wasn't grief. It was numbness.He'd staked everything on this ba

Chapter 6

The car sped through the streets.Throughout the drive, Niccolo kept turning the note over in his hands.All he could think about was getting down in front of me and telling me he'd lost the baby.He wanted to tell me we could go back to the way things were.If he looked desperate and sorry enough when he rescued me, I'd soften.And then I'd lean on him again, the way I had for the last six years.Then the car pulled up outside the warehouse.He was out at once, kicking the door open.His flashlight swept across the room, illuminating nothing but a few bodies.Other than dried blood and drag marks, there was nothing.No sign of me.His eyes widened. He swept the flashlight beam across the corners, the floor, and every inch of the warehouse.But there was no sign of me anywhere.His men searched the whole warehouse and came back looking shaken."Don, we couldn't find any other clues!"It felt like a fist had closed around his heart.Jaw clenched, Niccolo said only, "Find her."Three day

Chapter 7

Niccolo stared down at him."Shit. Even with her life on the line, she was still out for revenge. Gotta hand it to her, though. She actually managed to escape all of us."Luca coughed again. When he looked at Niccolo, there was an odd sort of admiration in his eyes."I chased her all the way out here, and she still got away from me. Gotta hand it to her. Your wife was never meant to sit at home looking pretty."Half his face was smeared with blood, but his eyes still gleamed."Too bad she got stuck with a bastard like you. Regret it now? Wish you'd treated her better? Ha! She's left you behind, and you don't even know where she went!"Niccolo stood there, a vein throbbing in his forehead.All he could think about was what Luca had just told him.I'd held on to that shard of glass. I hadn't been waiting to die. I'd been waiting for my chance.And then, all on my own, I'd taken on a group of grown men and gotten away.For six years, he'd thought he was the one indulging me, taking care o

Chapter 8

Niccolo slowly sank to the floor, his back against the doorframe.He sat there and stared at the wall, scraped clean.So empty it hurt.Except for a single photo still pinned to the wall.He reached up and pried out the pushpin.It was a picture of all three of us.Leo was in the middle, holding up a crayon and grinning at the camera.We'd taken it together on his third birthday.He looked at that photo for a long time.I'd scraped off all of Leo's drawings, but I hadn't taken the photo.I'd left it for him on purpose.He held it by the edges and ran his thumb over my face.The memory came back clear as day. When Leo was alive, the three of us had been happy together.I'd cook. He'd come home for dinner. Leo would be making a racket beside us.At night he'd sit on the couch going over paperwork, and I'd quietly set a glass of water by his hand.Now he finally understood what a home was supposed to feel like.And he was the one who'd torn it apart.It had started long ago, every time he

Chapter 9

I stared at the doctor, stunned.A miscarriage... a week ago?It was absurd.I hadn't known a thing.I closed my eyes."How far along... was I?"The doctor looked at me with pity, and a little caution."About three months. You were still in your first trimester."Three months.I did the math.I had already been pregnant when I found out Aria was carrying his child.I hadn't known it, and neither had Niccolo.I stared at the ceiling, my fingers slowly tightening on the sheet.What if I'd known sooner?What if I'd noticed my period was late that day, bought a test, and seen two pink lines?Would I have stayed?Would I have stood in front of him holding that test and said, "I'm pregnant"?Would he have chosen me?Would that have stopped everything that came after?The questions kept coming. I knew how ridiculous they were.Not because the answer was no. Because I was still stuck on "what if."I shut my eyes for a moment.Even if I'd known sooner, even if I'd shown him the positive pregnan

Chapter 10

Niccolo went pale. He tried to speak."No... it was just an accident. I was drunk that night...""So being drunk makes it okay? I'm supposed to understand and stand by while you protect another woman and wait for her to give birth to your child?"I laughed until tears welled up in my eyes."Niccolo, I should have seen it a long time ago. The only person you've ever really loved is yourself."When I said that, the room went quiet.He gripped the doorframe, his knuckles white.Then he said something so cruel, he probably didn't even realize how much it hurt."Elena, I know you're really hurting right now..."But losing this baby isn't the end of the world. We can go home and try for another."I looked at him."And what makes you think," I said softly, "that I'd ever go back with you?"I threw off the sheet and put my feet on the floor."Our baby is dead. And you already gave up on me."I stood up, the hem of the hospital gown swaying."There's nothing left between us."With that, I walke

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