Dante POV:
The organ music swelled, reverberating against the vaulted ceiling of St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
Hundreds of eyes were on me. The heads of the Five Families. The politicians on my payroll. They were all here to witness the so-called "unity."
Sofia stood at the altar. Her arm was bandaged, a calculated prop to remind everyone of Elena’s alleged madness. She looked beautiful.
But to me, she looked like a stranger.
"Do you, Dante Moretti, take this woman..." the priest began.
My chest felt tight, as if an iron band were constricting my lungs. A sense of wrongness clawed at my throat. I touched the pocket where I kept Elena’s origami crane, a habit I couldn't break—a talisman against the lie I was living.
Suddenly, a murmur rippled through the pews.
Then a gasp.
I turned.
The massive screens set up to broadcast the ceremony flickered violently. The image of our family crest vanished in a wash of static.
In its place was a video. Grainy, low-light footage.
It was Sofia. But not the demure woman standing in front of me. This woman was wearing leather, dancing on a pole in a club I instantly recognized as a Russian front.
The video cut to her sitting in a booth with a man. A known rival Capo.
"Cracking Moretti is too easy," the woman on the screen laughed, thumbing through a stack of cash. "The wife is a non-factor. And the Don? He's blinded by his own guilt. I'll have the codes in a month."
Silence descended on the cathedral. Heavy. Suffocating.
I looked at Sofia.
Her face had drained of all color. She looked like a trapped rat.
"It's a deepfake!" she shrieked, her voice cracking. "It's Elena! She did this!"
My phone vibrated in my pocket. Then the Capo’s phone in the front row. Then everyone’s—a cascading wave of buzzing that drowned out the organ.
I pulled it out.
*URGENT: EXPLOSION AT SAINT JUDE’S HOSPITAL. VIP WING DESTROYED.*
The world stopped spinning.
The VIP wing. Room 302.
I didn't look at Sofia. I didn't look at the priest.
I ran.
I sprinted down the aisle, shoving past the confused guests. I burst out of the heavy doors and threw myself into my car.
"Hospital!" I screamed at the driver. "Go!"
We tore through the city. Smoke was already visible, a black pillar choking the stars.
When we arrived, it was an inferno. Firefighters were battling the flames, but the third floor was nothing but a skeleton of charred steel.
"Elena!" I roared, trying to push past the police line.
"Sir, you can't go in there!" a cop shouted, grabbing me.
I threw him off. "My wife is in there!"
"The roof collapsed, sir! No one survived the third floor!"
I froze.
No.
She couldn't be dead. She was Elena. She was the light. You can't kill the light.
A firefighter walked out of the smoke, soot streaking his face. He was carrying a plastic evidence bag.
"We found this in the debris of Room 302," he said to his captain, his voice grim. "It survived the heat."
I saw the glint of metal.
I snatched the bag from his hand.
Inside was a diamond ring. *The* ring. The custom setting I had designed myself. The platinum was warped, twisted by unimaginable force, but the diamond was unmistakable.
"No," I whispered.
My knees hit the asphalt.
The roar of the fire faded. The sirens faded.
All I could hear was the sound of my own heart shattering into a million pieces.
