When I finally reached the house and pushed the heavy front door open, the sound of Serafina's sobs filled the living room. She sat on the leather sofa beneath the dim chandelier light, trembling as she cried in Dante's arms. Two of the Moretti soldiers stood near the far wall, gazes averted, hands clasped in front of them as though the scene unfolding on the couch were something sacred and private rather than a performance polished to a shine.
"Dante, I don't want to go through with the alliance marriage. I don't want to marry that lunatic. He's cruel and brutal. The Sisters from previous alliance marriages… they all died." Her voice broke on the word, and her lower lashes fluttered once too quickly before she pressed her face deeper against his shoulder. "Why does it have to be me and not Bianca?"
Dante stroked her back gently. His voice was soothing and tender, the same voice that had once made my chest bloom with warmth and now only hollowed it out. "Don't worry. With me here, no one will dare force you. It doesn't matter who has to go through with the alliance marriage. It won't be you."
My parents immediately chimed in, their voices full of reassurance. My father stood by the liquor cabinet, one thumb tapping once against the marble surface before he spoke, already reducing flesh and blood to arithmetic. "Don't worry, sweetheart. We would never agree to let you go. We'll protect you."
My mother sat in the wingback chair closest to Serafina, smoothing a wrinkle that was not there on the arm of her blouse, her expression already rewriting whatever inconvenient truth might have lingered from the night before. "You're our girl. No one touches you."
I stood silently at the doorway. No one turned to look at me. The soldiers did not shift. The warmth of the room, the low amber glow of the lamps, the faint scent of my father's tobacco, all of it curled around them like a wall I could not enter. Without a word, I walked straight to my room.
The moment the door clicked shut, memories flooded my mind like a relentless tide.
I remembered the time I casually mentioned wanting to see the sunrise. That very night, Dante chartered a private jet to fly me to a remote island. He even built a special observation deck so I could watch the sunrise in comfort. I remembered the feel of the wind at that altitude, how I had believed the whole gesture meant I was irreplaceable to him, as though a man who could reshape a coastline for a woman's whim would never let her stand alone in a hallway while her blood dried on her clothes.
Just to make me smile, he spent hundreds of millions creating a paradise for me. He took me skiing in the Alps, chased the aurora by my side, cooked my favorite dishes again and again and traveled with me to the farthest corners of the world. Every trip had felt like proof. Every meal he set in front of me had tasted like a promise.
Dante documented every moment we spent together, as if each memory was a treasure. Back then, I truly believed he was my one and only. But now I understood that he barely loved me. It was because I was just a passing novelty, a distraction. Something shiny a man picks up because the light catches it, and sets down the moment something shinier cries in his arms on a leather sofa.
I quickly wiped my tears away while I pulled a small recorder from my pocket and took out the memory card. My thumbnail pressed into the inside of my wrist until a pale crescent appeared, steadying the tremor in my hands. I placed the card, along with the prison's surveillance footage, into an envelope and sent it to Sofia.
As I stared at the files on the screen, a bitter taste rose in my throat. At first, I'd only planned to record Serafina pretending to be pitiful in front of Dante and my parents. But in the end, I had also captured proof of her ordering The Sisters to beat me. The footage was ugly. The audio was worse. And now it lived outside this house, outside Moretti reach, in the hands of the only person who would touch a file's edge before pressing play and know whether the truth inside was intact.
The moment the files were successfully sent, I heard familiar footsteps outside my door.
My heart tightened. The door opened quietly. Dante's tall figure appeared in the doorway, backlit by the corridor sconce so that his face was half in shadow. Before I could react, he crossed the room in a few strides and pulled me tightly into his arms. The scent of cedar still clung to him, the same cologne he had worn the first night he kissed me on the rooftop of the Falcone estate, but it only made me feel suffocated now. His arms locked around me the way a man holds something he is not willing to lose but has never learned how to keep.
Dante looked at me as if he was heartbroken. He then rested his chin gently on top of my head before he weakly whispered, "Forgive me, Bianca."
I couldn't help but be stunned in his embrace. My lips pressed together, unable to speak. But Dante didn't seem to mind my silence. He never did. Silence from me had always been permission to him.
He continued speaking softly, as though nothing had happened. "Don't be so hard on Serafina anymore. She's different from you. You're the Moretti Family's biological daughter. You already have everything. Besides, I'll marry you one day."
"But Serafina… she has nothing. It's normal for her to be sensitive. You should try to understand her, to be more patient with her."
"I have everything…"
I muttered those words that tasted bitter, which made me want to vomit. Everything. A name no one honored. Blood no one valued. A place at the table where the chair was never pulled out for me.
So, this was his apology. He didn't come here to truly say sorry. Instead, he came to make excuses for Serafina and to demand that I keep indulging her. The Falcone signet ring on his right hand pressed cold against my shoulder blade where his fingers gripped me, and I wondered if he even noticed the bruises beneath my clothes, the ones his silence had permitted.
Dante thought that a hug and a few soft words would be enough to erase everything. That no matter how deeply he hurt me, I would forgive him like always. Even if just yesterday, he had sent me home bruised, broken and covered in blood.
It seemed that Dante believed he could slap me ninety-nine times… and then hand me a single piece of bone to make me wag my tail and come crawling back.
I lifted my head and looked at his face. My heart ached so fiercely it felt as if it might shatter into pieces. Sadly, he was wrong.
