I spun around and fled back into the storm before the scream clawing at my throat could tear free.
The image of his hand claiming her skin seared itself onto the back of my eyelids.
I collapsed onto the cold stone bench in the garden, letting the rain hammer against me, hoping it would wash away the last of my pathetic illusions.
I remembered our first night together.
He had worshipped my body as if it were a holy temple.
Now, he knelt at another altar entirely.
I remained there until the lights in the villa flickered and died, and until my shivering escalated into violent, uncontrollable tremors.
Stumbling back to the servants' quarters, I collapsed onto the narrow mattress.
The fever didn't just hit me; it crushed me like a collapsing building.
I burned.
I hallucinated.
In the haze of my delirium, Dante's deep voice floated through the air.
He was reading.
"And the little rabbit ran all the way home..."
It was the story. The one he had promised to read to our children.
I dragged my heavy limbs to the door, cracking it open just an inch.
He was there in the hallway, standing outside Sofia's room, reading to the closed wood, or perhaps to the unborn life inside.
He turned, and his gaze landed on me.
He took in the sweat slicking my forehead, the glassy, fever-bright sheen of my eyes.
He crossed the distance, placing a hand on my forehead.
It was cool, professional, and utterly devoid of affection.
"You're sick," he stated, his tone clinical.
He offered no comfort. No softness.
Instead, he pulled a key from his pocket.
"I have to quarantine you," he said, stepping back.
"We can't risk the heir getting infected."
He pushed my door shut.
I heard the lock click.
It was the sound of a coffin lid sealing shut.
I screamed silently, my throat too raw and swollen to produce a sound.
I wasn't his love anymore. I was a biological threat.
Hours bled into days.
Sofia ordered the staff to stop bringing me food.
She claimed the trays were a "vector for disease."
I survived on tap water from the bathroom sink, fading in and out of a gray consciousness.
Through the thin walls, the sounds of life drifted in.
Laughter.
The delicate clinking of silverware against china.
I dragged myself to the window, bracing against the sill to look down into the courtyard.
They were having a candlelight dinner.
My favorite meal. Risotto with white truffles.
Dante was smiling.
He looked happy.
He looked... complete.
They were talking, their voices carrying clearly on the crisp night air.
"We need a name for the boy," Sofia said, idly twirling her wine glass by the stem.
Dante paused.
He looked up toward my dark window, though I knew he couldn't see me in the shadows.
"Luca," he said.
My heart stopped beating.
Luca.
That was the name we had chosen.
We had whispered it to each other between sheets, dreaming of a boy with his storm-gray eyes and my smile.
"He calls him Luca," Sofia repeated, testing the weight of it on her tongue. "I like it. A strong name."
She reached across the table, covering his hand with hers.
Dante didn't pull away.
He squeezed her fingers.
"To Luca," he toasted, lifting his glass.
I slid down the wall, curling into a tight, trembling ball on the floor.
He hadn't just stolen my freedom.
He hadn't just stolen my dignity.
He had stolen the future we built in our dreams and gifted it, wrapped in a bow, to the woman who destroyed us.
The gnawing hunger in my stomach was nothing compared to the vast, echoing emptiness in my soul.
I closed my eyes and whispered into the darkness.
"Goodbye, Dante."
And for the first time, I truly meant it.
