The Don Didn't Recognize His Own Son

The day Lorenzo got kidnapped by a rival family, I found out I was three months pregnant.

I took the million dollars his father offered, and I ran.

The next time we met, I looked him in the eye and told him I'd been a mole for the rival family the whole time.

He was chained up in a cellar, staring at me through the iron bars utterly despairing.

He said he'd kill me himself, and then grind my bones to dust.

Seven years later, when I saw him again, there was a beautiful woman on his arm. They were getting married.

And I was so far down I had to beg him for a loan.

He pulled out a thick stack of bills. Lit it on fire right in front of me.

He said he'd rather burn it than give it to some whore feeding another man.

He didn't know I was begging because my son was dying.

His son too.

Seven years after we ended, when I had no one left to turn to, I saw Lorenzo again.

It was the hundredth-anniversary reunion at our old high school. Nobody expected him to show up.

Someone laughed. "You were such a loner in high school. Can't believe you actually came."

"Oh, he's not here for the classmates." Another girl glanced at me, smirking behind her hand. "He's here for the ex."

The whole group started in.

I went stiff.

"Tch. As if she's worth it."

It was Lorenzo's voice, cold. I looked up.

Where I was shabby and broke, he was every inch a man with money.

Hair slicked back, not a strand out of place. Jaw shaved clean.

His mouth was a sharp line. His grey-brown eyes narrowed at me, and there was something violent moving underneath.

I was the only one who knew how soft those eyes used to be.

My chest tightened. I dropped my gaze before he could see anything in mine.

He was the only son of the Moretti family. The next Don. And somehow he'd fallen for me anyway.

To give me a normal life, he walked away from all of it. The family. The name. Everything he was born into.

He walked away from the throne laid right before him, just to hold my hand tight.

We lived in a tiny apartment. Nothing special. We were happy.

It was like salt. Plain on its own, but it made everything taste better.

When we were tangled up at the end of it, he liked to rest his head on my chest.

He used to say our hearts beat at the same speed when we were like that. He said I was his rib, his one and only, forever.

Then they took him. Locked him in a cellar.

His father, the old Don, offered me a million dollars to walk away.

I went to him. I told him I was a mole sent by the enemy family. I held up the check so he could see it.

He just stared at me, his face cut up by the iron bars.

"You're lying. Liana, you're lying."

"A million dollars? I'll earn it. I'll work and I'll give every cent to you—"

I bit down on my lip and didn't say a word.

I could taste rust. I swallowed the blood with everything else.

"Say something. Is someone forcing you? Just say something."

He smashed his forehead against the bars, over and over, until blood ran down his face.

I turned around. Bit my lip. Walked away.

Behind me, he was screaming.

He said he was going to kill me himself. He said he'd grind my bones to dust.