Chapter 7

I returned to the Marchetti estate numb all over, like a wandering ghost, and began packing up the things in my room.

The anniversary gifts Salvatore had given me over seven years of the alliance. The name-day presents my brothers had pressed into my hands when we were children, back before the Family taught them what I was worth. Their handwritten letters. Photographs from every stage of my life.

I threw everything I had once cherished without reservation into the fireplace.

As the roaring flames devoured them, the bone-deep chill in my body slowly began to thaw.

I had craved their love so desperately that I lost myself in the process.

Only after paying such a painful price did I finally wake up.

When the fire burned down to ashes, a pair of familiar arms wrapped around me from behind. Even the soldier posted at the door looked away, as if he already knew this was no tenderness at all.

"Serafina, I know this is hard for you right now," he said softly, his voice low and gentle, the very voice I once loved most.

"But Vittoria is sick. All she wants is the union ceremony. You've always been strong. Once the wedding is done and the bloodlines are joined before the bosses, I promise everything will return to how it was."

He swore it like an oath sealed at the table.

I was too tired to respond. I just stared blankly at the ashes before me.

Salvatore didn't notice my silence and continued, "During the preparations, I'll send you to stay at the clinic for a while. Think of it as recuperating."

As he spoke, he pressed a kiss to my hair.

From behind us came Gennaro's voice, sharp with impatience, the voice of a man who spoke for the Family's affairs and expected the room to bend to it.

"Why are you explaining so much to her? From the day Vittoria came back, you should've listened to me and sent her to the sanitarium. Then Vittoria wouldn't have been hurt by her so many times."

I turned around abruptly, my heart pounding wildly as I stared at them.

"You're... sending me to the sanitarium?"

Salvatore grabbed my arm and tried to soothe me. "Serafina, it's only temporary. Once the ceremony is over, I'll bring you back."

Matteo looked at me coldly. "If you want to blame someone, blame yourself. Why did you hurt Vittoria? If we leave you outside these walls, you'll go and ruin the ceremony in front of every Family that matters."

"This is Vittoria's only wish," he said flatly. He cracked one knuckle of his right hand, then another, slow and deliberate. "I won't let you destroy it."

I heard my own voice, eerily calm.

"No. I won't go to the sanitarium. If you're afraid I'll disrupt the ceremony, I can leave. I'll sever the ties and go, and no one will ever hear my name again."

Before I could finish, Salvatore's expression darkened instantly. The signet ring he had been rolling between his fingers went still, and his hand fell flat against his side.

"That's enough. Serafina, I said I'd bring you back. It's just one week. Can't you endure that much?"

"Why should I have to be buried in a sanitarium for Vittoria's wish?" I clenched my teeth. My fingers found the cheap thorn-flower ring and twisted it, twisted it, as if it could hold me to the ground.

"I've already given up my husband. I've already given up my place at the ceremony. Is that still not enough?"

Without another word, Gennaro pinned me down brutally, his face twisted with fury.

"You selfish, vicious bitch. Vittoria has treated you so well, and all she asks is for you to stay behind those doors for a few days. Salvatore is far too soft. I wish I could lock you away for life."

I struggled desperately, trying to break free, but Gennaro held me down with ruthless force, the weight of a made man who had held other people down before.

"Let go of me. I won't go. I can leave, I'll leave."

No one listened.

They looked at me as if I were already insane.

My hands scraped against the floor, leaving streaks of blood, yet no one spared them a glance.

Ten minutes later, I was tied to a bed in the back of the Family's clinic, the kind of room where inconvenient people were made to disappear behind bribed doors.

No one asked for my consent. In this world, no one ever did. That was omertà too, the silence that swallowed a woman whole while everyone in the house pretended not to hear.

I cried and screamed for every passerby to call the Feds, anyone, to send help, but no one came to my aid. Everyone here was bought.

A cold needle pierced my vein.

Vittoria's face appeared before my eyes.

She looked at me with feigned pity and leaned close to whisper in my ear, "I greased every palm in this place. I'm sure this week will be unforgettable for you. Consider it my wedding gift to myself."

I stared at her, biting down hard on my tongue, using pain to fight the creeping drowsiness.

"You... were never sick," I said hoarsely.

Vittoria smiled, a triumphant, childish grin. Her hand rose and pressed flat to her chest, the old gesture of a failing heart, but the fingers pressed a half-beat too early, before the grief could arrive.

"Of course, I wasn't. But no one will ever believe you."

I widened my eyes, thrashing against the restraints until the entire bed shook.

But the world before me still slowly sank into darkness.

The last thing I saw before losing consciousness was Salvatore walking away, his arm wrapped around Vittoria.