A recording of their plot, for our entire world to hear.
Chapter 1
Anya POV:
They told me Isabella was dead. For five years, I believed them.
Then I saw her ghost in the hallway of a private clinic, holding the hand of a little boy with my husband's eyes.
My world didn't just crack. It atomized.
Five years ago, on the eve of my wedding to Dante Moretti, the Don of the Moretti family, I brought my father the proof. Proof that my cousin, Isabella, had tried to have me drugged and assaulted, to ruin the alliance between our families. My father, Don Vittorio Marino, and Dante stood before me, their faces like stone, and swore vengeance. They assured me she was a traitor and would be dealt with the way traitors are.
"She will never hurt you again," Dante had vowed, his thumb brushing away a tear on my cheek. "She is gone."
Gone. In our world, that word was a final, heavy stone. It meant a quiet car ride, a shallow grave. It meant she was erased.
And I, the dutiful daughter, the perfect Mafia wife, believed them. I built my life on that lie, on that hollowed-out space where a cousin used to be.
Now, that lie was staring back at me from across the polished marble floor.
Isabella hadn't aged a day. Her dark hair was a glossy curtain, her smile the same sly curve I remembered. But the man beside her, the man whose hand she squeezed, was the real shock. Dante. My husband.
And the boy. He couldn't be more than four. He had Dante's jet-black hair, the strong set of his jaw, and a pair of startlingly familiar grey eyes. My husband's eyes.
They looked like a family. The way Dante's hand rested on the boy's shoulder, the easy intimacy in Isabella's laugh as she leaned into him. It was a perfect, sun-drenched portrait of a life I knew nothing about.
"We can't be late, Leo," Isabella's voice drifted down the corridor. "Daddy promised to take you for ice cream after your check-up."
Leo.
Daddy.
The words were simple, innocent. But they landed like bullets. My knees gave out. The cold, polished floor met my hands and knees with a dull thud. I couldn't breathe. The truth was a physical weight, pressing down on my chest, squeezing the air from my lungs.
He was my husband.
He was her lover.
And that little boy was their son.
Five years. A marriage, a life, built on a grave that was never filled. My parents, my husband... they had all lied. They had stood by and watched me mourn a ghost, all while she was living, breathing, and building a family with the man who slept in my bed. I was a placeholder. A tool to keep the peace between the Marino and Moretti families. A gilded canary in a cage of deceit.
My phone buzzed in my pocket, a harsh, unwelcome sound. My mother's name flashed on the screen. Sofia Marino. I stared at it, a bitter laugh bubbling in my throat. Of course. Her timing was impeccable.
I swiped to answer, my voice a stranger's, thin and reedy. "Hello, Mother."
"Anya, darling. I was just calling to check on you. You sounded a bit under the weather this morning." Her voice was a smooth caress, laced with the practiced concern of a politician's wife. But today, I heard the steel beneath it. She wasn't checking on my health. She was checking on the lie. On Omertà, the code of silence.
"I'm fine," I lied, pushing myself up, my legs trembling. "Just admiring some art at a new gallery downtown."
A pause. Too long. A silence filled with calculations I was only now beginning to understand.
"A gallery? That's lovely, dear. Don't be out too late. Dante will worry."
The call ended. The lie hung in the air between us. She knew I wasn't at a gallery. And I knew she knew. The emergency response of their corrupt system was already in motion.
Ten minutes later, he appeared.
Dante Moretti moved like a storm contained in a bespoke suit. The air crackled around him. Nurses flattened themselves against the walls. Doctors averted their eyes. His power was a tangible thing, an aura of quiet menace that demanded submission. His name was a weapon, whispered in the darkest corners of the city. He'd inherited the Moretti empire at twenty-five and in a decade, doubled its reach through blood and strategy. He was respected. He was feared.
He was my husband.
His eyes, the same grey as his son's, scanned the hallway and landed on me. Relief flickered across his face, but it was quickly replaced by something else. Urgency. Control.
He strode toward me, ignoring the blood that must have drained from my face. He didn't ask if I was okay. He didn't touch me.
His first words were not of comfort. They were an interrogation.
"What are you doing here?" he asked, his voice low, a quiet command.
I just stared at him, the face I had loved, the face that had become a mask.
He took a step closer, his gaze sweeping the corridor, checking for threats. The threat was me. I was the breach.
"Anya. Did you see anyone? Did you talk to anyone?"
The questions were sharp, precise. He wasn't a husband concerned for his wife. He was a Don managing a crisis. The lie was exposed, and his only instinct was to contain the damage. The guilt was a shadow in his eyes, but his authority, his need to control the narrative, was stronger.
He reached for my arm, his grip firm, proprietary. The owner reclaiming his property.
"Tell me what you saw."
---
/0/94132/coverbig.jpg?v=621a754818b78bb62df89ffbc3c352e9)
View More Comments on App
/0/93904/coverbig.jpg?v=912253abbf3ed9e53768007339eb0705)
/0/94136/coverbig.jpg?v=aebf964c9faf1dc65f912ec7461c3ee9)
/0/92001/coverbig.jpg?v=f4967ec64b7201693bd0990b07125220)
/0/89295/coverbig.jpg?v=f22582a4dd9eec7eecff56829622d2c6)
/0/90266/coverbig.jpg?v=8d0db191556f24a77430823b1ef029c0)
/0/89213/coverbig.jpg?v=c48768381d82b76d4ea0f39656970b34)
/0/74956/coverbig.jpg?v=15e883502ffbb53e6d56b42347b1326e)
/0/82937/coverbig.jpg?v=2907194aa510c647b04f7cba8770d5c5)
/0/75796/coverbig.jpg?v=7fa49608a32ed5c0cfde642b9545384e)
/0/89903/coverbig.jpg?v=5922b03470d4e546314f005371db6aca)
/0/64082/coverbig.jpg?v=3b6497ddf8ecfa841031756b6c683c74)
/0/72913/coverbig.jpg?v=359f7227b82fb9558a6bba211d39f585)
