Die verstoßene Chirurgin und ihre stille Rache

Dreißig Tage vor unserer Hochzeit hielt ich nicht mein Ehegelübde in den Händen, sondern eine Krankenakte, die bestätigte, dass mein Verlobter ein Kind mit einer anderen Frau gezeugt hatte.

Dante De Rossi, der Unterboss von Chicago, saß mir gegenüber und erklärte mit einer Stimme, die völlig frei von Reue war: „Es ist geschäftlich, Nina. Das Kind sichert den Frieden.“

Die Mutter des Kindes war Isobel, die Tochter unseres Rivalen. Die Frau, die behauptete, ihm vor Jahren das Leben gerettet zu haben.

Eine Lüge. Ich war es gewesen, die ihn damals in der dunklen Gasse gefunden und zusammengeflickt hatte, während er im Delirium schrie. Doch als Tochter eines einfachen Soldaten hatte ich geschwiegen. *Omertà.*

Und nun benutzte er genau dieses Schweigen, um mir das Herz herauszureißen. Er erwartete, dass ich brav am Altar stehe, während die Mutter seines Erstgeborenen in der ersten Reihe sitzt.

Er hielt mich für sein Eigentum. Er glaubte, ich würde einfach nicken und lächeln.

Doch er sah nicht, dass ich in diesem Moment nicht mehr seine Verlobte war, sondern wieder die Chirurgin. Und ich hatte gerade beschlossen, den verfaulenden Teil meines Lebens zu amputieren.

Während er glaubte, ich würde die Tage bis zur Hochzeit zählen, plante ich meine Flucht nach Mailand.

An dem Tag, an dem ich eigentlich „Ja“ sagen sollte, würde er nur ein leeres Haus und eine Nachricht auf dem Wandkalender finden:

„Wir sind fertig, Dante.“

Kapitel 1

Nina Romano POV

Thirty days before I was due to walk down the aisle, I wasn’t holding my wedding vows.

Instead, I was gripping a medical file that confirmed my fiancé had fathered a child with another woman to secure an inheritance that excluded me.

The file didn’t shake, because my hands were steady.

That was the training.

As a surgeon for the Outfit, I had learned to staunch hemorrhages while men with drawn guns stood behind me.

But this wasn’t a gunshot wound.

It was an execution.

Dante De Rossi, the Underboss of Chicago—the man whose ring weighed on my finger like a handcuff—sat opposite me.

He wore a bespoke black suit that cost more than my first car.

He didn’t look at me like a woman he intended to love.

He looked at me like a problem that needed to be solved.

"It’s business, Nina," he said.

His voice was deep, calm, and utterly void of remorse.

He poured himself a scotch, the crystal glass clinking softly in the silence of the penthouse that towered over the city he would soon rule.

"Isobel is pregnant," he continued. "Five weeks."

I stared at the paper.

Isobel De Luca.

The daughter of our rival.

The woman who claimed she had saved Dante’s life during an ambush five years ago.

A lie.

I had been the one who found him in that dark alley, bleeding out, half-dead.

I was the one who dug the bullets out and stitched him back together while he thrashed in delirium.

But I was the daughter of a simple soldier.

I knew my place.

I had kept quiet.

*Omertà.*

And now, he was using that very silence to tear my heart out.

"You impregnated her," I said.

My voice sounded foreign to my own ears.

Too clinical.

"It was artificial insemination," he corrected, as if the medical terminology could scrub the betrayal clean. "She has terminal bone marrow cancer. It is her dying wish to give the De Rossi family an heir. It cements the alliance."

He stood up and walked to the window.

He looked out at his kingdom, not at me.

"You will be my wife, Nina. You will be the mother of my children. But this child... this child secures the peace."

He turned around.

His eyes were dark, impenetrable.

"I expect you to understand. You aren’t a civilian. You are one of us."

He was right.

I was one of them.

I had been raised to follow orders, to keep my mouth shut, and to wipe the blood off the floor.

But as I looked at him—this man I had loved since childhood—I didn’t see a partner.

I saw a king who had just demoted his queen to a mistress.

"You’ve already done it," I said softly. "You didn’t ask me. You decided."

"The Don commands," he said simply. "And I obey. Just like you."

He set the glass down and walked toward me.

He placed his hand on the back of my neck, a gesture that used to mean comfort, but now felt like a chokehold.

"It changes nothing between us."

He actually believed that.

He believed I would simply nod, smile, and stand at the altar while the mother of his firstborn sat in the front row.

He thought I was his property.

I took his hand from my neck and gently placed it back at his side.

"Of course, Dante," I said.

He relaxed.

He didn’t see the resistance, because he didn’t believe I was capable of it.

He didn’t see that in this moment, I was no longer his fiancée.

I was the surgeon again.

And I had just decided to amputate the rotting part of my life.

He kissed me on the forehead, satisfied with my submission, and left the room to take a call.

I looked at the fireplace.

The wedding invitations lay on the mantelpiece—cream-colored paper with gold embossing.

I picked up a lighter.

I lit the corner of the top invitation and watched as the flame devoured his name.