On the day I was supposed to marry the heir of the Ferrante mafia empire… My fiancé, Harvick Ferrante, died in a helicopter crash.

He was on his way to surprise me. He said he had something special planned—a rooftop ceremony, just the two of us and the rest of his family, under the morning sun. He said he couldn’t wait to see me in white.

The chopper went down over the cliffs near Velbrunnia Bay. They said the explosion could be seen from miles away. They said the wreckage was unrecognizable.

All they gave me was a charred silver cufflink and a half-melted phone. That was it.

I was crowned a widow before I could ever be a wife.

And the child in my belly—our child—became a posthumous heir to a man who never made it to the altar.

After that, everything in me snapped. I went cold. I stopped eating. Sleeping. Breathing felt optional.

People told me to hang on for the baby. But how do you keep living when the person you loved most died before he even got to meet his daughter?

Two weeks later, during Harvick's funeral, his “twin brother” came back from Velbrunnia.

Jeremiah Ferrante. The family’s ghost. Disappeared for years, rumored to be dead. And now he’s back, holding his wife’s hand, Elodie, and offering silent condolences.

He looked just like Harvick—same sharp jaw, same damn eyes. It hurt to even look at him.

I thought grief was playing tricks on my mind.

Until I overheard them talking outside my mother-in-law’s door.

Her voice sliced through the hallway, low but sharp:

“You really faked your death and left Danica like that? She's pregnant with your child! For fucking sake. You staged a funeral just to run back to Elodie who left you five years ago?”

I froze. The blood drained from my face.

“Elodie’s dying, okay? She's now my wife. Legally for four months. That’s all she has left. Four months. The cancer’s eating everything. She begged me for one thing before she goes—to be my wife, just once. I owed her this. Once she’s gone… everything will go back to normal. Danica will give birth. I’ll come back. We’ll be a family again.”

I couldn’t feel my legs. My breath came out in sharp gasps like I’d been stabbed in the lungs.

He was alive.

The man I cried over. The man I buried. The man I dreamed about while holding my stomach at night. He faked it all—for another woman.

My hands shook as I texted the only person in this world who still gave a damn about me—my brother, Peter. He worked deep inside the Bureau, the kind of department that doesn’t ask questions. Just gets it done.

Me: Bro, I need to disappear. I want to stage a death. I want to give Harvick exactly what he gave me.

Me: But not yet. Give me one week. I want him to watch me fall apart first. I want him to feel safe.

My body trembled so hard, I nearly dropped the phone.

And still, they kept talking inside.

“She’s broken, Harvick,” his mother hissed. “If it weren’t for that baby, Danica would’ve offed herself already. You shattered her.”

“Danica will understand. She loves me so much that hating me was impossible…” Then a pause. “I’ll make it up to her. I’ve got a whole life to do that.”

A whole life? No. No, he won’t.

I dragged myself back to the bedroom, collapsed beside the bed like a puppet with its strings cut.

That’s when my phone rang.

Peter.

I picked up, but I couldn’t speak. “Danica?” His voice was tight. “What’s going on? I thought… didn’t Harvick die?”

I wanted to scream. But I just whispered, broken and low, “He’s alive. He faked it. For her. For Elodie. They're married. He married her. And now he’s pretending to be his own twin brother. Watching me cry for him every night.”

There was a long pause on the other end. Then Peter’s voice turned cold. Bureau cold.

“Alright. One week. I’ll set it up quietly. Burn everything clean. No mistakes.”

He didn’t ask anything else. He didn’t have to.

He knew. He always knew.

I stayed frozen for a long time, staring at the ceiling as Harvick’s voice replayed in my head, a loop of venom I couldn’t stop drinking.

Then came the knock.

Gentle. Familiar.

I opened the door—and there he stood...

The man I mourned. The man I buried. The man who’d lit my soul on fire and watched it burn. Holding a glass of milk like nothing had happened.

Like he hadn’t gutted me and called it mercy.

He smiled, casual.

“Hey… why are you sitting on the floor like that?”

“You crying again? You miss my brother that much?”

It’s been half a month since Harvick came back from the dead… wearing the mask of his twin brother, Jeremiah Ferrante.

And for half a month, he’s been nothing but kind.

Careful. Watching me like I’m glass he doesn’t want to crack. As if he’s mourning with me. As if he’s not the reason I’m bleeding inside. I locked my phone quickly, shoving away the message thread with Peter.

Then I forced a smile so sharp it almost cut my tongue.

“I’m fine,” I whispered. “My stomach just twisted. Lost my balance for a second.”

Harvick’s shoulders dropped like he’d been holding his breath. I watched him, quietly. Because in six more days, he’ll be crying over my grave.

Let’s see if he smiles then.

He stepped forward, set the warm milk on the nightstand, and reached for me.

"You’ve always been stubborn," he muttered, helping me off the floor. "Even the kid in your belly’s starting early. Wait till he's born—see how Uncle Jeremiah lays down the law."

Uncle.

What a joke.

He nudged the glass toward me gently.

"Come on. Milk’s warm. Drink it and rest. You need to stop overthinking everything. Harvick wouldn’t want to see you like this… not from wherever he’s watching.”

And that was it.

The name.

That name.

He said it too easily. Too naturally.

Like it didn’t taste like lies on his tongue.

Something inside me snapped.

I looked up—dead into his eyes. The same goddamn eyes I used to kiss under low lights. Same stormy gray. Same twitch in the corner when he was trying to hide guilt.

I clenched my fists and said it, slow and raw—each word like dragging glass through my throat.

“Are you really not Harvick?”

Harvick froze for half a beat. Then let out a soft, fake laugh… the kind that used to charm me back in college.

He reached out and patted my head gently—like I was a child who just had a nightmare.

“You’re overthinking again,” he said, voice calm, practiced. “How could I be Harvick? You’ve just been too tense lately. Drink the milk and get some sleep, alright?”

He took a step back, like he was giving me space—but his words landed like bullets.

“That little one in your belly... he’s the last blood of Harvick Ferrante in this world. I’ll make damn sure he arrives safely. That’s a promise.”

I didn’t respond.

I kept my eyes low.

I couldn’t stand to see that face anymore—that lie wearing skin I used to love.

“You should go,” I said quietly. “I’m tired. I just want to lie down.”

That’s when I heard her.

“Babe?”

The door across the hall cracked open, and there she was.

Elodie. Wearing my robe. The ivory silk one Harvick gave me on our anniversary last year—the one monogrammed with a little embroidered D at the hem.

She wasn’t even trying to hide it.

“I’m having a really bad headache,” she murmured. “Can you come to bed? I need one of your massages… the kind that makes me forget I’m dying.”

Silence sliced the air.

Harvick turned halfway, caught between both women—his living wife and his grieving one.

He glanced back at me for a beat, his eyes unreadable.

Then he nodded, “Get some rest,” he told me gently, before heading to Elodie and wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

She leaned into him like she belonged there. Like I was the guest in my room. Together, they disappeared down the hallway. And I just stood there, staring at the door long after it closed.

Not because I was shocked.

But because I wasn’t.

—

I met Harvick Ferrante seven years ago in Milan—at a private art auction hosted by one of the city’s oldest mafia dynasties. I wasn’t supposed to be there. I wasn’t even supposed to look at a man like him.

But I did.

And the moment his eyes locked with mine—cold, calculating, curious—I knew I was already undone.

He didn’t ask my name.

He asked who I belonged to.

And when I said no one, he smirked like I’d just offered him the world on a silver plate.

He pursued me like I was a vendetta he couldn’t drop.

Sharp. Dangerous. Obsessively mine.

And I let him in. HolyMary help me—I let all of him in.

Two years later, he proposed on the rooftop of the Museo Ferrante, just past midnight. The whole city stretched below us—quiet, lit, watching.

No crowd. No cameras. Just him.

He pulled out a ring wrapped in velvet and history—an heirloom, blood-soaked and priceless.

“Danica,” he said, voice low, “if this world burns, I want to burn with you.”

And I said yes.

He once told me—hand on my stomach, lips at my temple, eyes full of heat—

“This child came at the perfect time. He’s our proof. Our gift. Our beginning. I’ve never been this happy, cara mia.”

And now?

Now that same man faked his own death and left me at the altar like a pawn he outplayed.

For a woman with four months to live.

A woman who never once stood in the world we built.

I don’t even know when I lost him.

All I know is, the man who once whispered that I was his fire, his home, his reason—

Now fake his death and feeds me warm milk like it’ll silence the war inside me.

---

The next morning…A knock came at the door.

“Danica,” his voice called out—light but firm. “Time for your check-up. You ready?”

I was still lacing up my shoes, barely holding it together, when I heard footsteps pause outside my door.

Then—

“Jeremiah…” Her voice.

Elodie.

Weak. Fragile. Measured, like a rehearsed line from a dying actress. I stood frozen as her footsteps echoed faintly down the hall.

“I—I don’t feel good…” she whispered, wobbling against the wall. “I think… something’s wrong…”

And then, right on cue, her knees buckled.

“Whoa, whoa—Elodie!”

Jeremiah—Harvick—turned instantly, catching her before she hit the floor. “Damn it, you didn’t take your meds again, did you? Why are you even walking around?”

His arms wrapped around her carefully, cradling her like she was made of glass and moonlight.

From my cracked door, I watched him gently lower her onto the couch, tucking a blanket over her legs like it was instinct. His hand brushed her hair back from her face. His voice dropped to a murmur I wasn’t supposed to hear.

“You can’t scare me like that, babe.”

And just like that I was invisible again.

I stepped into the hallway quietly. He looked up, startled for half a second—then caught himself.

“Sorry, Danica,” he said, standing upright, his tone snapping back to efficient. “Elodie’s not doing well this morning. I don’t want to leave her alone like this.”

He reached into his coat and pulled out a phone. “You’ll still go to your appointment. I’m sending Claudio and Renzo to accompany you. The driver’s already out front, and your doctor’s waiting.”

It was all clean. Seamless. Controlled. Behind him, Elodie didn’t even try to hide the faint smile curving on her lips.

She looked at me like a woman who’d won the final round. My hand drifted to my stomach on instinct. My chest was already burning, but the tears came anyway—silent, bitter, fast.

---

I sat alone on a cold bench in the corner of the Ferrante private hospital, head down, fingers trembling as I studied the black-and-white ultrasound report.

There it was— an apple-sized flicker of life.

The doctor smiled earlier, pointing to the image like it was a miracle.

“That’s your baby.”

I wiped my tears roughly, as if smudging them away could erase what he did to me. I couldn’t do it here. Not at this hospital.

Not under their watch.

This was the Ferrantes’ territory. Cameras everywhere. Whatever happened here, Harvick would know.

I grabbed my phone and made a quiet call to the driver and the two men.

“I’m feeling a little heavy,” I lied. “I want to walk alone for a bit. You go on ahead. I’ll call when I’m ready to go home.”

They hesitated but didn’t question.

They were all trained that way—loyal to the name Ferrante, not the woman carrying the heir.

Once I saw the black car disappear past the gate, I stepped out from the shadows behind the column and hailed a taxi.

Destination? Another private hospital. One without mafia ties. One where I could disappear if I had to.

Just before I was wheeled into pre-op, my phone vibrated. A new message. A video. No caption. No words. Just a single file sent by Elodie.

I should’ve deleted it, but I didn’t.

I tapped it open with shaking hands, and the screen lit up with them—Harvick and Elodie.

She was in his lap, his mouth buried in her neck, murmuring something against her skin, and her nails dragged down his chest like she’d done it a thousand times. Like she knew exactly how to make him lose control.

Then he kissed her.

Slow, possessive, familiar. The kind of kiss that once made my entire world go quiet.

But what broke me wasn’t the way he touched her—it was what I saw next. As he leaned back, his shirt slid off, and there it was.

The small, red spade-shaped birthmark just below his collarbone.

Harvick.

I smiled bitterly, like someone who just found their own tombstone. That was it...the final proof. And yet, somehow, my heart still clung to one last hope.

One last chance.

So I did something pathetic. Something human.

I called him.

If he picked up…

If he heard my voice and chose me…

If he came to me right now—I swore I’d forget everything. I’d forgive the lies, the grave, the mistress, the pain. I’d erase it all for our child. For the love I still carried like a curse.

The line rang.

Then clicked.

His voice came through—low, strained, tired.

“Danica… I’ve got some things to handle here. Let the driver take you home. We’ll talk when I’m back.”

And then I heard it.

A moan—high, loud, shameless. A woman’s voice, wet and unfiltered.

Elodie.

She didn’t even try to hide it. She didn’t care.

Another moan followed, louder, and then her voice gasped his name—“Harvick…”—like she was singing it from her bones.

Click.

Silence.

Just the dead beep… beep… of the disconnected line. I didn’t cry. Not this time.

I just stared at the nurse, eyes hollow, voice flat.

“It’s fine,” I whispered. “Let’s proceed with the abortion…”

And as they wheeled me away, I swore...

The next time he hears my voice… Will be the last time he breathes easy again.

---

By the time I got home, it was already dark.

I stepped into the marble-floored estate, and there he was.

Harvick. Waiting.

Still pretending to be Jeremiah, the noble older brother, the mourning man, the fake.

“The driver said you went shopping after your check-up,” he said with a smile. “Came home empty-handed though. Didn’t find anything you liked?”

His tone was light. As if everything was normal. As if I hadn’t just erased the one part of him he didn’t even know existed. Halfway through his sentence, he paused—his eyes catching mine.

He noticed.

The red in my eyes. The puffiness. The dried salt on my skin.

“Danica… what happened? Why are your eyes like that?”

“Did… you miss Harvick again at the hospital?”

He moved closer, pretending like he cared.

“It’s alright. That baby in your belly—that’s Harvick’s legacy. That’s something real. Something to hold on to.”

I stared into his eyes. Still the same. Still beautiful.

Same smoky gray with that slight flicker of mischief that used to melt me.

The same eyes I once trusted with my soul.

And now—

The same ones I saw staring up in that video while Elodie rode him like I never existed.

I looked away, quiet and walked away—straight to my room.

---

I collapsed onto the mattress and, for the first time since Harvick's death, I slept. No nightmares. No ghosts.

In my dream, I saw him again. Harvick, age eighteen.

Nervous. Sweaty palms. Blushing as he confessed his feelings like a kid who had nothing to offer except honesty.

“Danica… I like you. Would you be my girl?”

“I swear, I’ll treat you right.”

And back then, I believed him.

Maybe because the sky was painted gold. Maybe because his eyes had that kind of light I never saw again after the lie.

I said yes. And that moment? It ruined me forever.

---

Morning light poured into the room like it wanted to mock me. I was still sitting in bed, numb, staring at nothing, when the door creaked open.

And there she was.

Elodie.

The other woman. The one he destroyed me for.

Except she didn’t look like someone with four months to live.

She wasn’t pale. She wasn’t weak.

She walked in with a full face of makeup, lashes curled, cheeks glowing. And she was wearing my silk robe. The ivory one trimmed with lace.

The same one Harvick used to say made me look like heaven wrapped in sin.

Worse?

I caught it immediately... my perfume. The one I wore the night he proposed.

Elodie stopped at the foot of my bed and crossed her arms, that familiar smug smile curving across her face like poison ready to pour.

“You know why I sent you that video, right?” she asked sweetly. She tilted her head, eyes gleaming with cruelty. "You really thought he was Harvick’s brother? You actually believed I was your sweet little sister-in-law?”

She took a step closer, voice dripping venom.

“Darling… wake up. I’ve been sleeping next to your husband this entire time.”

She laughed. Loud. Unapologetic. Insulting.

Then she spun, letting the robe flutter as she walked toward the window.

“Poor Danica,” she sighed dramatically. “You thought I was dying? God, no. I just needed time. Space. And a little pity so no one would question why he was always with me.”

She turned back around, grinning wider.

“I had Harvick wrapped around my little finger the second I came back. It wasn’t even hard. Do you really think a man like him would choose a soft little thing like you over me?”

Her voice dropped lower. Cruel now. Ruthless.

“Oh… and before I forget—I’m the legal wife.”

“Signed. Stamped. Certified. You were just the pretty placeholder.”

She laughed again, a slow, triumphant cackle that rattled the bones in my chest.

“Harvick Ferrante will always be mine, Danica. He loved you, sure—but he belongs to me.”