For seven years, I was ensnared by Dante Moretti, the feared Don of New York's underworld.

I was the enemy he loathed and the phantom in his nightmares.

On the day of his 97th attempt to marry his fiancée, Isabella, one second I was promising him I wouldn't interfere this time.

The next, images of us, tangled in a naked embrace, flashed across the giant screens of Times Square.

In less than half an hour, he found me, murder in his eyes.

On the roof of the Empire State Building, the wind howled.

"Elara, have you lost your mind?"

"All I want is to give Isabella the perfect wedding. Why must you declare war on the one thing I want?"

I smiled and brandished my phone, the live feed showing the wedding he had just fled in a panic.

"This was just a little bet between your fiancée and me. A bet on whether you would abandon her for me."

Hellfire burned in his eyes. He shoved me over the railing.

"You like to gamble, don't you? Then let all of New York place their bets—on whether you die today, or I do!"

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1

On the phone screen, Isabella was sobbing hysterically.

A vise gripped Dante's heart, and the hand clutching my neck tightened.

"You swore you wouldn't ruin my wedding this time. Why?"

"Do you have any idea how much I want Isabella to be my wife? Is my happiness that repulsive to you?!"

One hundred and two stories high, the wind whipped my long hair into a black frenzy against the sky.

I curled my lips into a languid smile, my fingertips tracing his taut jawline.

"Dante, don't you know? Promises are made to be broken."

After all, breaking promises was your specialty when it came to me.

The live stream's comment section instantly exploded with curses directed at me.

"Is that Elara Costello insane? How many times is this? Crashing weddings like it's a sport. Does she have a death wish?"

"If she really loved Don Moretti, she wouldn't have killed his mother and almost gotten him killed, too. What's with this whole 'devoted lover' act now?"

"If I were Dante, I'd throw her off right now. What's it to the Moretti family to kill a Costello? Getting rid of a menace like her would be doing the world a favor!"

Isabella's plaintive voice, tinged with anticipation, came from the phone.

"Dante, are you going to keep letting her get away with this..."

That sentence was the last straw.

He yanked me further out over the edge, yet the muscles in his arm were trembling.

Just when everyone thought he would send me plummeting to my death, Dante suddenly wrenched me back.

His eyes were bloodshot as he panted heavily.

"Elara, don't think I'll give up Isabella for some doctored photos. I never touched you!"

"Maybe I had a crush on you when we were kids, but ever since you killed my mother, there's been nothing but hatred between us. Just looking at you makes me sick!"

Seeing that he had let me go, Isabella suddenly clutched her chest and collapsed.

"Isabella!"

Dante immediately made a call, ordering his men to get Isabella to the hospital.

Before leaving, he shot me an icy glare, his warning unspoken but clear.

"Elara, I'm not letting this go."

My gaze fell on those photos, a bitter smile rising from the depths of my heart.

Some of it was real. He had just forgotten. Or rather, not entirely.

He only remembered me as his mortal enemy. The woman who murdered his mother.

So in his mind, and in everyone else's, I was the murderer. His mother's killer.

When I returned to the Costello estate, my grandfather was sitting in the main hall, his face ashen.

The moment I stepped through the door, the leather belt in his hand whipped toward me without hesitation.

"Kneel!"

"I thought you were finally useful when the Morettis agreed to cooperate. But you're nothing but a useless troublemaker! Ruining their wedding again and again, and now splashing those photos everywhere? Have you no sense of shame?! Don Moretti himself called me!"

So, this was Dante's revenge.

Getting someone else to do his dirty work. He’d always been skilled at that.

He knew my grandfather prioritized profit over blood, so he used the cooperation between our two families as leverage.

The belt lashed down on my body again and again.

Only when my skin split and bled did my grandfather make a video call to Dante to inspect the results.

"I appreciate you handling this, Mr. Costello. Your family discipline is as stern as they say."

Dante's voice, lazy and cruel, came through the screen.

His gaze fell upon me, his expression dark and unreadable.

"Elara, not sending you to prison was a courtesy, for the sake of the long-standing friendship between our families."

"As long as you promise me you'll behave from now on and leave Isabella alone, we'll call it even. How about it?"

He didn't remember that this was the second time he had seen my grandfather use family discipline on me.

Except last time, a young Dante had stood in front of me, taking a bullet for me.

Covered in blood, he had pointed a gun at my grandfather's head and warned:

"It's just a few docks' worth of business. The Moretti family will cover them. But if you dare touch a single hair on Elara's head again, I will make the Costello family disappear from New York!"

How strange.

My body ached, but it was my heart that was tearing itself apart.

I slowly pushed myself up from the floor, forced a smile at the screen, and enunciated each word.

"In. Your. Dreams."

My grandfather panicked. He glanced at the screen, then snatched the whiskey bottle from the table and raised it to smash over my head.

"Don Moretti is offering you an out and you spit in his face, you ungrateful brat! Are you trying to drag this entire family down with you?!"

Blood trickled from my forehead, blurring my vision.

But no matter how he beat or cursed me, the sight of Dante made me swallow any words of surrender.

Dante's face grew darker and darker. Just as my grandfather was about to bring the second bottle down, he suddenly spoke, his voice laced with irritation.

"Enough!"

"Elara, this is the last time. Don't test me again."

He abruptly ended the video call, as if he were running from something.

The cooperation between the two families was saved. My grandfather couldn't be bothered with me anymore and had the housekeeper take me back to my room.

The old housekeeper, Maria, teared up as she tended to my wounds.

"And that Don Moretti… The Morettis have been cutting us in on their deals for years, but you're the one who's paid the price, haven't you? With your own pain. It's one thing for strangers not to know, but how could he, of all people, say something so cruel?"

My phone buzzed. A message from Isabella.

It was a photo of Dante's strong forearm. Over the spot where our matching "Sanctuary" tattoos used to be, the name "Isabella" was now crudely inked.

"Elara, still not giving up? Even after all your scheming, Dante is determined to marry me. He only loves me."

"Do you dare tell him the truth? Neither the Costello nor the Moretti family will let you go. Stop struggling. In his heart, you'll always be the murderer who killed his mother!"

Maria was indignant.

"That liar! What right does she have to be so arrogant?! It's been seven years, how much longer will you wait? Why not just tell Don Moretti the truth…"

I turned off my phone, cutting her off softly.

"Maria, I have to keep the promise I made to him."

Everyone on the outside thought Dante and I were mortal enemies.

But no one knew that we were once each other's everything.

In the ambush seven years ago, Dante was shot in the head. The surgery to save him came with a high risk of amnesia.

When he refused the surgery, terrified of the risks, I kissed the corners of his trembling lips and whispered that it would be okay, that I would be there.

After he lost his memory, the first time I went to visit him, I found him holding his private doctor, Isabella, in his arms.

He threw everything I had brought at me, coldly watching my humiliation.

"Who let you in?"

"You murderer. The sight of you makes me sick. Get out!"

That bullet didn't just erase our love; it twisted his memories until he believed I was the enemy who had tried to kill him.

But Isabella was right; I didn't dare tell the truth.

Not because I was afraid of the two families.

But because I couldn't bear to see Dante have another mental breakdown, pressing a gun to his own temple, unable to accept the facts.

That night, I dreamed again of Dante before he went into surgery, holding my hand and vowing through his sobs.

"Elara, I love you so much, I'll never forget you. We'll grow old together in our sanctuary on the Hudson, lovers forever."

"If I really do forget, you can hit me, you can scold me, but I'm begging you not to leave me. If I fall in love with another woman, you have to break us up, by any means necessary."

We made a pact. If he hurt me a hundred times for another woman, I would give up.

Including tonight, it had already been 98 times...

Perhaps because of that dream, when I woke up, I felt a sudden, strong urge to go back to our "Sanctuary."

It was an estate Dante had once given me, a place that held all our secret joys.

Whenever I felt I couldn't go on, I would go there and just… sit.

But before I could even leave the house, I got a call from the caretaker there.

"Miss Elara, Don Moretti had the estate razed to the ground! He said he's building a new rose garden for Miss Isabella!"

"The child's grave was dug up too!"

By the time I arrived, the sanctuary that held all our beautiful memories had been reduced to a pile of rubble.

As if it had never existed.

Isabella was nestled in Dante's arms, her tone full of disgust.

"I really don't know who could be so vicious as to bury ashes here. Dante, why don't we just flush them down the sewer? Let this filthy thing never find peace."

Dante gently stroked her hair.

"Alright. Anyone who dares to scare my Isabella, I'll make sure their soul never finds peace."

Blood rushed to my head. I charged forward, grabbing a fallen shovel and swinging it hard at one of the thugs standing guard by Isabella.

Amidst Isabella's screams, I slapped her hard across the face twice.

"Who are you to touch my child? You dare trespass on my property? Get out!"

"Elara, what new madness is this?!"

Dante pulled her into his arms, glaring at me furiously.

"Miss Elara, this estate is in Don Moretti's name. You're just a squatter, taking advantage because he's too busy to deal with you. Have you no shame?" one of Isabella's men sneered.

"I was just wondering why there would be ashes here," Isabella added, her voice dripping with mock sympathy. "So you had a child with some other man, had an abortion because you were afraid it would ruin your reputation, and secretly buried it here. If you're not disgusted by it, we are. It's a bad omen!"

Isabella's last sentence seemed to strike a nerve with Dante.

His face grew even darker, and a cruel sneer twisted his lips.

"I knew it. Those photos in Times Square, you just replaced some other man's face with mine."

"Elara, all these years you've been sabotaging my relationship with Isabella, while secretly fooling around with other men and even having a bastard child. How dare you bury this filth on my land?!"

A white-hot rage seized him, and he couldn't even explain why.

Hearing his words, a chill spread through my heart.

Yes, Dante and I once had a child.

But on the very day we had planned to register our marriage, he was ambushed.

At the time, Dante was in a coma. The hospital declared him critical, telling his father to prepare for the worst.

His father, seeing him as a lost cause, was busy searching for a new heir among the family's collateral branches.

Aside from sending money, he never once visited.

I was the one who stayed by his side day and night, praying to every god I could think of, begging them to let Dante live.

But I miscarried from the sheer exhaustion.

When Dante regained consciousness, he ignored the doctor's advice and dragged his weakened body out to help me bury our child under the oak tree at the sanctuary.

He held me and cried like a child.

"Elara, it's all my fault, all my fault."

"Let's bury our baby here. I'm afraid he won't find his way home when he's reincarnated. In life or death, our family will always be together..."

Now, he was calling our child filth.

"Dante, what if I told you that this was our child?"

"On that urn, you personally carved 'D & E'. Don't you even recognize your own mark? Give it back to me!"

Dante froze, his gaze subconsciously falling on the small urn.

D & E...

Suddenly, Dante's head felt like it was splitting apart, and he clutched it instinctively.

"Dante!"

Isabella quickly supported him, snatched the urn, and glared at me.

"Miss Elara, that's enough! Don't you think you've caused Dante enough misery?!"

"Even if you hate him, you should have some decency! First you ruined our wedding, and now you're forging markings. Dante can't even stand the sight of you, how could he possibly have a child with you?!"

"What are your intentions, slinging such disgusting accusations at him?!"

The next second, Isabella opened the urn and pulled out a voodoo doll pierced with needles.

Her birthday and name were stuck to it.

"So you knew all along that Dante was going to build a rose garden for me here. You couldn't stand to see us happy, so you used this black magic to curse me! No wonder I've been feeling unwell lately!"

Dante was even more enraged, the earlier suspicion in his eyes vanishing completely.

"Elara, I know your grandfather believes in those old southern Italian sorceries and has dealt with all sorts of people to protect the Costello family's business."

"But I never thought you'd stoop so low. Knowing Isabella is my weakness, you resort to these despicable tactics just to get at me. You're irredeemable!"

"Kneel and apologize to Isabella, now!"

I looked at him with a sardonic smile.

"Why should I apologize for something I didn't do?"

"Then again, if that voodoo crap actually worked, I would've stuck a thousand needles in that doll and made the bitch beg for death!"

I had thoroughly provoked Dante. He waved his men forward.

Isabella quickly took his arm and advised.

"Dante, Elara is just a madwoman, she'll never admit she's wrong. I have some expertise in psychiatry, and with patients like her, you have to use the right treatment for the illness."

Dante's expression softened slightly.

"What do you mean?"

Isabella smiled triumphantly at me.

"For a stubborn lunatic like Miss Elara, the best course of treatment is high-voltage electric shock."