The day I married Santino Connor, he went from the infamous heir of a mafia fortune to a broke nobody.

When he handed me a plastic ring in a shabby basement and asked if I would start from scratch with him, I looked at the man I had loved since I was a girl and nodded without a second thought.

"Santino, as long as it was with you, I would do anything."

For him, I worked more than ten hours a day until my stomach bled from the stress. Our son, from the moment he could walk, trailed me from one odd job to the next.

I thought my love could eventually build us a life in the sun.

Until, at a lavish banquet where I was serving the elite, he showered me with cash from his seat at the head of the table.

"What's that thing crawling on the floor? It's blocking my view!"

"Take the money and get out of my sight!"

When I saw the woman by his side, her face an eerie copy of my own, I finally understood. To him, this was just a game, and I was the only one playing for keeps.

If he was going to go to such lengths to deceive me, then it was time for his game to end.

What he didn't know was that one month later, he would be tearing the world apart to find me.

The day I married Santino Connor, he announced he was leaving the Family, and as a result, all his accounts were frozen.

Believing his promise to "go straight and start over," I spent five years chained to a sewing machine in a cold, damp basement, my fingers scarred from countless needle pricks.

Our son, Luca, dressed in oversized T-shirts from a thrift store, was digging through dumpsters with me for scrap cardboard by the time he was three.

But then I discovered that my supposedly broke husband, the man I thought was earning an honest living, had taken his place as the Don of the Connor family.

This time, something inside me broke for good. In one month, I would be gone from his world completely.

On Luca's fifth birthday, a torrential downpour soaked the city. I had just pulled an all-nighter to finish a rush order.

Drenched to the bone, we stood at the gates of a sprawling private estate, clutching a newly finished sample tuxedo.

This was an urgent job, and the pay was enough to cover Luca's tuition for the next semester.

A man who looked like a butler tossed a towel at me. "Get inside before you dirty the carpets. The Don is meeting with important guests. You two can use the dog door over there."

"You're here to discuss the tuxedo with the staff. Don't disturb the Don and his guests in the main hall."

The thought that this money was one step toward a clean break gave me the strength to go on. I took Luca's hand, and we stooped low to crawl through the dog door.

The scent of cigars drifted out from the hall. I glanced up at the glittering, magnificent ballroom.

I never expected the man in the seat of honor, a red rose pinned to his lapel, would be my husband. The same man I thought was breaking his back hauling crates at the docks.

My body went rigid. A deafening roar filled my head.

Santino leaned back in his chair while the woman beside him whispered in his ear, her red lips vivid, her face eerily similar to mine.

I grabbed the arm of a nearby servant. "That man... the Don. Is that Santino? I thought he left the Family years ago."

"Leave?" The servant looked at me like I was crazy. "Are you kidding? He practically runs this city."

My knees gave out, and I could barely stand.

"Santino," the woman beside him murmured, a smile in her voice, "you're giving my father the entire port's profits. What does that leave for you?"

Santino slowly raised a hand, his thumb stroking her earlobe. "It's nothing. I told you, Riley, everything I have, all my power, is for you. Only for you. I never break my word."

The jazz music swelled as a servant shoved me hard. "What are you gawking at? Get down and take the measurements!"

I bit my lip so hard I tasted blood.

I knelt mechanically, adjusting the trousers. From the corner of my eye, I saw Luca frozen in place. Children are so sensitive. He must have recognized his father's voice.

"What are those two doing crawling on the floor? They're like dogs, blocking my view!" a child's voice rang out. The woman, Riley, swept the boy into her arms. He looked about the same age as Luca.

"Santino, my darling Finn adores you. He says that when he grows up, he wants to be the most powerful man in the city, just like you."

Santino let out a deep laugh and pulled the boy onto his lap. "Clever boy."

He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket and tossed it down. "Get those two dogs out of here. Can't you see they're ruining the view?"

The bills fluttered down, landing on me and Luca. I fought to hold back my tears, refusing to look up until my eyes burned from the strain.

I pressed Luca's head down, shielding his eyes, then quickly finished the measurements and retreated.

Five years. Eighteen hundred days and nights.

Had he lied to me for five years with that story of "leaving the underworld to start over," all to keep his promise to Riley that "everything I have is for you"?

I realized then that no matter how much time had passed, he had never forgotten her.

The memory was a poisoned knife, twisting in my heart.

I was the daughter of the Connor family's old tailor. I had always known Santino was the untouchable heir, while I could only admire him from the shadows.

I never asked for anything. I just watched as he spoiled his childhood sweetheart, Riley, rotten.

When he was eighteen, he blew up a rival casino for her, just to see her smile.

Riley, wearing a gown stained with another man's blood, threw herself into his arms and whispered, "You're insane."

He held her tighter, a smile playing on his lips. "You deserve the best. I would give you my life if I had to."

Later, during a power struggle within the family, the Connors were in crisis.

Riley fled overseas to save her own skin. He chased her to the airport like a madman, only to be met with her cold words: "Stop bothering me. You're beneath me."

That night, he collapsed on my doorstep, covered in blood. I saved him, and in return, he pulled me violently into his arms.

"You like me?" His eyes were unfocused, but his fingers still dug painfully into my skin.

I opened my mouth, but no words came out.

He scoffed. "Then be with me. We'll leave the Family, start a new life."

"Help me forget her."

I knew he only said it because I looked so much like Riley, but I chose to believe him anyway.

On the first day of our marriage, he told me that to escape the bloody underworld, his accounts had to be frozen. He couldn't touch a cent of the family's dirty money.

I was so in love with him, I never cared about his status as a mafia heir. Starting over was fine. As long as it was with him, I was willing to do anything.

So during what he called his "downfall," I lived in a basement, ate stale bread, washed clothes for mobsters in the dead of winter, and gave birth to Luca in a back-alley clinic.

Only now did I see how absurd my dream had been.

I don't remember how I left the estate, only that I walked for a long, long time, holding Luca's hand.

His face was streaked with tears, but he didn't make a sound, his small face red from the effort of holding back sobs.

"Mommy, that was Papa... right?"

"He lied to us, didn't he?"

"He just doesn't love us. That's why he let us starve and freeze, right?"

Seeing him sob, my heart broke.

I was the fool. For a love that wasn't real, I had made my son suffer with me for five years.

I thought of how, while Luca and I were begging our landlord for a rent extension, he was spending a fortune at an auction for the woman he loved.

Now, on Luca's birthday, my son was crawling through a humiliating dog door in a storm to help me fit clothes for servants, while he was planning the most lavish birthday party for his lover's child.

I stroked Luca's head and finally made a decision. "Mommy doesn't want that Papa anymore."

"I'll take you away, Mommy will. We'll go to a place without lies, okay?"

"Okay!" Luca cried, his small body trembling. "Let's go far, far away, and never see him again."

Back in that dark basement, the two of us shared a cold, cheap piece of cake.

Late that night, the lock turned. Santino was back.

He had shed the imposing persona of the Don and changed back into the cheap jacket I had bought him from a street stall.

The cloying scent of expensive perfume still clung to him.

"Still awake?" He loosened his tie, his expression weary, his acting flawless. "Something came up at the site today. I'm late."

Before, I would have rushed to heat up soup for him, my heart aching. But now, all I felt was disgust.

I sat in the darkness, without turning on a light, and pushed a document across the table.

"Sign this."

"What's this? An insurance policy?" He frowned, and just as he picked up a pen, his phone vibrated in his pocket.

It wasn't on speaker, but I could still make out Riley's sickeningly sweet voice. "Santino, Finn is making a fuss. He says he can't sleep unless you tell him a bedtime story."

Santino's expression instantly softened. That gentleness was a knife twisting in my gut. "Alright, I'll be right over." He hastily signed the document without a glance.

"I have to go. I won't be back tonight." He grabbed his jacket and turned to leave.

At the door, his hand tightened on the frame, as if he was holding something back.

I watched his back, my voice as soft as a sigh. "Santino."

He stopped, turning back, "What is it now?"

"Nothing." I looked at him, but in the end, I didn't say what I was thinking. "It's cold out. Stay warm."

In the end, he just walked out.

"Mommy, that's a divorce agreement, right?"

Luca looked up, his face pale, his small hands clutching the divorce papers stamped with the Connor Family crest.

I knelt down, stroking my son's soft, curly hair, my heart clenching as if squeezed by an icy hand.

"According to Connor Family rules, there's a one-month review period, Luca."

"But don't worry. We're protected by the Family's rules. No one can touch us. When the month is up, Mommy will take you away from New York, and we'll never come back."

Luca nodded forcefully, his eyes shining brightly, looking so much like Santino's.

For the next week, Santino vanished. He didn't return to the basement, and I heard nothing about anyone interfering with the divorce papers I had quietly submitted to the Family.

The elder who handled family divorces was an old friend of my father's. He would do everything he could to help me keep it secret until it was all settled.

I didn't even have to go out of my way to find news about the celebrated Don.

I only had to listen to the gossip from the low-level enforcers collecting protection money on the street corners to piece together his movements.

"Hey, you hear? Don Connor popped ten bottles of Louis XIII at the club last night just because that woman, Riley, said the champagne was too dry."

"And get this, I hear he bought her son a purebred racehorse for over half a million dollars!"

"I heard the Don has a wife, but she's never been seen in public. Poor thing."

I lowered my head, my fingernails digging so hard into my palms that they drew blood.

A half-million-dollar racehorse.

And my Luca, malnourished as he was, looked more like a three-year-old than a five-year-old.

In the leaked photos that circulated, Santino looked at that mother and son with a fiercely protective gaze.

It was a look I had never once received during my five years in the slums.

I stared at those blurry photos, and each one felt like a dull, rusty saw dragging across my heart.

I remembered that cold night five years ago, when I thought he had chosen to leave the life for me. There was no grand Sicilian wedding, no wedding dress. We hid in that moldy basement like rats.

For five years, to make ends meet, my fingers were pricked countless times by sewing needles.

And Luca, from the moment he could understand, learned to help me sort fabric and make deliveries, all to ease the burden on his supposedly "down-and-out" father.

How ridiculous.

Even after seamlessly taking his place as Don of the Connor Family, he continued to play the part of a pitiful failure for me.

On the evening of the seventh day, Santino returned.

The lock turned, and he entered, bringing with him the chill of the late night and the faint, expensive scent of perfume.

He didn't even look at me. While unfastening his cufflinks, he spoke coldly, "Get Luca dressed. I'm taking him out."

I froze, the needle in my hand nearly piercing my fingertip.

He had made it clear that for his own safety, Luca was never to be exposed to the world of the Family.

Why the sudden change of heart?

"Tomorrow," I said, instinctively blocking the door to Luca's room. "It's too late tonight. He's still getting over that bad cough."

Santino's expression darkened. His mask of patience slipped, and for a moment, I saw the ruthless Don beneath.

Just as his temper was about to snap, a knock came at the door. It was our landlady, Mrs. Russo.

Santino frowned, the annoyance of being disturbed making him look like a caged lion. "So late. What is it?"

Not wanting him to know my plans, I spoke first. "I'm thinking of moving. I was just talking to the landlady about the lease."

"I found a cheaper place."

Santino didn't suspect a thing.

In his eyes, I was just a poor woman who complained about the five-hundred-dollar monthly rent. He nodded indifferently, loosening his tie. "Go talk outside. Don't make a racket in here. I'll watch Luca."

I hesitated.

But he was Luca's biological father. He wouldn't harm his own son. I could only nod.

Mrs. Russo was a kind-hearted old Italian lady. She pulled me into a dark corner of the stairwell.

"Erin, you're really leaving? If the rent is too much, I can lower it a little more..."

"No need, Mrs. Russo." I shook my head, lowering my voice. "The boy's father and I are separating. We're leaving the city soon."

The old woman's eyes widened in shock. "What? Leaving Mr. Connor? Heavens, my dear, have you gone mad?"

She paused, then sighed. "It must be his idea, right? After all, I see how much you love him, putting up with this life for his sake. You'd never leave on your own."

I lowered my eyes, a bitter taste on my tongue.

So even an outsider could see how pathetic my love for him had been.

Seeing my silence, Mrs. Russo didn't press the issue. She just patted my hand sympathetically. "Since you've decided, then so be it. God bless you, Erin. That man will regret losing you one day."

However, when I finished the conversation and pushed the door open, my blood ran cold.

The room was empty. Luca was gone.

My hands trembled as I dialed Santino's private number.

No answer.

My nineteenth call went unanswered. A fear I had never known before seized my throat. I burst out of the room, grabbing everyone downstairs and questioning them like a madwoman.

These people weren't ordinary tenants; they were all Santino's lookouts.

Seeing my state, they knew there was no point in hiding it anymore.

One of the low-level enforcers, a man I had once helped, told me with a troubled expression, "Don Connor took the young master. He got into a black, armored car. The license plate belonged to the Family's medical unit."

A chill ran down my spine. I stumbled to the private clinic controlled by the Connor Family.

It was the place where the family dealt with gunshot wounds and other off-the-books procedures.

The clinic was heavily guarded, but my identification was still valid, and it got me inside.

Outside a diagnostic lab, one only core family members could enter, the heavy door was slightly ajar.

Santino's voice drifted out. "The specialist is sure this will work. The data will give them the diagnostic model they need."

Then came Riley's voice, laced with false concern. "But Santino, this cardiac stress test... the specialist said it's strenuous. And Luca is so small, and you heard Erin, he's sick. If she finds out you're doing this for Finn, won't she..."

Santino's gaze was fixed on the complex machinery inside the lab. "Finn's condition remains unresolved. The doctors are running out of time. This experimental test is our only hope, and it requires a test sample of the same age."

"I am Luca's father. According to Family tradition, the firstborn son carries the burdens of the Family. He will do his duty."

"I won't let her interfere."

I clamped a hand over my mouth, tears streaming down my face.

So his sudden appearance today wasn't to make up for his absence as a father.

His sudden warmth was a ploy to lure my son, who was already weak, to a clinic and use him like a lab rat for an experimental procedure.

I had thought he'd had a change of heart, that he wanted to finally act like a father.

I never imagined he would risk our son's health for a diagnostic test for Riley's precious boy.

So much for the sacred bond of blood.