On a flight, my boyfriend Cassio tried to steal a seat for his pregnant childhood sweetheart.

Last time, I stopped him. I forced him to return the seat to its rightful owner.

Out of spite, his sweetheart Ella refused to take the seat.

She stood through the entire flight.

By the time we landed, she miscarried.

She bled out and died.

Cassio never blamed me.

He arranged her funeral quietly…

Then married me.

He gave me the best prenatal care, the finest doctors, and a seemingly perfect life.

Until the day I went into labor.

He put me on a long-haul flight with multiple layovers.

And when I collapsed in a filthy airport restroom, bleeding and barely conscious—

He looked down at me with pure hatred.

“Serena, this is what you owe her.”

“If you hadn’t interfered back then, Ella would still be alive.”

“Today, you and your bastard child will pay for her and her baby.”

When I opened my eyes again, I was back on that flight.

Watching him berate the plainly dressed woman, I quietly put on my noise-canceling headphones.

He didn’t know that woman was the beloved wife of the most dangerous mafia Don in the city.

And the kick he was about to deliver—

Would be their death sentence.

This time, I just watched.

“Serena, must you act like this every time Ella is around? I’m warning you—don’t cause trouble. Ella is pregnant. She will sit here.”

Cassio’s low, impatient voice snapped me back.

I froze.

My hand was already halfway raised—just like last time.

The same moment. The same choice.

My gaze drifted to the middle-aged woman standing beside the seat.

Plain clothes. Worn leather bag. Slight discomfort in her posture.

A chill crept up my spine. I had really come back.

Last time, this was the moment I stopped Cassio.

I let that woman keep her seat all the way to Las Vegas.

When we got off the plane, I discovered the truth.

This plain-looking woman wasn’t just anybody. She was the wife of Domenico Accardo, the Don of the most powerful crime family in the city.

Because I stopped Cassio from stealing her seat that day, he avoided drawing the Accardo family’s wrath.

Later, he even leveraged that accidental connection. With the family’s indirect influence, his business ventures took off.

He became the celebrated new star of the business world.

But his childhood friend, Ella, had been stubborn. Pouting, she refused to sit in Cassio’s offered seat.

She stood for the entire flight.

The prolonged strain caused a miscarriage. She hemorrhaged, fought for a day and a night in the hospital, and died.

Cassio quietly arranged her funeral. Then he married me.

But on the day I went into labor, he bought the cheapest possible tickets.

He put me on a long-haul flight with multiple connections.

Then, as I lay bleeding on the floor of a cramped airport bathroom, he looked at me with pure hatred before locking the door.

“Serena, if you hadn’t stopped me back then, Ella would never have died! You’re just a jealous, vindictive bitch! Today, you and your brat will pay for Ella and her child! Die!”

My baby and I died right there, with the baby stuck breech, no midwife to help, and the floor covered in filth.

The memory sent a violent chill through me, my face turning pale.

“My friend is pregnant. Just give her the seat. You look healthy enough to stand for a bit. Don’t be selfish.”

Cassio’s voice pulled me partly back.

Ella, who had been silent, shot me a glance.

Then she gently tugged on Cassio’s sleeve.

“Cass, don’t. Serena looks upset. I don’t want to cause trouble between you two. Really, I can just stand.”

There it was. Ella’s classic performance from my last life.

The act of rising, the false sacrifice.

Cassio had a seat. If she was truly unwell, she could sit there.

But no. She had to frame it as my fault, to stoke Cassio’s anger toward me.

Not this time.

I remembered the Don’s evident, fierce devotion to his wife I’d witnessed at the airport last time.

A faint smile touched my lips. I met Cassio’s glare calmly.

“I’m not upset. You two do whatever you want. It’s got nothing to do with me.”

I finished speaking, sat back down in my own aisle seat in economy, and shoved my noise-canceling headphones in.

Cassio stared at me, momentarily confused by my compliance.

But he quickly lost interest in me.

The woman had used the moment Ella pretended to rise to place her small, worn leather bag firmly on the first-class seat.

Cassio’s expression darkened instantly.

He grabbed the bag and hurled it to the carpeted floor of the cabin.

“What the hell is your problem? Did you not hear a word I said? My friend is pregnant! Can’t you show some basic decency? You’re pathetic!”

The woman looked at her bag on the floor, distress clear on her face. Her voice trembled.

“That… that bag has a special bottle of olive oil from my husband’s family grove in Sicily. It’s for him. You’ve broken it!”

She bent stiffly to open the bag.

The sharp, pungent smell of high-quality, unfiltered olive oil mixed with shattered glass filled the immediate space.

The dark green oil was already seeping through the fabric, creating a slick, fragrant puddle.

People nearby recoiled, covering their noses.

Ella took one look, turned, and made a theatrical gagging sound.

Cassio, seeing her reaction, kicked the bag further down the aisle.

“So it’s broken. Big deal. It wasn’t worth much anyway. I’ll pay for it. And for your seat.”

He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket—five hundred-dollar bills—and threw them into the spreading oil slick.

The woman, her movements slow and pained, carefully picked each bill out of the oil.

She wiped them clean on her simple dress and placed them on Ella’s fold-down tray table.

“Young man, I don’t want your money. I want my seat.”

“I had knee surgery last month. I cannot stand for long. My husband had his men work for three days to get me this specific seat. I am not trading it.”

Ella looked at the oil-stained bills with utter disgust.

She gave another dry heave, used a tissue to push the money off the table onto the floor, and clutched Cassio’s arm.

“Just forget it, Cass. I don’t want to sit there anymore. It’s filthy and causing such a scene…”

She started to stand up again.

“Ella, no. You sit. Right now.”

Cassio’s voice was soft as he pressed her back down. Then he turned his fury on the woman.

It was immediate and volcanic.

He seized the front of her dress, his face inches from hers.

“You had surgery? Prove it! You’re just a bitter old woman who doesn’t want to give up her seat to someone who needs it! What, never had kids of your own so you’re jealous? Where’s your humanity?!”

A flight attendant and a few passengers tried to intervene.

“Ma’am, please, maybe just let the young lady sit? She’s expecting.”

“It’s a long flight. Can’t we all just be reasonable?”

I remembered. In my last life, at the arrivals gate, I’d seen this woman walking with a pronounced, careful limp.

She was telling the truth.

An image flashed in my mind: last year, at the hospital with my own mother, a stranger offering her a seat.

My resolve hardened.

I didn’t stop Cassio this time. But my seat was mine to give.

I took off my headphones and gestured to the woman.

“Signora, come. Sit here.”

She shook her head vehemently.

But I stood, took her arm, and guided her firmly into my aisle seat in row 28.

“Sit. I’ve been sitting too long anyway. Rest. I’ll tell you if I get tired.”

The woman looked up at me. Tears, held back for so long, finally spilled over.

She wiped her oil-smeared hands on her dress again and grasped mine.

“Signorina, I… I have no money to thank you. But this kindness… my husband. He will know how to thank you properly when we land.”

I gave her a small, reassuring nod.

Then I turned and walked toward the back galley.

Partly so she wouldn’t feel obligated to get up.

Mostly because I couldn’t stand another second of watching Ella’s performance.

I had given up my seat.

I thought, even with Ella’s dramatics, that would be the end of it.

But barely an hour into the flight, a fresh wave of raised voices came from the front cabin.

Before I could process it, Cassio was striding down the aisle toward the galley.

He found me and grabbed my wrist, his grip like a vise, pulling me back to the seat area.

“Serena. It’s your seat. You decide. Who sits in it? Ella, who is sick? Or this… this peasant?”

I looked at Ella, now installed in my former seat.

She was clutching her stomach, moaning.

“Cass… it hurts… it really hurts…”

Cassio didn’t wait for my answer.

He started shoving the woman—Marta, I’d learned her name was—who was sitting where I’d put her.

“Get up! Are you deaf? She’s in pain! She needs to lie down! Get out!”

Marta winced, rubbing her knee. Her eyes sought mine, questioning.

Cassio saw the look and shoved her harder.

“What are you looking at her for? I’m her boyfriend! What I say goes! Now move, before I make you move!”

In eight years with Cassio, he had never been this aggressively “protective” of me.

Only of Ella.

The memory of his heel coming down on my stomach flooded back.

I stepped forward and pushed Cassio away from Marta with all my strength.

“Who said you speak for me? It’s my seat. She stays. No one is taking it from her.”

Cassio stared at me, stunned.

“Are you insane? She’s a stranger! You’re choosing some random woman over me? Over Ella’s health?”

“Let’s be clear, Cassio. I’m not ‘choosing’ anyone over you. I’m maintaining control of my own property. This seat is mine.”

A nasty, mocking smile twisted his lips.

“Playing word games, Serena? Look at her! She needs to lie down!”

“If she needs to lie down, buy a ticket in a sleeper pod. This is economy. It doesn’t recline that far.”

“Not this again! God, can you stop with the jealous act every time Ella is involved? We’re just friends! Why are you so petty?”

The absurdity was so profound it made me laugh.

“Petty? You are trying to steal a seat I paid for, for your ‘just a friend,’ and I’m the petty one?”

“Cass! The pain… I can’t…”

Ella’s tearful whimper sent Cassio over the edge.

He stopped talking.

With a snarl, he shoved me aside so hard I lost my balance.

My lower back slammed into the armrest of a seat across the aisle. White-hot pain lanced through me.

Cassio didn’t notice. He grabbed Marta by the collar of her dress and literally threw her out of the seat.

She crumpled to the floor with a cry.

Her loose, modest dress rode up.

A brutal, freshly healed surgical scar ran from her knee all the way down to her ankle, stark and angry against her skin.