The agony from his shoe nearly snapped the last thread of my sanity.

But I didn’t beg.

I just stared at him, my mind flashing back to two years ago.

It was an assassination attempt on the Bianchi family.

He was kidnapped, badly wounded. It took me seven days, crawling through nearly every sewer in New York, to find him.

He was passed out in an abandoned warehouse. The bomb the kidnappers set was about to go off.

I dragged him with all my strength, and just as the blast wave threw us through the air, I shielded his head with my right hand.

A sharp piece of glass pierced my wrist, severing the nerves.

With his last bit of consciousness, Marco looked at me, his eyes red. He said he loved me. He said he would marry me.

And what happened next?

The Family rushed me to Switzerland for treatment. The best doctors, but also the highest costs and the most painful recovery.

I didn’t want him to worry, so I downplayed how bad it was.

But all the messages I sent him, his replies went from “Get well soon” to “K” and “Busy.”

A year later, I came back, full of hope. I was met with him and Sandra, and the words from his mouth: “Your hand is useless. You’re not fit to be the matriarch of the Bianchi family.”

Only now did I understand.

It wasn’t that he’d stopped loving me. He believed Sandra’s lies. He thought I was a cheat who took his money to get an abortion.

“Let go…” I choked out.

“Apologize!” Marco pressed down harder, twisting his heel. “Get on your knees and apologize to Sandra, and I’ll let your hand go! Or else I’ll have someone tattoo ‘WHORE’ on it right here!”

CRASH!

Not a gunshot, but the deafening roar of an engine. A black Hummer didn't just lose control—it leaped the curb, plowing straight through the glass storefront.

Glass and displays went flying.

Screams everywhere.

This was no accident.

A swarm of unmarked motorcycles roared up, masked gunmen spraying the store with automatic fire. It was a classic drive-by shooting. The target was clearly someone in here.

Bullets chewed up the marble floor, ricocheting through the air.

“AH! HELP!” Sandra shrieked, scrambling for cover.

On pure instinct, Marco lifted his foot off my hand, grabbed Sandra, and dove behind a counter.

His movements were smooth, decisive, full of a fierce need to protect.

Just like how I protected him three years ago.

Only this time, I was the one left out in the open, a living target.

I was still crumpled on the ground, my right hand numb with pain. I couldn't move fast enough.

A bullet hit the floor inches from my face, stone shards cutting my cheek.

I watched Marco’s back as he shielded Sandra, never once looking back at me.

In that moment, a part of my heart collapsed into rubble.

A bullet screamed for my heart.

I closed my eyes, ready for the end.

SCREEECH!

The shriek of tires drowned out the gunfire.

A bulletproof Maybach slammed to a halt, positioning itself between me and the hail of bullets.

The heavy chassis absorbed the assault, sparks flying off the metal.

The world went silent.

The rear window slid down.

Even in this chaos, the man inside was terrifyingly calm.

I couldn’t see his whole face, just a delicate silver mask covering one half, and a pair of ice-blue eyes as deep as an abyss.

“Can you move?” his voice was a low, magnetic rumble, full of a dangerous charm that demanded obedience.

I gritted my teeth and nodded.

A hand in a black leather glove emerged, offering a small silver canister.

“For the nerve pain. Spray it on the wound.”

My shaking fingers took it. The moment I brushed against his glove, a jolt shot through me.

“Thank you…”

But the window was already rising. The car pulled away like a ghost, leaving behind the smoke, the chaos, and a stunned Marco peeking out from behind the counter.

…

The next day. St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Every powerful family in New York was there, but no one dared to sit in the front pews.

Those were for the Moretti family.

As I put on my wedding dress, my father was still begging me not to make Sandra confess.

But I wouldn’t let her off the hook.

I stood alone at the altar in an ivory gown, waiting for the legendary monster.

The groom hadn't shown up yet.

“Wait!”

The cathedral doors burst open. Marco stormed in, the Bianchi family trailing behind him, along with a smug-looking Sandra.

“This wedding cannot happen!” he yelled, pointing at me, his voice echoing through the vast church. “Odessa Rossi is damaged goods! A liar! Her right hand is crippled, she is unworthy of the Moretti Godfather!”

The guests began to whisper.

I stood there, feeling their eyes on me, my heart a calm, dead sea.

“And she spent a year in Switzerland fooling around with other men! She had an abortion!” Marco bellowed, determined to nail me to a cross of shame. “How can an unclean woman like this marry the great Godfather? This is an insult to the Moretti name!”

“She doesn’t deserve to be his wife! She can’t even hold a ring steady with that hand! She’ll only bring shame to the Moretti name! She should be thrown out into the slums!”

He was here to humiliate me. To prove his loyalty to Sandra, to show everyone he wanted nothing to do with the "whore" he was leaving behind.

Even as I was about to marry another man, he had to destroy my name, to ensure I had no future.

I watched his mad performance, about to speak.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

The heavy, steady sound of leather shoes on stone came from the shadows behind the altar.

The air in the cathedral froze. Every breath was held.

A tall figure emerged.

He wore a perfectly tailored black suit that did nothing to hide the power in his broad shoulders and narrow waist. His presence was so heavy it was suffocating.

He wasn't wearing a mask.

His face was brutally handsome. A jagged scar ran through one eyebrow, but it didn't ruin his looks—it just added a wild, bloodthirsty edge.

Jude Moretti.

He ignored everyone, walking straight to me.

Those ice-blue eyes locked onto mine, then drifted down to my gloved right hand.

He reached out.

After a moment’s hesitation, I gave him my hand.

He pulled off the glove, revealing the scarred, trembling flesh beneath. And on the back of my hand, the ugly, fading bruise from where Marco had stomped on it.

From the crowd, Marco sneered. “See, Don Moretti? I told you. It’s a useless hand. She is unworthy…”

He didn’t finish.

Jude suddenly bowed his head.

And before the horrified eyes of everyone, this feared Godfather, this demon of the underworld, reverently, gently, pressed a kiss to my ugliest scar.

“This hand saved a blind man’s life.”

He looked up, his voice low and raw, laced with an undeniable authority that filled the church.

“But in my house, it’s meant to wear a crown.”

The next second, Jude spun around.

He drew his gun, cocked it, and aimed the black muzzle right between Marco's eyes.

"You're on my turf," he said, his voice deadly soft. "And you put your filthy hands on my wife."