I was three months pregnant.

My boyfriend, Dante Moretti, gestured toward my stomach in front of everyone at a private cigar club.

"Get rid of it."

His tone was dismissive, as if ordering an underling to take out the trash.

I pleaded with him to come home, but he shoved me away.

Dante was arrogant and cold, his disdain a palpable force.

"Elena, you're just a warm body in my bed. When did I ever promise you a home?"

"Isn't this roof over your head your payment for crawling into my bed and getting yourself knocked up?"

A sharp pain lanced through my abdomen.

With no regard for the eyes on him, Dante kissed the dancer in his arms, shoving his tongue into her mouth.

In the dim light of the club, everyone was waiting for the spectacle of my humiliation.

————————

1

Dante's dark eyes were locked on me as he undid the slip dress of the dancer in his arms.

The woman's soft gasps hung in the air, a soundtrack to the sordid scene unfolding.

"Don't, Don Moretti... she's watching..."

Her sultry, inviting voice was enough to make any man in the room weak at the knees.

Dante's grip tightened, and he roughly tore the strap from her shoulder.

"What are you afraid of?" He shifted his gaze from the woman's pale skin to me. "Go on. Tell Elena to give you her shawl."

I didn't move.

His voice turned icy. "If you don't take it off, are you waiting for me to do it for you?"

My face was ashen. I bit my lip, desperately trying to suppress the emotions threatening to overwhelm me.

After a deep breath, I removed the cashmere shawl from my shoulders and draped it over the woman's bare skin.

The club's lighting was too dim; I couldn't see their faces clearly.

"Dante, you're drunk. I'll wait for you outside."

My voice trembled, a tremor running through my body.

"Principessa, it's cold outside. You should have your shawl back."

A sweet female voice came from behind. Before I could react, she grabbed my wrist.

Turning, I saw a constellation of fresh love bites on the pale skin of her neck, a stark contrast against her torn collar.

She stuffed the shawl back into my hands and smiled at me.

Because we were so close, I finally saw her clearly. She smiled, and it was the very same smile as Isabella's—Dante's unforgettable, deceased love.

I was stunned. "Isabella?"

The woman flinched, scrambling back into the safety of Dante's arms.

"You're not worthy of saying her name!"

"In that fire all those years ago, it should have been you who died, not Isabella!"

Dante's low roar was filled with raw fury, his eyes promising to tear me limb from limb.

He hated me. He hated that I was the sole survivor of that fire.

Ten years ago, a fire had suddenly broken out in the art studio at Isabella's school, and she had perished in the flames.

And I, who was supposed to be with her, had left just moments before the fire broke out.

Dante blamed me for all of it. If I had been with her, he reasoned, she wouldn't have died.

But he didn't know the woman he worshiped had faked her own death simply because she no longer loved him.

She had already flown far, far away.

To keep him from being heartbroken, I had kept this secret for ten years.

But in ten years, I had utterly failed to warm this man's heart.

This time, I was truly tired.

A heart I can't warm... Fine. I'm done trying.

With a loud "thump," Dante threw me into a corner.

The dull impact shot through my back, almost knocking the wind out of me.

I instinctively protected my stomach, but the gesture only fueled Dante's rage.

"I know you signed an heir agreement with the Moretti family. As long as you give birth to an heir, the family will pardon your father's 'debts'."

"But this child, I will never acknowledge it! Be smart and get rid of it."

The whispers finally started, impossible for even Dante to ignore.

Each mocking gaze was a fresh slice of a knife.

They openly discussed my absurd decade with Dante.

Stealing my dead friend's boyfriend, climbing into the bed of a Mafia Underboss, being a secret lover hidden from the light of day, selling my body to pay off my father's debts...

Even the heir agreement I signed with the Moretti family was public knowledge.

One by one, their words branded me a pariah, nailing me to a pillar of shame.

"I will not let any woman other than Isabella give birth to my—"

"Fine."

I cut him off before he could finish.

Using the wall for support, I slowly pushed myself to my feet.

He stared at me, a flicker of shock in his eyes.

Perhaps he thought I would never agree, that he could subject me to this humiliation all night.

He had probably planned even crueler humiliations.

But he never expected me to agree so readily.

"What did you say?"

A bitter smile touched my lips as I repeated myself.

"I said, I'll get rid of the child."

Under the stunned gazes of everyone in the room, I walked slowly out of the club.

Behind me, the chaotic sound of smashing glass erupted.

The moment I closed the door, the chaos was silenced.

Then, I dialed the number that had contacted me a month ago.

"Isabella, you win."

"I don't want Dante anymore. You can have him."

Isabella had returned to New York City a month ago.

At the time, I had just discovered I was pregnant and was preparing to sign the heir agreement with the Moretti family.

She'd contacted me, hoping I could help her meet with Dante.

I knew she just wanted a witness to her story, someone to corroborate a few convenient lies.

In truth, Dante would believe whatever outrageous story she spun.

Just as he would never believe a word I said.

I refused her request, so she proposed a bet: that Dante would never let me have this child.

Now, I had lost. Utterly.

I had thought that even without love, he'd have some compassion. If not for me, then at least for our child.

But Dante was incapable of it. He was heartless.

The next morning, braving the wind and snow, I took a taxi to an underground clinic that asked no questions and scheduled the abortion.

"The fetus is already formed. Are you sure you want to terminate?"

The doctor looked at my chart, a hint of regret in his voice.

"I'm sure."

My hand, hidden in my sleeve, clenched into a fist. The moment I nodded, a sharp, physical pain tore through my chest.

The doctor looked up, his eyes flicking to the empty space behind me, and his expression shifted to one of grim understanding.

Without the father's signature, I wasn't even given the choice of anesthesia.

Lying on the cold operating table, I could feel every sensation as the child was stripped from my body.

The pain was a visceral agony, wrenching my heart and crushing my soul.

I'm so sorry, baby.

It's Mommy's fault. I couldn't protect you.

"She's perforated and hemorrhaging! Quick, contact her family!"

On the verge of fainting, I was shaken awake by a nurse.

"What's your family's phone number? You're bleeding out, we have to contact them now!"

"The file... there's a number for the child's father!"

...

"Mr. Moretti, Elena Hayes is here for an abortion and she's hemorrhaging! We need you to come down and decide what to do!"

The nurse repeated my name, her voice strained with panic.

But the other end of the line was dead silent.

"Elena, are you colluding with the doctors to put on a show for me now?"

"Let her die. Call me when you need the body collected."

The line went dead. The operating room descended into chaos.

My consciousness was drifting, but it snapped back the moment I heard his words.

He would rather let me die than believe me, just this once.

I smiled bitterly, closing my eyes as the tears finally fell.

So tired. Living is so tiring.

Loving someone who doesn't love you back is even more exhausting.

But Dante, if you knew... if you knew the person you loved would rather fake her own death just to leave you...

When you finally learn the truth, will you regret any of this?

I had a secret crush on Dante for years, an affection that could never see the light of day.

He, who had never been close to women, fell for my friend, Isabella, during our freshman year of college.

A girl as fiery and beautiful as a wild rose.

But in our senior year, Isabella suddenly came to me and said she didn't love Dante anymore. She was eloping with some street punk.

To spare Dante the heartbreak, she begged me to help her stage her own death.

But I never expected that one act would trap Dante in the past for ten years.

In those ten years, the Hayes family fell on hard times. My father was imprisoned for a massive "debt" owed to the Moretti family.

To protect her own interests, my mother drugged Dante's drink and pushed me into his bed.

From then on, I became Dante's secret lover, a ghost in his life.

Later, under the Moretti family's arrangement, I signed the heir agreement.

These ten years have left me exhausted, body and soul.

After surviving by the skin of my teeth, I woke up in the clinic, utterly alone.

In a daze, I thought I saw my father, the man who loved me most, the man who had always been my shield against every storm.

"Papa... I miss you so much."

But the room was so quiet that only the steady drip of the IV answered me.

For the two weeks I was recovering, Dante never called. Not once.

The day I was discharged, I called him.

His first words were cold sarcasm.

"Weren't you hemorrhaging? How are you still alive?"

My hand tightened on the phone. A cold laugh escaped my lips.

"Thanks to you, I'm still clinging to life."

"Dante, I have a business proposition for you."

"Isabella. She's alive."

The breathing on the other end of the line stopped.

In my ten years with Dante, traces of Isabella were everywhere.

No matter what he was doing, he would drop everything at the slightest hint of a lead.

For a blurry video, he once left me alone in a mountainside villa and flew overseas.

For a false tip without even a photo, he could climb out of bed, pull on his pants, and be gone in an instant.

I knew Isabella was just stringing him along.

She couldn't let go of her first love, but she also couldn't give up a meal ticket like Dante.

So I wasn't surprised at all that she had come back.

I took a taxi back to the penthouse apartment where we had lived.

The "roof over my head" Dante had provided.

I had just walked in the door from the clinic, not even having a moment to catch my breath, when I heard a key turn in the lock.

Dante, dressed in black, stood at the door, looking travel-worn.

"Talk. Where is Isabella?"

I hadn't expected him to be so fast. It had only been half an hour, and he had rushed over in person.

He had never willingly set foot in this place before.

Every time, I was the one who had to beg him to come.

That's why he'd call me a whore, nothing more.

Sometimes, I almost believed him.