She Disappeared On Their Wedding Anniversary—The Mafia Boss Finally Learned Why She Left

CHAPTER 6

The first week at the estate was a blur of sleep and silence. I woke at odd hours, ate when Lucia put food in front of me, and walked the grounds when the afternoon sun broke through the November clouds. I didn’t check my phone. I didn’t call anyone. I simply existed, for the first time in years, without performing for someone else’s expectations.

Dante was gone most days. “Business,” Lucia said, with the same careful vagueness she used when discussing his schedule. He returned in the evenings, sometimes with food from Valentino’s, sometimes with bruise-knuckled hands he tried to hide.

I never asked about the bruises. He never offered.

On the fifth day, I found myself in the kitchen with Lucia, watching her roll pasta dough with practiced hands.

“Teach me,” I said.

She looked at me sharply, then smiled. “It’s about time you showed some interest in something other than sleeping.”

I laughed. Actually laughed. It felt foreign and good.

Over the next week, I learned to make pasta. To properly season a sauce. To tell when bread was ready by the sound it made when you tapped the bottom. Lucia was patient, exacting, and generous with her praise when I got it right.

“You have good hands,” she said one afternoon. “Steady. The baby will be lucky to have you.”

“Assuming I don’t mess it up.”

“Every mother thinks she’ll mess it up. The good ones worry about it. The bad ones don’t.”

I was learning. Not just about cooking, but about myself. About the person I’d been before Marcus filed down my edges. She was still in there. Bruised, but not gone.

On the tenth day, I woke to shouting.

I sat up in bed, heart pounding, disoriented by the unfamiliar room. The shouting came from downstairs. Male voices. Angry.

I crept to the top of the stairs and looked down.

Dante stood in the foyer, his back to me, facing a man I didn’t recognize. The stranger was tall, expensively dressed, with a coldness in his expression that made my skin crawl.

“She’s here,” the man said. “I know she is. My son has been looking for her for ten days.”

“Your son should have treated her better.”

“You have no idea what my son did or didn’t do.”

“I know enough.” Dante’s voice was ice. “I know he told her to abort her child. I know he’s been cheating on her for six months. I know he threw her out on their anniversary and then had the audacity to demand she come back when she left.”

The man’s face reddened. “That’s between my son and his wife.”

“Your son lost the right to call her his wife when he put his hands on her.”

“He did not—”

“She came to me with bruises on her arm from where he grabbed her. So unless you want to explain to your wife why you’re being escorted off my property, I suggest you leave.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “This isn’t over.”

“It was over the moment she walked out your son’s door. You just haven’t accepted it yet.”

Dante’s men appeared, flanking the stranger with silent menace. The man had no choice but to retreat. The front door closed behind him with a heavy thud.

I stood frozen at the top of the stairs. Dante turned, his eyes finding me immediately.

“You heard.”

“Who was that?”

“Marcus’s father.” He climbed the stairs slowly, his expression unreadable. “He’s been trying to find you for days. My people intercepted him before he could get past the gate, but he made it to the front door.”

“Does Marcus know I’m here?”

“No. And he won’t. But his father is persistent. He has resources.” Dante’s jaw tightened. “It’s not safe for you to stay here much longer.”

My heart dropped. “You’re sending me away?”

“No.” He stopped in front of me, his voice softening. “I’m taking you somewhere safer.”