Chapter 2

Elara POV:

In the week that followed, I moved like a ghost through a life that no longer felt like mine. Dante's preference for Seraphina wasn't a secret, not really. It had become a pattern, a series of small cuts that had bled me dry long before Luca died.

He bought Seraphina a new Birkin bag every season, but he forgot my birthday last month. He started a war with M Corp, a rival organization, because they'd backed out of a real estate deal that would have inconvenienced a spa Seraphina liked. For me, he couldn't even answer his phone.

I arranged Luca's funeral alone. A small, quiet service. I didn't want Dante's blood money tainting the only pure thing I had left. I took the small box of ashes to the coast and scattered them into the gray, churning sea, whispering a final goodbye to my moral compass, my only family.

Seven days after Luca's death, Dante finally called.

"I heard about Luca," he said, his voice a low murmur. He didn't apologize. He offered an excuse. "The medical resources... they were tied up in a sensitive situation. It was unavoidable."

Ice flowed through my veins. "A sensitive situation?" I repeated, my voice dangerously calm. "You mean delivering Seraphina's kittens? Was that the life-or-death emergency, Dante?"

"Don't be like that, Elara," he sighed. "Luca was family to me, too. You know that."

In the background, I heard her voice, light and musical. "Dante, darling, are you coming back to bed?"

He didn't even have the decency to call me from another room.

I hung up. I refused to let him feed me another lie.

My hand went to the drawer of my nightstand, pulling out a crisp manila envelope. Inside were the divorce papers he'd thrown at me six months ago during a fight. *"If you're so unhappy, then leave,"* he had snarled. I hadn't been ready then. I was now.

My signature was firm, a black slash severing our history.

I had to go back to the old apartment one last time, the one in the slums where Luca and I grew up, where I had saved Dante. I needed to pack up Luca's things, the last tangible pieces of him.

As I turned onto the familiar, grimy street, I saw it parked under a flickering streetlamp. Dante's Maybach. A sleek black beast in a concrete jungle of decay.

My heart hammered against my ribs. I ducked into a dark alley across the street, my body hidden by the shadows. Through the tinted windows of the car, I could see their silhouettes. Dante and Seraphina.

He leaned over and kissed her, a long, passionate kiss that made my stomach clench. When they broke apart, she opened her door to get out. Her heel landed in a murky puddle.

"Ugh, disgusting!" she whined, pulling her foot back.

Dante was out of the car in a second. He took off his thousand-dollar suit jacket, the one I'd picked out for him, and laid it over the filth for her to walk on. The same man who couldn't be bothered to show up for my brother's last breath was now treating his mistress like a queen over a dirty puddle.

"Why did you even bring me to this shithole?" Seraphina asked, stepping gracefully onto his jacket and then onto the pavement.

Dante's voice was low, but I heard every word. "I'm buying the whole block. I'm going to tear it all down and build you a shopping center. A gift."

He was going to demolish our history. The place I saved him. The place Luca called home. He was erasing it all, for her.

A wave of nausea washed over me. I stumbled back, my foot landing on an empty plastic bottle.

*CRUNCH.*

The sound echoed in the silent alley.

Across the street, two heads snapped in my direction.