My hand was ruined, my career as a composer over. But for them, the game was just beginning. They needed my jealousy, my tears, my pain, to feed their sick definition of love. They pushed me down a flight of stairs just to watch me cry.
I had mistaken my husband's obsession for passion, his cruelty for a test. I finally saw it for what it was: a pathology of ownership. My suffering was their trophy.
Lying broken at the bottom of the stairs, I heard my son's voice float down.
"See, Dad? Now she's really crying. She really does love us."
Something inside me didn't just break; it turned to ice. When my lawyer visited me in the hospital, I took the papers he brought. In our world, a Don's wife doesn't leave. She endures or she disappears. I signed the divorce petition. I was choosing war.
Chapter 1
Alessia POV:
The surgeon told me I had one hour to save my right hand, the one that spun my soul into symphonies. My husband, Don Dante Rossi, gave that hour to his mistress.
"It was a clean break for her, a minor fracture," the surgeon, a man whose face was tight with fear, had tried to explain to Dante. "Mrs. Rossi's injury is a crush. The nerves, the bones... every minute we delay surgery increases the chance of permanent, catastrophic damage."
Dante's gaze was like polished granite, cold and unmoving. He stood in the sterile white hallway of the hospital, the scent of antiseptic failing to mask the iron tang of his power. He ran the Rossi family, a sprawling empire built on whispers and bloodshed, and every soul in this city, from the mayor to this terrified surgeon, knew it.
He didn't look at me, lying on the gurney with my hand wrapped in blood-soaked gauze, a mangled mess of flesh and bone pinned beneath the twisted metal of our car. He looked at our ten-year-old son, Nico, who stood beside him, a perfect miniature of his father's chilling composure.
"What do you think, Nico?" Dante asked, his voice a low rumble.
Nico's eyes, the same dark shade as Dante's, met mine. There was no childish sympathy in them, only a cold, assessing curiosity. He had been raised on a diet of twisted loyalty, taught that love was a thing to be tested, to be proven through pain. He believed my jealousy, my suffering, was the ultimate declaration of my devotion to them. Omertà, the code of silence, wasn't just for business; it was for the heart. My heart.
"Seraphina was scared," Nico said, his voice unnervingly calm. "Mamma is strong. She's the Don's wife. She'll understand the sacrifice. Besides," he added, a flicker of something calculating in his eyes, "if she's in pain, it means she loves us more. She'll be jealous Seraphina got the doctor first. And jealousy is proof."
A breath of approval, almost imperceptible, escaped Dante's lips. He nodded, a single, sharp gesture that sealed my fate. He placed a hand on Nico's shoulder, a silent commendation for correctly interpreting the brutal laws of their world. The Supremacy of Loyalty was not to a person, but to the Don's power, and that power was demonstrated through control.
My world went quiet. The frantic beeping of the monitors, the surgeon's stammered protests, the distant wail of a siren-it all faded into a dull, flat hum. I watched them turn away, Dante's broad back a wall of indifference, Nico trotting to keep up. I saw them through the window of Seraphina's room, cooing over her elegantly bandaged wrist, a performance of concern for the tool they used to torment me.
The love I had nurtured for twelve years, a stubborn flower I insisted could grow in the cracks of this concrete fortress, shriveled and died in that moment. It wasn't a dramatic explosion. It was a quiet, cold implosion, leaving nothing but a hollow ache where my heart used to be.
A new thought took root in that empty space, hard and sharp as a diamond. I will get out. I will make them pay. And I will use their own rules against them.
Weeks later, the surgeon's prediction came true. The report was clinical. "Severe nerve damage... loss of fine motor control... permanent." My career as a classical composer was over. My hand was a useless, scarred claw.
They sent me home to the grand, silent mansion that had become my prison. Dante and Nico continued their game, circling me like sharks sensing blood, waiting for the tears, the accusations, the jealousy that would feed their sick definition of love.
They didn't get it.
I learned to be silent. I learned to watch. I ate my meals, attended the functions, played the part of the dutiful Don's wife. And every night, I avoided them. My lawyer, a man from outside the family's reach, was already working, quietly, efficiently.
One evening, searching for a book in Dante's private study, a room I usually avoided, my fingers brushed against a loose panel behind a bookshelf. Curiosity, a long-dormant instinct, stirred. I pried it open.
It wasn't a safe or a secret compartment for weapons. It was a room. A small, hidden gallery. And the walls were covered with me.
Hundreds of photographs, taken without my knowledge. Me sleeping, my face slack and vulnerable. Me in the garden, a rare, genuine smile on my lips. Me weeping after one of their cruel tests. Me in the shower, water sluicing over my body. This gallery represented four years of my work-my soul-hung on these pristine white walls. My work, my soul, his property.
I'd first met Dante at a recital where my first symphony was performed. I remembered the intensity in his eyes, the way he looked at me not as an artist, but as a masterpiece he had to acquire. I had mistaken it for passion. I saw now it was the cold, calculating gaze of a collector.
My blood ran cold when I saw the far wall. It was Nico's corner. He had replicated his father's obsession on a smaller scale. Scraps of my clothing, a lock of my hair snipped while I slept, a diary filled with childish scrawl detailing every time I cried, every time I flinched. He wasn't just my son; he was my junior warden.
Any lingering illusion that this was love, however twisted, shattered. This was pathology. This was ownership.
I walked out of that room and into our master bedroom. I took our wedding album from the nightstand. I methodically tore every picture of us, of our family, into tiny, unrecognizable pieces. I let the confetti of our dead life flutter into the wastebasket.
When Dante and Nico returned that night, they were fresh from a celebratory dinner. Seraphina had moved into one of the guest wings, her presence a constant, grating reminder of their cruelty.
"Seraphina thinks we should redecorate the west drawing-room," Nico announced at the dinner table, pushing his food around his plate. "She wants gold curtains. What do you think, Mamma?"
I didn't answer. I just kept eating.
"Alessia." Dante's voice was low, a warning. He hated being ignored. It was a challenge to his absolute authority. "Your son asked you a question."
"I don't have an opinion," I said, my voice flat.
Seraphina, sitting across from me, smirked. "Oh, let her be, Dante. She's probably still upset about her hand."
The game was on. They tried for an hour, poking and prodding, waiting for a reaction. I gave them nothing. My heart was a frozen lake. They could skate on it all they wanted; they would never break through again.
Later, Dante served the dessert himself. A rich, decadent chocolate mousse. He knew I was allergic to a specific type of dark chocolate, an allergy that caused anaphylactic shock. He had made sure the chefs used that exact kind. He placed a bowl in front of me, his eyes daring me.
I looked at him, then at Nico, who was watching with breathless anticipation. It was another test. A loyalty test to the death. Would I eat the poison he served me, just to prove I trusted him?
A tiny, bitter smile touched my lips. I picked up my spoon.
But as I brought it to my mouth, a burning pain shot through my chest, completely unrelated to the chocolate. My breath hitched. My heart seized, a fist clenching tight in my ribcage.
Dante's eyes flickered with something-for a second, it looked like genuine concern. Nico half-rose from his chair. "Mamma?"
Then Seraphina let out a little shriek. "Ow! I cut my finger on this wine glass!" She held up her hand, a tiny bead of red welling on her fingertip.
It was all it took. The switch flipped. The brief flicker of concern in Dante's eyes vanished, replaced by the familiar mask of performative care for his precious tool. He and Nico rushed to her side, fussing over the minuscule cut.
"Are you alright, darling?"
"Let me see, let me see!"
My vision started to blur. The pain in my chest was unbearable. I couldn't breathe. My body slumped forward, my head hitting the polished mahogany table with a sickening thud.
The last thing I heard before the darkness took me was Dante's voice, thick with annoyance, as he looked at my collapsed form.
"For God's sake, Alessia. Stop being so dramatic."
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