The Don’s Favorite Lover Vanished

---- Chapter 25 Chiara's POV "Tam sorry." Those three words were a knife in my heart. I stumbled, catching myself on the doorframe. It wasn't because I loved Alessandro. It was because a clean, innocent man was dead. A casualty of my dirty war. Slowly, I turned and walked back toward Vincenzo. He was still on his knees, his face a mask of utter, blank shock. He hadn't expected this. He hadn't wanted this. "Are you happy now?" I whispered, the words like ash in my mouth. He looked up, his lips trembling, unable to speak. "You wanted me back, right?" I said, each word a stone.

" You wanted to destroy the new life I chose?" ---- "7 didn't... I didn't want him to die..." he shook his head, frantic. "But he's dead because of you!" The control I'd held onto for two years finally snapped. A raw scream of pure, undiluted rage tore from my throat. "You and your obsession! You killed him!" Traised the Beretta M9 again. This time, the muzzle was pointed at his heart. "Now," I looked into his eyes, now filled with pain and regret, my voice trembling. "I'm ending all of this." He didn't move. He just knelt there. He opened his eyes, a strange, broken smile on his lips.

"Do it," he whispered. "End it. I deserve it." He closed his eyes, waiting for the bullet. My finger was on the trigger. One small movement, and it would all be over. My pain, my hatred, my past. ---- I looked at him, at the face I had loved for ten years and hated for two. T saw the double-headed eagle tattoo, a faint, dark shape under his blood-soaked shirt. I saw ten years of blood, tears, betrayal, and despair. And then I saw Alessandro's gentle, apologetic face. BANG! The gunshot echoed across the estate. Vincenzo's body jerked. But he didn't fall. He opened his eyes in disbelief.

The barrel of my gun was smoking. And on the ground beside him, there was a new bullet hole. Thadn't killed him. "Why?" he looked at me, his voice full of confusion. "Because killing you," I said, my voice hollow, "makes ---- me you." I didn't want to be a cold-blooded monster, enslaved by hatred and the past. "Your punishment isn't death, Vincenzo," I looked at his shattered face and delivered my final verdict. "It's life. You have to live with what you've done. With the ghosts. Forever." I threw the Beretta M9 on the ground in front of him.

"This was the first gun you taught me how to use," I said. "Now I'm giving it back." I turned and walked toward the waiting helicopter, and I didn't look back. "Chiara!" I heard his hoarse cry behind me. I didn't stop. As I climbed into the helicopter and the rotor wash kicked up, I took one last look. Vincenzo was still kneeling where I had left him. He hadn't picked up the gun. He hadn't stood up. ---- He was just clutching the ebony box-the coffin of a future that would never be-like a child abandoned by the entire world, weeping silently in the wind. The helicopter rose.

The prison he built for me shrank below, becoming a smaller and smaller black dot. Tlooked out the window at the endless snow-capped mountains. The sun broke through the clouds. I closed my eyes as the sun warmed my face. And for the first time in a long, long time, I felt nothing. No hate. No love. No pain. Just... peace. The war was over. And I had survived.