Back From the Dead
Dante
She’s alive.
Those three words loop endlessly through my head as I drive across Paris, my hands locked tight around the steering wheel. The city lights blur past unseen.
My heart leapt before my mind caught up with reality. One fraction of a second of pure, brutal joy—before the truth hit, ice-cold.
She had been alive all this time while I tore the world apart trying to recover her body. While I signed her death certificates with shaking hands. While I died from missing her, night after night, in a bed that still smelled like her perfume.
She let me believe she was dead.
Rage floods through me.
It has nothing to do with the anger I use in boardrooms. That kind of anger is cold, calculated, strategic.
This one is personal and it wants blood.
What kind of woman does that?
If she wanted to end our marriage, one word would have been enough. I would have let her go—I would have respected her choice, even if it had meant tearing my own heart out.
She could have kept her shares. I never cared about the money.
Instead, she vanished. She made me go from hope to the certainty of her death. She made me grieve her while she was still alive. Hidden somewhere. Never once sending word.
And tonight, she had the nerve to reappear before the entire world, unharmed and radiant, on another man’s arm, as if nothing had happened.
As if she owed me no explanation.
I slam my palm against the steering wheel.
“Fuck!”
A memory rises—sharp and precise as broken glass.
It was December, three years ago. Same car. Same avenue. She had rested her hand on my thigh, a simple gesture she always made when we drove together. I’d asked where she wanted to have dinner.
“Nowhere,” she’d said with a smile. “Let’s go home. I just want to be with you.”
That night, we made love against the front door, unable to wait until we reached the bedroom.
Afterward, she stayed curled against me, her head on my chest, and whispered,
“I love you so much it scares me. I don’t know what I’d become if I lost you.”
“You have no reason to be afraid. I’m here. I’ll never leave you.”
A bitter smile pulls at my mouth.
What irony. She was the one who left. She was the one who broke us.
My phone vibrates. Bianca, probably. I abandoned her at the gala without a word.
I should answer.
I can’t.
Not now.
Because all I can see is Valeria.
The look in her eyes when they met mine. That suspended instant when something crossed them—longing, pain—before she put her mask back on.
And the man beside her. Who is he? Her lover? Did she leave me for him?
The jealousy twisting through my gut is almost as violent as the rage.
I thought she was dead. All that time, she was living somewhere else.
Maybe even with him.
“You heard about the funding round.”
The words I threw in her face still echo.
It’s the only logical explanation. It’s the explanation that hurts least.
She waited until Aurenza reached peak valuation, until her shares were worth a fortune, to return.
Rational. Cold. Calculated.
Fine. But this time, I’ll be the one setting the rules.
When I arrive at the apartment, Bianca still isn’t home.
I dial my brother’s number.
Andrea answers before the second ring.
“Dante. I was about to call you. I heard about Valeria—it’s everywhere. How are you holding up?”
“How do you think?”
My voice comes out harsher than I intended.
“She was alive this whole time. She never contacted me once.”
“Did she explain why?”
“No. I didn’t want to hear it.”
A silence stretches.
“You deserve to know,” he says. “You deserve answers, after everything you went through.”
Yes, I deserve them. But not from her. Her word has no value anymore. I’ll get them myself.
Andrea is two years older than I am. He went into private intelligence while I went into the corporate world. Our paths differ, but our networks complement each other.
That’s why I’m calling.
“The man who was with her tonight. I want everything on him.”
“His name is Hugo Perez.”
I stiffen.
“You know him.”
“Let’s say I suspected you’d call. Heir to one of the largest fortunes in France. Corporate lawyer. His family has holdings in tech, real estate, energy. Private. Travels often. No known official relationship to date.”
“How long has he known her?”
“Hard to say. Even through him, I couldn’t find any trace of her.”
I don’t want to ask the question. But not knowing would be worse.
“Does she live with him?”
“No. He lives alone.”
Andrea pauses, emphasizing what comes next.
“Even now, I still can’t locate her. No registered address, no lease, no subscriptions, no bills. On paper, she doesn’t exist. Someone is helping erase every trace of her.”
“Perez.”
“Probably. He has the means.”
I stare at the lights of Paris beyond the window.
“She’s hiding.”
“That’s what the evidence suggests.”
If she’s hiding, she’s running from something.
“Why?”
“That’s the right question. And I don’t have the answer yet.”
When I hang up, my fingers struggle to unclench around the phone.
She’s still wearing her wedding band and her engagement ring.
I couldn’t stop myself from checking, even while I was pouring my fury over her. I couldn’t help it.
I removed mine the day I agreed to marry Bianca. I have nothing to feel guilty about. Valeria disappeared. She let me believe she was dead. I can’t forget that.
Bianca comes home an hour later. She enters without a word, sets down her bag, and looks at me. Her eyes search mine carefully before she speaks.
“You should have told me you were leaving.”
Her voice is calm. No accusation. But something flickers in her eyes, too quickly for me to clearly identify it.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
She nods, steps closer and places a hand on my cheek.
I don’t lean into the touch.
“How are you?”
I search for an honest answer. I don’t find one.
She sees it on my face.
“I was in shock too,” she says softly. “How could she do this to us? How could she be so cruel?”