Chapter 23 #2
And then I saw him.
Vincenzo.
Leaning against the driver’s side of his matte-black SUV.
Arms crossed. Posture relaxed..
I walked faster.
Clutching the report tighter.
“There’s got to be a mistake with these results—a serious one,” I said the moment I reached him.
My voice came out breathless.
“This isn’t possible!”
He didn’t look at me.
Didn’t move.
Didn’t even acknowledge the report in my hand.
“Quit stressing me out, Elena,” he said flatly.
The words were dismissive.
“Whatever you’re carrying... it’s the child of a rapist.”
My breath caught.
Then—
Without looking at me—
“I gave you my word—I’ll kill Matteo for touching you,” he said evenly.
“I can make you watch exactly how much he suffers before I send him to hell. So tell me... why are you still trying to force a child on me that isn’t mine?”
Everything inside me went still.
“Wait—just listen to me.”
My voice shook, but I forced the words out anyway, clinging to them like they were the last thread keeping me from falling apart.
“I’ve only had sex once in my entire life. And that was with you. That night.”
The memory hit me as I spoke—faint, but vivid enough to make my chest tighten.
“I have no reason to lie. No reason at all. This result is wrong.”
I took a step closer, desperate now.
“Please—come back with me tomorrow. We’ll do another test. Together. See it through with me.”
For a moment, there was nothing.
Then—
He looked at me.
Cold. Distant.
“I have things to do, Elena,” Vincenzo said flatly.
His voice carried no warmth.
“I run an empire—legal and illegal. I don’t have time to sit through endless DNA tests because you refuse to tell me the truth.”
The words hit hard.
He exhaled slowly through his nose, gaze already drifting away from me as if the conversation had lost all importance.
“I kept trying to understand why you wouldn’t give up,” he said, his voice almost absent.
“I’ve told you before—I was a victim, my sister was, and now you are. I won’t hate you for it, and I won’t look at you in a way that would make you relive it. No... I get it. I understand the pain. Just... let it be, alright?”
My lips parted.
But no sound came out.
The words had stolen it.
“Vincenzo—”
“Get in. We’re leaving.”
“No.”
The word came out sharper than I intended.
I planted my feet firmly on the ground, refusing to move.
“I’m not getting in until you agree to come with me tomorrow,” I said, my voice trembling but stubborn. “You have to. You can’t just walk away from this.”
He studied me.
Long. Quiet.
Something unreadable flickering across his face—tiredness, maybe. Or irritation. Or both.
Then he sighed.
A sound that carried more weight than any argument.
“Fine,” he said at last. “I can’t promise I’ll come.”
My chest tightened.
“But I’ll give you whatever samples you need,” he continued, already dismissing the emotional weight of the moment. “Hair. Blood. Saliva. Enough to keep confirming the identity of the child you refuse to admit isn’t mine.”
The words stung.
Every single one of them.
He stepped past me, opening the passenger door of his SUV.
His voice came again, impatient now.
“Now—will you get in?”
I took one step forward—
Then stopped.
A voice.
“Mr. Vincenzo!”
The sound cut through the garage, urgent and breathless.
Both of us turned.
A young man—early twenties, suit slightly rumpled, chest rising and falling rapidly—burst around the corner, skidding to a halt as he tried to catch his breath.
He looked panicked.
“Mr. Vincenzo,” he said again, voice strained.
Vincenzo’s entire demeanor shifted instantly.
“What is it?” he demanded sharply.
The young man swallowed hard.
“Violet—she’s just been rushed here. She fainted completely.”
Silence.
For a fraction of a second—
The world seemed to hold its breath.
Then—
Vincenzo moved.
Fast.
All his earlier indifference replaced by something sharper.
More urgent. More alive.
“Lead the way to her ward,” he ordered immediately.
The young man nodded and turned, hurrying off down the corridor.
And then—
Vincenzo turned back to me.
Without a word—
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his keys.
Then—
Pressed them into my palm.
“Find your way home, Elena.”
No second glance. No concern.
Just—
Dismissal.
He turned and strode after the young man, his long strides already pulling him away from me, his focus entirely locked on her.
On Violet.
On the woman who mattered.
I stood there.
Frozen.
The keys pressed into my hand like a cruel joke.
He had left me.
Here.
In the garage.
Like I was nothing.
Like I had always been nothing.
My fingers tightened slowly around the metal.
So tightly that it hurt.
I clenched my jaw.
Then—
Without thinking—
I moved.
I followed.
Fast.
Each step sent a dull ache through my body, but I ignored it, pushing forward, keeping pace from a distance as I trailed behind him through the hospital corridors.
He didn’t look back.
Not once.
Not even a flicker of awareness that I was there.
Every step he took screamed urgency.
Purpose. Devotion.
Everything he had never given me.
Everything he gave her.
I watched him move.
Watched how quickly he responded to her.
How instinctively.
And something inside me twisted painfully.
I wondered—
Bitterly.
Had he moved like this when I was missing?
When I was locked in that concrete room at Matteo’s estate, holding a gun to my own father’s head while praying—begging—that someone would come for me?
That he would come?
I doubted it.
I knew it.
Because I was the one he discarded.
The unwanted wife. The inconvenient truth.
The mistake.
And Violet—
Violet was everything.
Yet still—
I kept following.
Why did I keep following?
I didn’t have a clear answer.
Maybe because he had left me standing there like discarded trash.
Or maybe—
Because some stupid, stubborn part of me still believed I deserved to be seen.
To be acknowledged. To matter.
Even if only for a moment.
Even if only as someone following behind him like a shadow he couldn’t shake.
Even if it hurt.
Especially if it hurt.
Because pain meant I was still here.
Still fighting.
Still refusing to disappear quietly into the life he had already decided for me.
I watched him slip into the private ward.
I followed, stopping just outside the door, careful not to be seen—half-hidden by the frame, pressed against the wall, letting the cold seep into me as if it could keep me steady.
My heart hammered so violently it felt like it might give me away.
The corridor smelled of antiseptic and fresh lilies.
I pressed my palm flat against the cool wall, forcing air into my lungs.
Then I looked in.
Vincenzo didn’t hesitate.
The moment he stepped into the room, everything about him changed.
He moved straight to her bedside, like the world outside didn’t exist.
“Violet...”
His voice softened instantly.
Not just softer—lower.
Urgent.
Stripped of every layer of ice he usually wore, every trace of that cold, controlled distance he showed everyone else.
He reached out, placing the back of his hand against her forehead.
The gesture was instinctive and intimate.
“She’s burning up,” he said sharply, turning his head toward the room.
“Why the hell aren’t the doctors here yet?”
His tone snapped back just enough to carry authority.
The young man shifted nervously at the foot of the bed, wringing his hands slightly as if unsure where to stand in a moment like this.
“They just left, sir,” he stammered. “They said they’d be back with more fluids—”
But Vincenzo wasn’t listening anymore.
Because Violet moved.
Her eyes fluttered open—slowly, weakly.
Her lashes trembled, her gaze unfocused for a moment as if it took effort just to hold them open.
She looked fragile.
Her skin had a waxy pallor under the harsh hospital lighting, lips pale, almost colorless.
“Vin...” she whispered, her voice barely audible.
“You came...”
The words broke something in the room.
In me.
“Of course I came.”
Vincenzo dropped to one knee beside her bed, bringing himself level with her like gravity no longer mattered.
His voice deepened—thick, raw, stripped of everything except urgency and something dangerously close to emotion.
“I’ll always come for you.”
Always.
The word echoed in my head.
Violet’s trembling hand lifted slightly.
Vincenzo caught it immediately.
Without hesitation.
He cradled her hand between both of his, careful—almost reverent—as if she were made of something delicate enough to shatter at the slightest pressure.
“It’s...” she began, her voice wavering, “already a miracle I’ve lived this long...”
A cough tore through her.
Wet. Violent.
When she pulled her hand back slightly, there were dark flecks of blood at the corner of her lips.
She looked like she was slipping away in front of him.
He didn’t look away.
Vincenzo grabbed a handkerchief from his pocket—crisp white linen, untouched—and leaned in to gently wipe the blood from her lips.
His movements were careful and tender.
The kind of touch I had never received from him.
“God, Violet...” His voice broke slightly, just at the edges.
“I wish so badly that you could live longer... it pains me to see what this congestive heart failure is doing to you.”
The words were quiet.
But they carried weight.
Violet shook her head faintly, a small, pained movement that seemed to take all the strength she had left.
“No... no, Vin...” she whispered, her voice trembling.
“If it truly hurt you that I could die from my heart failure, you would have given me Elena’s heart... so I could live.”
Another cough.
More blood.
Her body trembled slightly as pain rippled through her, but she kept her eyes on him—like he was the only thing anchoring her to the world.
“I don’t want to die, Vin...”
The words came out broken.
Desperate.
Vincenzo stiffened slightly at that.
His hand tightened just a fraction around hers.
“You promised me,” Violet continued, her voice weakening but still pressing forward, refusing to let the moment slip away.