Chapter 3

For several heartbeats, it felt as though the entire ballroom had stopped moving.

Luke stood completely rigid. The confident, untouchable Syndicate Don who had been so eager to humiliate me moments ago was suddenly gone, replaced by a man whose enormous ego had just been shattered. His fingers tightened around my bare arm until his grip became painfully tight.

“What exactly did you just say?” he demanded, his voice reduced to a trembling, dangerous whisper. “Who was he, Baela? Tell me who you were with.”

Daniella immediately noticed the change in him. Her expression shifted from confidence to alarm as she watched Luke lose control over the very woman he claimed to despise.

This was never supposed to happen.

Luke was supposed to shame me, force me out, and make himself look victorious. He was not supposed to become obsessed with discovering whether another man had taken my place.

“Luke!” Daniella cried, rushing toward him and grabbing his tuxedo sleeve. “Stop this. She’s obviously making things up just to provoke you. You know she isn’t stable. Please, don’t let her words affect you. Everyone is watching us.”

“Stay out of this, Daniella!” Luke snapped.

He jerked his arm away so forcefully that she stumbled backward.

For the first time that evening, he didn’t even bother checking whether his pregnant wife was all right.

His attention remained entirely fixed on me.

“Give me his name,” he demanded as he moved closer. His face was only inches from mine, and I could feel the heat radiating from his body. “Who was the man who touched what belonged to me?”

I stared into his furious eyes and discovered something surprising.

I was not afraid.

Instead, his expression brought back memories I had spent years trying to bury.

There had once been a time when I would have done anything to erase the anger from those eyes. I had loved Luke with a devotion so complete that it bordered on foolishness.

During the first year of our marriage, there were nights when he would pull me onto his lap in the privacy of his study. He would hold me close, bury his face against my neck, and breathe in my scent as though being near me was the only thing that could calm him.

“You are the one bright thing in my dark life, Baela,” he had murmured while gently holding my face. “You are the Queen of the Syndicate, and no one will ever dare lay a hand on you. I would destroy everything before I allowed anyone to hurt you. You belong with me, and you always will.”

I had believed him.

I had adored him so completely that I convinced myself I was different from everyone else. I thought my love had somehow softened the ruthless mafia boss feared by the entire underworld.

I was wrong.

Every beautiful promise had been nothing more than a carefully constructed lie meant to keep the woman who had been traded to him obedient.

The memory of those promises gradually gave way to another memory, one I could never forget.

Three years earlier, I had walked out of that hospital for the last time.

I had been physically exhausted, emotionally destroyed, and completely empty. I had just signed the divorce documents, leaving behind the mansion, the wealth, the life I had once believed was mine, and the memory of the child Luke had barely cared enough to save.

Outside, a freezing storm was raging.

Rain poured over me as I walked aimlessly away from the hospital. I had nothing left to hold on to. At that moment, I genuinely believed that if I simply lay down on the freezing pavement, I could let the cold take away everything I was feeling.

Then a black Maybach stopped beside me.

The vehicle was sleek, heavily armored, and imposing even beneath the pounding rain. Its rear door opened, and a tall man stepped outside while holding a large black umbrella.

He was not an ordinary businessman.

He was a legend in the criminal underworld.

A rival Don whose reputation was even more terrifying than Luke’s. A man whose influence stretched through the shadows and whose name alone was enough to make members of the Syndicate cautious.

He looked down at me.

There was no pity in his expression.

Instead, his eyes were calculating, as though he immediately understood exactly what had happened to me and what I had lost.

“You have nothing left,” he said, his deep voice cutting through the storm. Then he extended a gloved hand toward me. “Come with me. I can give you a new identity, a secure home, and enough power to make everyone who destroyed you regret it. In return, you will become part of my family, and your loyalty will belong to me completely.”

I looked down at my bruised hands before raising my eyes toward the man who had always been Luke’s greatest threat.

Then I took his hand.

That single gesture changed everything.

I was not simply accepting his help.

I was walking away from the Syndicate.

I was choosing to sever Luke’s hold over my life and place my trust in his most dangerous rival instead.

I gave that man my loyalty, my future, and eventually my heart.

That was the “cheating” Luke was demanding an explanation for.

And it was the best decision I had ever made.

The memory disappeared as the brilliant chandelier lights of the banquet hall came back into focus.

Luke was still standing in front of me, breathing heavily.

His anger had only intensified.

He shook my arm again, his fingers digging painfully into my skin.

“Tell me who he is, Baela!” he shouted. “Give me his name, and I swear I will find him. I will make him pay for taking what belongs to me!”

Then he lifted his free hand and snapped his fingers.

Almost immediately, four heavily armed Syndicate guards emerged from different parts of the ballroom.

The guests fell silent.

“You are not walking out of here,” Luke said, his voice turning dangerously cold. “Not until you tell me who you chose over me.”

I looked at his hand still wrapped around my arm.

“You don’t have any claim over me anymore, Luke,” I said calmly. My voice carried clearly through the tense silence. “And if you refuse to let me go, my husband will make you regret touching me.”

Luke gave a low, humorless laugh.

“Your husband?” he mocked. “You honestly believe some ordinary man can protect you from me? I am the Don of the Syndicate. I can destroy him whenever I want.”

His grip tightened.

“I’ll kill him right in front of you,” he continued coldly, “and then I’ll take you back to the place where you belong.”