A Million Dollars Too Late Chapter 07

A Million Dollars Too Late Chapter 07

Marcello’s POV

After Valeria went to prison, I paid off every guard, every connection. Every day, she endured exactly what

Audrey had suffered.

I crushed the Corvino family until they were completely bankrupt. With their fortune gone and nothing left to live for, Valeria’s parents jumped from the roof of their company headquarters. Her father first. Then her

mother.

When the news reached Valeria in her cell, her mind snapped completely.

Now she sits there clutching a pillow, screaming and sobbing. Sometimes she calls for Marcello. Sometimes

she calls for a child that never existed.

I never visited her. No version of her suffering can bring Audrey back.

The war I waged to destroy the Corvino family damaged the Ravello family’s interests too. The family

commission united to remove me.

Enzo asked if I wanted him to deal with my opponents. I didn’t care anymore. I told him to handle it however

he saw fit.

All I wanted was to make things right.

I moved into the old apartment where the Lane family had lived after they went bankrupt-the place where Audrey had spent her most hopeless days.

The walls sweat moisture. There’s no heat in the winter.

For the first time, I understood how terrified that nineteen-year-old girl must have been.

I placed the urn in the center of the dining table and spoke to it every day.

“Audrey, it’s snowing today. You always loved the snow.”

I never learned to cook. The first time I tried, the knife sliced my finger open. Blood dripped into the cutting

board, and I felt nothing.

I spent hours trying to cook her favorite meal. Burnt it twice. When it was finally edible, I set the plate beside

her photo.

“This was your favorite. I wish I’d made it for you when you were still here. You were so thin at the end. So

thin.”

My own voice echoed back at me in that empty room. No one answered.

At night, I was scared to shut my eyes. Every time I did, I saw Audrey coughing blood in her cell. I saw our unborn child curled against her chest, the two of them staring at me through iron bars. No matter how hard I

ran, I could never reach them.

Three days later, the medical examiner’s office called again.

They told me her remains couldn’t be held any longer. I stayed silent for a long time, then finally signed the

cremation paperwork.

Enzo brought the urn to the Lake Forest estate. The prenatal report was tucked underneath it.

Ten weeks. The baby hadn’t even fully formed his body before he vanished with Audrey.

I folded the report carefully and placed it beneath the urn.

From that moment on, that cold little box was the only way I could pretend mother and child were still beside

I had damaged the Ravello family to destroy the Corvinos. The commission stripped me of my Don title and took back the ports, the casinos, and the other family holdings.

I didn’t fight it. But the Lake Forest estate, the three hotels, the investment accounts, and the offshore funds were all my personal assets. No one could touch them.

I used to think those things represented power. Later, they became the only things I had left in this world to

give away.

Chronic insomnia wrecked my body fast. My doctor told me I was severely malnourished, and that my

stomach lining was bleeding. I refused treatment.

Every bit of this pain was nothing compared to what Audrey endured in that cell. But as I lay on the floor,

there was only one thought in my head.

Audrey. Did it hurt this much for you? Did it hurt more?