Betrayed on My Birthday, Crowned By A True Don Chapter 02

Betrayed on My Birthday, Crowned By A True Don Chapter 02

Junk.

It took me a moment to understand what he meant.

I had brought our things with me tonight. Years of gifts exchanged, small objects that had

witnessed everything we’d been through together. I’d arranged them around the room, imagining

us sitting together later, going through each one, laughing and crying over the story of how two unknowns had built a dynasty.

To him, apparently, they were junk.

The bubble didn’t just burst. It collapsed inward and left nothing but rot.

Life was never a fairy tale. There was no perfect ending waiting for anyone.

I forced myself to breathe. My shoulders shook anyway, small involuntary tremors I couldn’t

control. The hollow feeling in my chest expanded until it had no edges.

Outside, fireworks erupted. Color and light blazing across the sky. The crowds twenty-two floors

below erupted with them, their cheering so loud it carried all the way up.

Dante blinked. The date registered on his face: not just our shared birthday, but New Year’s Eve. Every cab in the city was occupied, every hotel room taken.

I pulled my wrist free.

“If anyone’s leaving, it’s you. You drove here. You can drive yourselves out.”

Camilla raised her voice. “The entire hotel is booked under the Don’s name. Are you really too

stubborn to learn to drive, or are you just looking for another reason to leech off him?”

I was not too stubborn to learn to drive.

I was medically unable to drive.

Five

years ago, a rival family had come after me. They wanted me to dissolve our partnership with the Marino rail empire, a deal Dante had spent six months cultivating. I refused.

Even with precautions, six months later a vehicle I never saw coming hit me on a deserted street. My left tibia shattered. After it healed I could walk fine, but I couldn’t drive. The nerve damage

made certain reflexes unreliable, and in this world, unreliable was fatal.

Every second I remained in this room felt like swallowing broken glass.

I walked out without taking a single thing.

Dante watched me go. His mouth opened once, then closed.

In the lobby the Caruso family parted to let me through. Dante had just executed a clean sweep against a rival family; no one in his circle dare to challenge his authority. Not even over the quiet

scandal of watching his own fiancée walk out the door.

His consigliere, Lorenzo, looked like he had something to say. He swallowed it.

No ride-share accepted my request for thirty minutes.

I started walking. Three hours on foot. In the grand inventory of things that had happened to me tonight, this barely registered.

What I hadn’t anticipated was the alley.

Three men. Maybe four. They materialized out of the dark and grabbed me before I could react.

“Finally.” One of them grinned. “Took long enough to find you.”

I looked at their faces. None of them were familiar. “I think you have the wrong person.”

One of them held up a photograph and laughed. “No mistake. You’re Elena. Dante’s woman. He

owes a blood debt, and you’re the collateral.”

“How does ten thousand a night sound? I’m sure you meke it sell.”

Every drop of warmth drained from my body at once.

I remembered, distantly, that in the very beginning, before the family had money, Dante had

borrowed from people who didn’t deal in paperwork. Blood lenders.

What he had never told me was that he’d used me as collateral.

When they lunged I ran. Pure instinct drove me into the nearest public restroom, a grimy

fluorescent-lit place that smelled of disinfectant and cold concrete. I pressed myself into a stall,

crouched against the partition, and called Dante.

My voice came out steadier than I expected. “Dante, did you borrow from loan sharks and put me up as collateral? Those men just cornered me. I’m-”

“Paid off years ago,” he said flatly. “They’re really coming after you over that? Stay hidden. I’ll be there. Don’t move.”

For one second, I exhaled.

Then Camilla’s voice floated through the line, sweet and knowing. “She’s definitely regretting it. She wants to come back but doesn’t know how to ask. I know exactly how girls like her think.”

The urgency in Dante’s voice evaporated.

“Elena.” His tone had gone dry with contempt. “If you want to come back, just come back. There’s no need to stage a scene out of some romance novel. It’s embarrassing.”

“The debt was cleared ages ago. Why would they come after you? How do you manage to come up with excuses this pathetic?”

He hung up.

At the same moment, the footsteps stopped outside.

The bathroom door exploded inward.

“Found you, you little bitch. Thought you could run?”

I fought when they grabbed me. It wasn’t enough.

Then a gunshot. The man nearest to me dropped.

A voice, calm and low and absolute: “Don’t be afraid. I’ve got you.”