The Mafia Heir’s Runaway Mistress Chapter 10

The Mafia Heir’s Runaway Mistress Chapter 10

Lorenzo’s POV

I thought with my connections, finding one person would be nothing.

But after going through everything, all I got was a vague address.

I spent days circling old residential buildings. Nothing.

Later I heard she had gone to teach in a rural program.

So I went to neighboring cities, visiting every volunteer teaching site I could find, asking at every

school one by one.

I used to think she couldn’t live without me.

Now I knew-if she wanted to disappear, I could turn Boston upside down and still never find her.

I kept going back and forth between New York and Boston, chasing scraps of leads.

Even Matty joked that I might as well just move there.

Another half year slipped by.

Tony finally traced her to a small primary school in a town where she was teaching.

It was winter. The cold wind stung my face.

At the school gate, she stood there in a thick pale yellow down jacket, her hair loosely tied up, light

makeup on her face.

She looked gentle, almost the same as before.

Except now there was a young man beside her.

Clean-cut, nice-looking, making her laugh until her eyes crinkled at the corners,

A gust of wind passed and she sneezed lightly.

The young man took her hand and warmed it in his palm.

That easy intimacy-there was no mistaking it.

Something in my chest was violently torn open.

Pain spread instantly, raw and merciless.

For a second, I almost walked over and pulled them apart.

Then I saw them.

On their joined hands-rings. Matching rings, glinting in the winter light.

I went still.

Tony asked quietly, “Mr. De Luca… should we go over?”

My throat closed up. I opened my mouth, but nothing came.

How ridiculous. Walk over and say what?

Demand to know who he was? Tell her how broken I’d been these past two years? How wrecked?

As if I could say any of it.

She seemed to sense something. Turned her head.

Our eyes met.

For a brief moment, there was surprise in her gaze. Nothing more.

No shock. No hesitation. Just calm recognition.

She gently tugged at the young man’s sleeve, said something in a low voice, and then walked over

alone.

“Mr. De Luca,” she said, looking at me calmly. “What brings you here?”

Mr. De Luca. She called me by my surname. So distant. So formal.

As if those five years between us meant nothing. Almost laughable.

“Are you here for work?” she asked, giving me a way out.

I forced a faint smile. “Something like that. Just passing through. Thought I’d stop by.”

I couldn’t tell her I had been searching for her for over a year.

I couldn’t tell her I had crossed cities just for this moment.

And I couldn’t admit that I had abandoned all pride and reason just to see her again.

I would never admit that.

She didn’t call me out on my flimsy excuse. Just nodded.

“The wind is strong here. If you have nothing else, you should head back early.”

She was telling me to leave.

The wind stung my eyes.

I swallowed the ache in my throat and said, my voice laced with that old arrogance.

“Since I’m already here, you won’t walk with me?”

She hesitated slightly.

“My husband is waiting for me.”

Husband. That word alone set fire to everything I’d been holding back.

“You’ve got a husband now? So you just forget your old lover like that?”

“Has he spent more nights with you than I have?”

The second the words left my mouth, I regretted them. Too cruel. Too ugly.

I saw her eyes redden slightly, stunned.

The anger in me died halfway and curdled into something heavier.

The wind howled between us.

I wanted a cigarette. I couldn’t have one.

My eyes burned. I took a long, shaky breath.

“When did you get married?”

“Six months ago.”

Six months ago. Right around the time I’d gone to Boston looking for her, only to be told she’d left -gone to teach in some nowhere town.

A late, sharp pain pierced through me.

If I had let go of my pride earlier, would I have stood here before a stranger calling himself her husband?

I dropped my gaze to her hand. That ring. Plain. Simple.

And yet it suited her more than anything I’d ever given her.

She seemed to read my mind.

“It’s just a simple ring,” she said softly.

I let out a hollow laugh and said nothing.

“If there’s nothing else, Mr. De Luca, I should get back.” She turned to go.

Then I asked, “These past two years… have you been well?”

She paused-just for a heartbeat. Then a genuine smile touched her lips.

“Very well.”

She didn’t ask how I was.

Just added, polite and distant, “I hope you are well too, Mr. De Luca.”

Snow fell heavily from the sky.

That conversation ended there.

She didn’t give me a chance to continue.

She simply turned and walked away, linking arms with the young man.

The sky was dull and heavy with snow.

The children had already left.

Only a little girl in a yellow floral sweater ran into a middle-aged man’s arms.

For a brief moment, I wen still.

If our child hadn’t been lost… would she have been like that?

Warm. Bright. With gentle eyes like Elena’s.

Maybe she would’ve tugged me into the snow.

Maybe she would’ve called me, sweet and clear, “Daddy.”

But life never worked that way.

I used to hate London-too gray, too cold.

And now I would spend the rest of my life paying for it.

The car left the town.

I sat in the backseat, eyes red, and threw the new ring I had bought at the auction out the window

with force.

I used to hate London-too gray, too cold.

Now I hated this place more.

It buried the love that had just begun to bloom. And the girl who had loved me most.

The unfinished yellow sweater. The ill-fitting diamond ring. The unborn child.

All of it-buried under this snow.

The car drove north.

I closed my eyes, listening to the wind outside.

Tears slid down, silent.

From that day forward, I never set foot in Boston again.