A Doctor's Fall, A Mafia Queen's Rise

Elara POV:

A team of stylists descended on the penthouse like vultures. They painted my face, coiled my hair, and poured me into a gown of emerald silk. I was no longer a person. I was a prop, cast in my role as the Underboss's wife. A sacrificial offering for the Moretti Family's most important night.

"Magnificent," Emilio breathed when he saw me, his eyes sweeping over me with an owner's pride. He took my arm, his touch making my skin crawl, and led me into the grand ballroom. We were the image of a perfect power couple-a polished lie for the consumption of the Five Families.

He stopped me under the grand chandelier. "A little something," he said, fastening a diamond watch around my wrist. It was gaudy, ostentatious, a style I despised. It was a declaration: to the man beside me, I was just another one of his possessions.

We were making our way toward his Don when it happened. A small body collided with my legs. I looked down to see the boy from my clinic. Leo.

He stumbled back and immediately burst into tears, his small face contorting in a practiced show of fear. He pointed a tiny, trembling finger at me.

"You're the bad lady!" he screamed, his voice high and piercing. "You're the bad lady trying to take my daddy away!"

The ballroom fell silent. The music, the chatter, the clinking of glasses-it all stopped. A hundred pairs of eyes turned to me. Whispers erupted, sweeping through the room like wildfire. They didn't see the wife of Emilio Moretti. They saw the "other woman," the homewrecker.

Hayden materialized at the boy's side, her face a mask of feigned concern. "Oh, Leo, baby, no," she cooed, scooping him up.

My eyes were locked on Leo's wrist. Dangling from it was a small, braided leather bracelet with a single silver charm.

The roar of the ballroom faded to a dull hum, my entire world narrowing to that single, damning piece of evidence.

It was the custom bracelet I had given Emilio for our first anniversary. A symbol of our bond. A piece of his soul he swore he'd never take off. Now it was on the wrist of his bastard son.

My hand reached out, an involuntary tremor running through it. I had to see. I had to be sure.

"Don't you touch him!" Emilio's voice was a roar, a raw, protective sound I had never heard him use for me.

He shoved me-not a nudge, but a violent, brutal push meant to drive me away from his son. I stumbled backward, my balance gone. My heel caught on the thick rug.

The back of my head cracked against the corner of a glass table. Stars exploded behind my eyes.

But that wasn't the worst pain.

A sharp, tearing agony ripped through my abdomen. I looked down.

A dark bloom of red was spreading across the emerald silk of my gown.

The world faded to black. The last thing I saw was Emilio, my husband, turning his back on me, rushing away with Hayden and their son as I lay abandoned in a growing pool of my own blood.