My Kidney For His Mistress: Never Again

I woke up from surgery with a jagged scar on my side and a missing kidney.

My fiancé, Dante Moretti, the Capo of the Chicago Outfit, hadn't saved me from an illness. He had harvested me like spare parts to save his mistress, Sofia.

"She pays the tithe," he had told the surgeon coldly while I was paralyzed by anesthesia.

For ten years, I was his loyal shadow. I managed his legitimate empire, took bullets for him, and even aborted our child three years ago because Sofia threw a tantrum about bloodlines.

I thought my absolute loyalty would eventually earn his love.

But when the Cartel held us both over the edge of a bridge days later, Dante didn't choose me.

He tackled Sofia to safety and watched as I fell backward into the freezing black river.

He thought I drowned. Or worse, he assumed I was a dog that would eventually swim back to its master, no matter how hard he kicked it.

He was wrong.

I dragged myself out of that water, but the woman who loved him died in the depths.

Seven days later, I didn't return to the Moretti penthouse.

I walked straight into the headquarters of his mortal enemy, Enzo Falcone.

"Do you still want to marry me?" I asked the man who wanted Dante’s head on a spike.

Enzo didn't hesitate. "I will burn the city down before I let him touch you again."

Now, Dante is crawling at my gates, paralyzed and ruined, holding a medical box containing my stolen kidney.

But he forgot one thing: I don't want it back.

Chapter 1

The glass of warm milk sat on the nightstand, innocent and white, a perfect visual echo of the lies Dante Moretti had fed me for ten years.

I drank it simply because he handed it to me.

I drank it because when the Capo of the Chicago Outfit tells you to do something, you do not ask questions.

I drank it because I was foolish enough to believe he actually cared about my insomnia.

The darkness that took me wasn't sleep. It was a chemical sledgehammer that swung down without mercy.

I floated in a black, viscous void, unable to move my limbs.

But sound has a nasty habit of slicing through anesthesia long before the rest of the senses wake up. The rhythmic beep of a heart monitor kept time with the dull thudding in my skull.

"You cannot do this, Dante," a voice hissed.

Matteo. The Consigliere. The only man in this godforsaken city who still possessed a scrap of a soul.

"She is not a spare parts inventory. She is the daughter of your late Underboss. She is Elena."

"She is part of the Family," Dante's voice was a low rumble, the sound of a heavy door sealing a tomb. It was the voice that made grown men wet themselves in fear. "She pays the tithe, Matteo. We all do."

"This isn't a tithe! You are harvesting her kidney because Sofia destroyed hers with cocaine and bad decisions!"

"Lower your voice."

The metallic snick of a lighter flicking open. The smell of sulfur and expensive tobacco filled the sterile room.

"Sofia dies without a match. Elena is the match. It's simple math."

I tried to scream. I tried to force my eyelids open. Nothing happened. I was a statue trapped inside my own flesh, forced to listen to the man I had loved since I was sixteen discuss carving me open like livestock.

"You made her abort your child three years ago because Sofia threw a tantrum about bloodlines," Matteo said, his voice trembling with suppressed rage. "You broke her then. This will kill her spirit."

"She didn't want the child either," Dante lied. Smoothly. Effortlessly.

"And she won't mind this. I'll marry her in the spring. That will be compensation enough. She's loyal. She's a dog that always finds its way home, no matter how hard you kick it."

A dog.

That's what ten years of shadowing him, taking bullets for him, and managing his legitimate empire had amounted to.

I wasn't a partner. I was a golden retriever with a compatible blood type.

"Scalpel," a third voice said. The surgeon.

I felt the pressure then. Not pain, not yet. Just a cold, sliding pressure across my lower back.

They were cutting into me. They were stealing a piece of me to give to the woman who had tormented me for a decade.

My silent scream echoed only in the hollow cavity of my chest.

When I finally woke up for real, the room was dim.

The pain in my flank was a living thing, a sharp-toothed animal gnawing at my side that refused to let go.

Dante was sitting in the armchair, reading a file. He looked impeccable in his charcoal suit, not a hair out of place. The devil usually dresses well.

He saw me stir and snapped the file shut.

"Easy, tesoro. You had an acute appendicitis attack. We had to operate immediately."

The lie was so lazy it was an insult to my intelligence.

I looked at him. I really looked at him.

The sharp jawline I used to trace with my fingertips. The ice-blue eyes that used to make my knees weak. Now, all I saw was a butcher in a bespoke suit.

"My appendix," I croaked. My throat felt like I'd swallowed broken glass.

"It was close to rupturing," he said, standing up and smoothing his jacket. He checked his watch, a dismissive gesture. "I have to go. Business with the Commission."

He didn't touch me. He didn't brush a kiss against my forehead. He didn't even glance at the fresh dressing taped to my side.

"Rest, Elena. I'll have the nurse bring you morphine."

He walked out the door without looking back.

A minute later, two nurses walked past my open door, their whispers carrying into the room like smoke.

"Is that the Don?"

"Yeah. He's heading to the VIP suite on the top floor. I heard he's personally spoon-feeding broth to that Bianchi woman. She just got a transplant."

Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes, hot and humiliating. I didn't wipe them away. I let them fall, counting each one as a payment on a debt I no longer owed.

I reached for my phone on the bedside table. My hand shook, but my resolve hardened into something colder, sharper than the diamond he had promised but never delivered.

I dialed a number I had memorized from a business card five years ago. A number belonging to the man who wanted Dante Moretti's head on a spike.

It rang twice.

"Speak," a deep, dangerous voice answered.

"Enzo," I whispered.

"Do you still want to marry me?"

Silence stretched on the line, heavy and thick.

"Elena?" His voice changed. The lethal edge softened, just a fraction. "Where are you?"

"I'm in the clinic," I said, staring up at the sterile white ceiling.

"I am done belonging to the Morettis. I saw the photo on your desk, Enzo. The one of me. If you want the real thing, come and get her."