The Betrayed Princess's New Reign

Elena Vitiello POV:

Three months later, the first freezing rain of winter lashed against the windows of the Chicago estate.

I stood in front of the full-length mirror in my bedroom. I looked at my reflection. Thick, silver keloid scars crawled across my left shoulder and down my collarbone, replacing the flawless skin I had been born with. I felt no pity. I pulled a high-necked black cashmere sweater over my head, hiding the damage.

In the center of my bedroom sat a large metal fire basin. It was filled to the brim with ten years of diaries, letters, and photographs.

I struck a match. I dropped it into the basin. The flames caught instantly. I watched the fire eat through a picture of Luca and me from three years ago, turning his smiling face into black ash.

The bedroom door creaked open. My mother walked in. Her face was pale, her expression tight with suppressed anxiety. She held a black velvet box in her hands.

She set the box on my vanity. Inside sat a first-class ticket to JFK Airport and a brand-new untraceable cell phone.

She turned to me. She raised her arms, her eyes welling with tears, wanting to pull me into a hug.

I stepped back. My shoulder muscles locked tight. Her silent suffering, her years of bending to my father's will, suffocated me. I would not let her weakness touch me today.

I turned my back on her. I grabbed the handle of my single black suitcase. The wheels made a dull, heavy thud against the hardwood floor as I walked out of the room.

I did not look back at the burning fire basin.

I walked down the grand staircase. The main hall was a flurry of activity. Two workers covered in freezing mud were struggling to roll up a massive, heavy Persian rug near the entrance.

One of the workers looked up. The dirt on his face could not hide the deep purple bruises and the hollowed-out cheeks. It was Luca. Beside him, shivering violently, was Matteo.

For three months, my father had stripped them of every human dignity. They were forced to do the lowest, most humiliating labor on the estate, put on display for every passing soldier to mock.

Luca saw me on the stairs. The dead, empty look in his eyes suddenly vanished. A sickening, desperate joy exploded across his face.

He dropped his end of the heavy rug. The estate butler yelled at him, but Luca ignored it. He sprinted toward the bottom of the staircase.

Foul-smelling mud dripped from his torn clothes onto the pristine marble floor. He looked entirely out of place, like a rat crawling into a palace.

He looked up at me. His voice trembled with a pathetic, self-deceiving softness. Are you going to college? Are you moving to the dorms?

Matteo limped over, rubbing his frostbitten, cracked hands together. He flashed a sickeningly sweet smile. We can help you carry that to the car, Elena.

I stopped on the third step. I looked down at them. I did not see the boys who had sworn to protect me. I saw two beggars.

I tightened my grip on the handle of my suitcase. My expression remained completely blank. I offered them nothing. No anger. No hatred. Just pure, suffocating indifference.

Luca took my silence as permission. His eyes lit up. He reached out his filthy, mud-caked hand toward the handle of my suitcase.

Just as his fingertips brushed the plastic, a sharp, annoying ringtone erupted from his pocket.

Luca froze. He pulled out a phone with a completely shattered screen. The name Sofia flashed through the cracks.

He answered it. Sofia's hysterical, crying voice poured out of the speaker. She screamed that she had been clipped by a delivery truck at an intersection in the slums.

All the color drained from Luca's bruised face. The desperate joy in his eyes was instantly swallowed by blind panic.

He looked up at me. His mouth opened and closed. He looked like he wanted to apologize, but no sound came out.

Matteo grabbed his arm, panicking. She might be bleeding, Luca. We have to go.

Luca ripped his hand away from my suitcase. Just like he had done a thousand times over the last ten years, he chose her. He turned around and sprinted toward the estate gates, running back out into the freezing rain.

I watched their pathetic, muddy figures disappear into the storm. A slow, icy smirk curled the corner of my lips.

I carried my suitcase down the final three steps. I walked out the front doors and approached the black armored SUV waiting in the driveway.

I opened the door and slid into the leather seat. I looked at the driver in the rearview mirror.

"To the private airport. Don't look back."