He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom

"The child is mine."

My husband, the Capo of the Chicago Outfit, announced to the world, his hand resting protectively on his mistress's stomach.

He was lying to save her life, but in doing so, he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside me.

Just hours before, I had finally gotten the positive test we had prayed for over five years.

But Dante chose to claim a traitor's bastard as his heir.

When I tried to confront him, he dismissed me cold-heartedly.

"It's a strategic lie, Elena. You aren't pregnant, so it doesn't matter."

He didn't know.

Later, when an accident left his mistress critical, he dragged me to the hospital.

He forced me to donate my blood to save her, ignoring my ghostly pallor.

He didn't know I was already bleeding out.

He didn't know I had just come from the clinic, where I had removed the "complication" he made me feel ashamed of.

He thought he was being noble.

He didn't realize he was killing his own son to save another man's lie.

On the night of the gala celebrating his "heir," I left a white box on his desk and vanished.

Inside was a medical report: *Termination of Pregnancy. 8 Weeks. Father: Dante Moretti.*

By the time he read it, I was already gone.

Chapter 1

The moment Dante Moretti claimed another woman's child as his heir to save her life, he didn't just break his vows to me; he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside my own body.

I stood in the shadows of the grand hall, rendered invisible by the brilliance of the spotlight.

My husband stood under the blinding glare of the press conference.

He looked every inch the Capo dei Capi of the Chicago Outfit.

His suit was tailored to fit the broad, lethal expanse of his shoulders.

His jaw was set in that granite line that usually made grown men crumble in fear.

But his hand wasn't resting on a gun today.

It was resting protectively on the small, rounded swell of Sofia Ricci's stomach.

Sofia looked up at him with tear-filled, doe-like eyes.

She played the part of the fragile, protected ward perfectly.

The reporters were shouting questions, their voices a frenzied cacophony, like vultures sensing a fresh carcass.

"Don Moretti, is it true? Is the child yours?"

Dante didn't flinch.

He leaned into the microphone, his voice a deep rumble that vibrated through the floorboards and settled deep in my marrow.

"The child is mine," he lied. "Sofia carries the Moretti heir. Anyone who touches her answers to me."

The room erupted in a storm of camera flashes.

I felt the blood drain from my face, pooling somewhere in my feet.

My hand drifted instinctively to my own flat stomach.

Two hours ago, the doctor had handed me a slip of paper.

Positive.

Five years.

We had bled and prayed for five years.

And now, amidst the chaos of the Russian Bratva ambush we had