Was I supposed to be angry? Sad? Betrayed? I didn’t know anymore. All I knew was that Marco—the man I thought I knew, the man I had trusted with everything—was gone.
I stumbled toward the living room, my feet dragging like lead. He wasn’t going to walk through the door. He wasn’t going to apologize or explain. There was no confrontation. No argument. No last moment. Just a letter.
The sound of the doorbell shattered the stillness in the house, its shrill tone pulling me out of the fog I had been slipping into. I stood frozen, staring at the empty space in front of me where Marco’s letter still lay on the coffee table, the cruel words echoing in my mind. He’s leaving for another woman without a trace!
I hadn’t even read the entire thing. I couldn’t bear it. What was there to understand? How could he just walk away like that? The man who had vowed to love me forever, who had promised me the world, had abandoned me for another woman.
And I had no idea where to even begin picking up the pieces of my broken heart.
I couldn’t bring myself to answer the door, not now, not with the pain clawing at me from every direction. But the bell rang again, louder this time, forcing my feet to move, as if some external force was pulling me forward.
I opened the door slowly, expecting perhaps another note, or a business associate, or even one of Marco’s lackeys. But it wasn’t. Standing there was Vito—Marco’s right-hand man, always stoic, always quiet. Today, though, his expression was... different. A hardness in his eyes. A weight in his stance that made my heart drop.
“Vito,” I said, my voice cracked and uneven. “What are you doing here?”
He hesitated for just a moment, his gaze flicking past me to the inside of the house, then back to my face. “I need to talk to you, Celia. We need to have a real conversation. I’m sorry, but… it’s time you knew the truth.”
The air in the room thickened with tension the moment Vito stepped inside, closing the door with a soft but final click. His expression was unyielding, his presence oppressive.
“What’s going on?” I asked, barely managing to steady my voice. “Where’s Marco? Why would he leave me like this, with just a letter?”
Vito’s gaze softened, but the truth in his words was sharp and cutting. “He’s gone, Celia. He’s not coming back. Marco’s leaving you for her—for Victoria. She’s pregnant, and he’s chosen her.”