Chapter 4

"Arthur, I'm leaving the Vitale Family." When we were nine, Arthur Sinclair once swore he'd give me a home.

But that home was gone now, and it was time for me to say goodbye.

Arthur Sinclair wiped Giuliana Rossi's hand clean and kissed her fingertips lightly. His expression barely changed.

"Say that again," he said flatly.

I took a deep breath. "I said, you and Miss Giuliana are pledged now, and I'm nothing but an outsider. Just like the other ninety-eight daughters they drew for the union. I should leave."

"Arthur, this isn't a request. It's a notice."

"Notice?!" His tone shifted without him even realizing it, and his jaw worked, teeth grinding once before he caught himself. "Bianca Falcone," he sneered, "that broken old made-man of yours, rotting on his machines. Are you giving up on his treatment?"

His voice carried a threat beneath it that made me freeze. Memories from my past life made me tremble. He had once held me close, only to push me into a coffin with those same cold hands.

It was a pity. No matter how possessive Arthur Sinclair once was, he never imagined I'd soon be wed to another man's blood.

Before, when I wanted him to soften, I would threaten to leave the Vitale house. But now I didn't need his softness anymore. I really needed to go.

After a long silence, Arthur snorted.

"If you're so scared, then stay put. Giuliana needs a personal maid, especially on our wedding night. You can warm the bed for us."

Giuliana flushed, tapping his chest lightly with a small pink fist.

"Arthur, shame on you."

Arthur caught her delicate white hand, wrapped an arm around her waist, and pulled her into him.

"What are you shy about? Come, I'll take you out."

She kicked me with the point of her high heel as she passed, sending me crashing down into the shards of glass on the floor.

I picked up the tweezers from the tray and calmly drew the broken pieces from my leg. Then I dabbed on antiseptic as if it were nothing.

I went back to the room I'd lived in for twenty years inside these walls. I tried to pack the way some heroine from a novel might. But I quickly understood that none of it belonged to me.

Arthur used to have his picture taken with me. But at some point, the girl beside him in those photos was always ten years old. Giuliana had been across the water for ten years, and he had spent every one of them aching for her.

The dark room he'd made ready for the wedding was plastered wall to wall with photographs of Giuliana, taken in secret by a man he'd paid to follow her. All of it obsessive.

I stuffed my documents into my pocket and sat dazed at the edge of the bed.

My phone buzzed. A message from the caretaker at the safehouse infirmary.

"Miss Bianca, your father has come round a little. He's calling your name!"

I limped across the city to him. There, in that quiet room, I heard my father weakly call my name in a whisper barely louder than the hum of the machines.

That had never happened in my previous life.

Back then, the power was cut and the ventilator went silent. He was gone within a minute.

But now he spoke my name. For a man kept alive by wires and prayers, this was nothing short of a miracle. Maybe, just maybe, I would live to see him open his eyes.

The caretaker slipped out and left us alone, giving me a warm smile at the door. I sat beside the bed and held his hand tightly. His fingers twitched, reaching toward the withered sprig of lavender kept at his bedside.

"I'm leaving the Vitale Family. Those people... they'll have nothing to do with me anymore."

"I'm sorry. I couldn't keep the lavender you gave me."

"Papà, can you get up and tell me... where did you find those seeds?"

I bowed my head and let the tears fall freely.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk... I've been looking everywhere for you. And here you are, crying over a dying man."

Giuliana stood in the doorway, arms crossed, swaying her hips with a smirk. Her eyes narrowed as she sauntered in.

I wiped away my tears. "What are you doing here?"

Giuliana lifted her foot and kicked the frame of the bed. The monitors beeped in protest as the machines jolted.

She tilted her chin arrogantly. "I heard Mamma say you're planning to wed that Angel-Faced pervert from the Corvo Family?"

I didn't answer. I just watched her, wary.

"It's no business of mine if you want to marry a beggar," she sneered. Then her tearful gaze flicked sideways, a half-beat too fast, before she settled it back on me. "But I heard you know my secret?"