Chapter 5

"Where were you?"

The nurse's voice was sharp, cutting through the sterile air. She was adjusting my IV drip, her glare fixed firmly on Dante.

"I was... handling the situation," Dante said, shifting his weight. He looked uncharacteristically uncomfortable. Here stood the great Don Moretti, being scolded by a middle-aged nurse in orthopedic shoes.

"Your wife was unconscious for two hours," the nurse snapped, checking the monitor with efficient, angry movements. "She woke up alone."

"I'm here now," Dante replied, his voice tight.

He reached for my hand. Instinctively, I pulled it away.

"Don't," I said.

"Elara," he warned, his tone dropping an octave into that familiar command. "Don't make a scene."

"Where is she?" I asked, ignoring his warning.

He stiffened, his jaw tightening. "Isabella is in the psychiatric wing. She's... in shock. The crash traumatized her."

"She has a scratch on her elbow," I stated flatly, staring at the ceiling. "I have broken ribs."

"It's not about physical injury," Dante argued, frustration leaking into his voice. "She's fragile, Elara. She wasn't raised in this life like you were. She doesn't handle violence well."

"So you checked her into a suite?"

"I needed to make sure she was safe."

His phone buzzed against the bedside table.

He looked at it. He sighed, the sound heavy with exhaustion.

"She's panicking again," he said, reading the message. "The doctors can't calm her down."

He looked at me then. He was torn; I could see the conflict warring behind his eyes. But the tear wasn't equal. It was a ninety-ten split.

And I wasn't the ninety.

"Go," I said.

"I'll come back," he promised, already stepping back. "I just need to settle her."

"Don't bother," I murmured.

He hesitated for a fraction of a second, then turned and walked out.

I waited exactly one minute.

I pushed the button to lower the bed rail. Taking a breath, I swung my legs over the side. The pain in my ribs was blinding, immediate-like a hot knife twisting deep in my torso. I gritted my teeth against a cry and forced myself to stand.

I grabbed the IV pole for support, my knuckles turning white.

I walked.

I shuffled down the corridor, moving like a shadow past the nurses' station. They were too swamped with a fresh trauma intake to notice one wandering patient.

I followed the sterile signs pointing to the Psychiatric Wing.

It was a nicer wing. Quieter. The air smelled less like antiseptic and more like lavender.

I found room 402. The blinds were partially open, slicing the room into strips of light and dark.

I stood there, leaning heavily on my IV pole, breathing through the agony radiating from my side.

Dante was sitting on the bed. Isabella was curled up in his lap, sobbing into his chest like a frightened child.

He was rocking her. He was stroking her hair. He was whispering things I couldn't hear, but I could read the movements of his lips.

*I've got you. I'm not leaving. You're safe.*

A doctor was standing by the door, speaking in low tones. I moved slightly, wincing, so I could catch the words.

"She has an acute stress reaction," the doctor was explaining to Dante. "She needs an emotional anchor. Someone she trusts implicitly."

"I'm staying," Dante said, his voice leaving no room for argument. "Prep the jet. As soon as she's cleared, I'm taking her to the vineyard in Tuscany. She needs quiet."

The vineyard. *Project True North.*

He was taking her to the house he had designed for *our* retirement.

He pulled out his phone and made a call, his demeanor shifting instantly from protector to predator.

"Find out where her ex-husband is," Dante ordered into the phone, his voice cold and lethal. "If he came anywhere near that restaurant, if he had anything to do with her stress... handle it."

He hung up and kissed the top of Isabella's head.

I watched them.

It wasn't that Dante was incapable of love. He loved fiercely. He loved with a protective, consuming violence that was terrifying to behold.

He just didn't love me.

I was the obligation. She was the obsession.

I caught my reflection in the glass of the window. Pale skin. Hospital gown. A bruised, swollen face.

I looked like a ghost.

And that's exactly what I was to him. A ghost haunting his real life.

I turned the IV pole around.

The pain in my ribs was still there, sharp and biting, but the pain in my chest-the heavy, suffocating weight I had carried for three years-was gone.

The hope was dead. And with the death of hope came the birth of indifference.

I shuffled back to my room, each step a little lighter.

I reached for the imaginary pen in my mind.

*Minus ten.*

Forty-five points left.

But honestly? I didn't think I needed to wait for zero anymore. The math was becoming irrelevant. The equation was solved.

Dante Moretti + Elara Rossi = Nothing.