That was why he had given me everything, day after day. His resources, his protection, the full invisible weight of his empire restructured around my survival.
It kept me hidden and untouchable, and it remade my life until the barrier between our worlds slowly dissolved.
Even so, it had taken us years of failed attempts and quiet grief to conceive this child.
"Everything I've said is true. If anything happens to this child, no one here will survive the Don's wrath. He will reduce the Five Families to ash and ruin!"
Under the Don's protection, my body had long surpassed anything a civilian should have endured.
But now, broken and bleeding, I could feel my life draining away with terrifying speed.
I poured every last scrap of strength into those words, praying Seraphina would spare my child.
She only gave a cold, thin smile.
"The harder you beg for this bastard's life, the more I want to kill him."
She raised my son high and hurled him at the ground.
"No!"
The scream ripped from my throat. It changed nothing.
All I could do was watch as my son slammed into the stone.
"He's still alive?"
Seraphina stared at the infant still squirming on the ground, murmuring to herself.