5
Meanwhile, in the hospital room, Dante had just glanced at the incoming message when Peaches snatched the phone from his hand. “Brother, my
stomach really hurts. Can you make me some ginger tea?”
Dante frowned, annoyed. “I think that
hat was from Anya. Let me see it first.”
Peaches pouted, handing the phone back with a martyred sigh. “Brother, Anya knows you’re good to me, so she’s always been jealous. She says the most awful things about me behind my back. I know my marriage to Julian was a huge blow to her, but it was her own fault for dressing so provocatively and getting targeted. Now that she’s tainted, she wants me to be tainted too. If she’s texting you to say I cursed her, I’ll just take the
blame. As long as it makes her feel a little better. Just don’t fight with her because of me.”
Normally, her words wouldn’t have fazed him. But thinking of my unnervingly calm expression when he’d left me, a sudden unease gripped him. He was about to argue when he saw her turn away, tears welling in her eyes, the loose collar of her hospital gown intentionally revealing the cres-
cent birthmark on her right shoulder.
Dante’s expression immediately softened. “Okay, okay, brother won’t look. I’ll go make you some tea right now. You just lie down and rest.”
The moment Dante left, Peaches checked the phone. When she saw my last message, her face darkened, and she quickly deleted it. Just as she was about to exit, another message popped up. A ransom demand.
“Dante, I have your wife and child. Eight o’clock tonight. One billion dollars. One cent short, and you can come collect their bodies.”
Peaches had been with Dante for years; she recognized the number immediately. It belonged to his biggest rival, another syndicate boss.
A cold smile touched her lips. She quickly typed a reply. “That worthless trash Anya isn’t even worth a penny. I got tired of her long ago. You can have your fun with her. When you’re done, just dump the body in the ocean for the fish. I don’t want her back.”
She preened, feeling a wave of satisfaction at the thought of me in the hands of his rival, surely not surviving the night. Once I was dead, no one would ever know the truth about who really saved Dante eight years ago. She could continue to be his savior, reaping all the benefits.
Humming a cheerful tune, she settled back into bed.
Dante, meanwhile, had intended to send a subordinate for the tea but ran into a nurse making her rounds. He grabbed her arm. “My sister is preg- nant and her stomach hurts. She wants ginger tea. Go make a cup for her, quickly.”
The nurse looked at him like he was an idiot. “Ginger tea promotes blood flow. It’s absolutely forbidden for pregnant women. You’re a grown man, so maybe you don’t know, but doesn’t your pregnant sister know? Is she even sure she’s pregnant? That’s basic common sense!”
Dante stood frozen, a seed of doubt taking root in his mind.
He turned and walked back to the room. Just as he was about to push the door open, he heard Peaches‘ triumphant laughter from within. “Marco, thank goodness you helped me pull it off back then. My brother is completely convinced I’m his savior. All these years, he’s been devoted to pavi- ng my way, helping me secure my position as Mrs. Sterling.”
Through the crack in the door, Dante saw Marco pinning Peaches to the bed, his hands roaming freely over her body. Not only was she not resisti- ng, she looked like she was enjoying it.
He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He stared, thunderstruck, his breath catching in his throat.
Marco’s laughter drifted through the door. “So how are you going to repay me? I risked my life lying for you. You know the Boss’s temper. If he ever finds out that Anya was the one who saved him, and that he’s been hurting his real savior all these years for you, he’ll never let me go.”
“And to get revenge for you,” Marco boasted, “after you left that day, I hammered two bone–breakers into Anya’s ankles.”
“Hahaha, so she’s going to be a cripple for the rest of her life?”
The two of them were laughing together when the door burst open with a deafening crash.
