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Eighteen Years a Mother, One Day a Fool ,Then I Ruled Them All
NovelShort
Hoàn thành
Ten years ago, my husband Nico Ferraro convinced me to get a hysterectomy so we could live a child-free life together. I gave up my ability to have children for him, and I never looked back. Not until...
Chương (8)
第1章
Ten years ago, my husband Nico Ferraro convinced me to get a hysterectomy so we could live a child-free life together. I gave up my ability to have children for him, and I never looked back.
Not until the day he came home with a pair of adopted twins and asked me to raise them as my own.
I agreed. And from that moment on, I devoted myself to those kids like they were my flesh and blood. I changed every diaper, packed every lunch, stayed up all night through every fever. Eighteen years later, they got accepted into Princeton and Yale. I was so proud I could've burst.
At their college send-off at the Family estate, Nico handed me a document, a territorial deed transfer. He wanted me to sign everything over to the twins.
I agreed without hesitation. Just as I reached for the pen, my mom pulled me aside, worry etched all over her face. "Seraphina, you don't even know where those kids came from. Are you really going to sign everything over to them? Keep something for yourself, at least."
"Don't worry, Mom. Everything's going to be okay," I said softly.
But she broke down, dropping to her knees and begging me not to be so naive. When my father saw her crying and realized I still planned to go through with it, he stormed in, slapped me across the face and shouted that I was a disgrace to the Family.
Still, I signed.
Nico's face lit up with satisfaction. Then, without a shred of shame, he turned and wrapped his arm around another woman's waist. She stepped forward, eyes smug, and tossed a set of severance papers in my face.
"Thank you for taking care of Nico and the kids all these years," she said. "But now it's time for you to step aside. It's time for our family to be whole again."
I looked at her, my expression calm, my voice steady.
"Fine."
……
Eighteen years ago, Nico Ferraro looked me straight in the eye, his gaze steady and certain, and promised me we would live a child-free life forever. No kids. No complications. Just the two of us, building a future exactly the way we wanted it. I believed him completely, with a kind of blind faith that only comes from loving someone too deeply. I trusted him so much that I made a decision most people would never even consider. I went under the knife. I let the doctors take out my uterus so there would be no chance, no temptation, no accidents down the road. No children. No regrets. I told myself it was a sacrifice worth making, because it was for him, for us, for the life we had promised each other.
For years, I never questioned it. I never doubted him.
Then one day, everything changed without warning.
He came home, pushing open the front door of the Valente compound like it was any ordinary evening, except it wasn't. In his arms were two babies, a pair of brown-skinned, giggling twins, a boy and a girl, wrapped in bright, mismatched blankets that looked like they'd been hastily chosen. Their tiny hands reached out, their eyes wide and curious, and when they looked at me, they smiled as if I was the center of their world, as if I was already someone they could trust. They couldn't have been more than a few months old, fragile and warm and impossibly alive.
"I adopted them," Nico said casually, like he was announcing he'd picked up a case of wine. "From a children's shelter. They need a mother, Seraphina. Will you take care of them?"
I didn't hesitate. Not even for a second.
From that moment on, I became their mother in every way that truly mattered. I was there through every sleepless night, pacing the floor of the estate while they cried with fevers that wouldn't break. I held them when they were sick, stayed up until dawn checking their breathing, terrified of losing them. I rushed them to the family doctor for broken bones, soothed their fears after nightmares, and kissed away every tear as if my love alone could protect them from the world.
I packed their lunches every single day without fail, making sure their favorite snacks were always tucked inside. I sat through parent-teacher conferences, celebrated every good grade like it was a personal victory, and treated every scraped knee like a milestone worth honoring. I watched them take their first steps, heard their first words, and stood in the crowd for every school play and sports game, cheering louder than anyone else.
I kissed their foreheads goodnight more times than I could ever count.
And I loved them. Fiercely. Completely. Without reservation.
Years passed before I even realized how deeply they had become my entire world.
Now they were grown. No longer the tiny, fragile babies Nico had brought home, but young adults standing on the edge of their futures. One had been accepted into Princeton. The other was heading to Yale. Ivy League schools. Prestigious. Competitive. The kind of achievements that would open every door the legitimate world had to offer, the kind that would give the Valente name weight in places where guns and territory meant nothing.
I was so proud I felt like my chest might burst. Every late night, every sacrifice, every moment I had given them, it all felt worth it.
At their college send-off, the grand hall of the Valente estate was filled with the quiet clink of crystal glasses, the murmur of capos and their wives offering congratulations, the scent of gardenias and old money that clung to every surface of the room my grandfather had built. Nico approached me with a document in his hand. His expression was calm, almost rehearsed.
"Seraphina," he said, his voice smooth, "it's time to transfer everything to the kids. Let's make sure they have a solid start."
I didn't question him. I didn't even glance at the document. My trust in him, built over nearly two decades, was so absolute that I simply reached for the pen, ready to sign without a second thought.
But just as the pen hovered over the paper, my mom suddenly grabbed my arm.
Her grip was tight, almost desperate. When I turned to look at her, her eyes were filled with panic, her lips trembling as if she was struggling to find the right words. Her fingers found the crucifix at her neck and closed around it.
"Seraphina," she whispered urgently, her voice shaking, "do you even know where these kids came from? You're giving them everything. Everything. Can't you keep something, anything, for yourself?"
第2章
I gave her a small, reassuring smile, trying to calm her fears.
"It's okay, Mamma," I said softly. "I trust my judgment. Nothing will happen."
The moment the words left my mouth, her composure shattered.
She started crying, the kind of raw, uncontrollable sobs that draw attention from across the room. Then, to my shock, she dropped to her knees right there in front of me, her hands clutching at my clothes as if she could physically stop me. Elisabetta Valente, wife of a Don, a woman who had survived decades of this life without ever bending in public, was on her knees. The soldiers along the walls looked away. Even the capos at the far tables went quiet.
"Please, Seraphina," she begged. "Don't do this. I'm begging you."
Her fingers closed white-knuckled around the crucifix at her neck.
Before I could respond, my father stormed over, his face dark with anger and confusion. Salvatore Valente, former head of the Commission of the Five Families. A man whose name once made other Dons choose their words with surgical care. The moment he saw my mother kneeling and the document in my hand, something inside him snapped.
He didn't hesitate.
His hand came down hard across my face, the sharp sound cutting through the gathering like a gunshot. My head snapped to the side, and for a moment, everything went silent. Not a glass moved. Not a chair shifted. The entire room held its breath because no one had ever seen Don Salvatore strike his own blood heir.
"You're a disgrace to the Valente name!" he roared, his voice filled with fury and disappointment.
Even then, even with the sting on my cheek and the weight of my parents' desperation pressing down on me, I didn't stop.
I signed.
The moment my signature was complete, Nico's grin spread across his face, wide and unmistakably satisfied. And then, right there, in front of everyone, he turned away from me and walked across the room.
He wrapped his arm around another woman.
She was young, polished, and confident, with sharp, calculating eyes and a smile that carried a quiet arrogance, as if she already knew she had won long before this moment. Two fingers rested lightly against the hollow of her throat. Without hesitation, she stepped forward and tossed a set of severance papers at me like it was nothing more than a party favor.
"Thanks for taking care of Nico and the kids all these years," she said lightly, her tone dripping with mock politeness. "But it's time for you to go. It's time for our family to be whole again."
I looked at her, my expression calm, almost eerily so.
"Okay," I said.
But inside, everything shattered.
This woman, Giada Sorrentino, wasn't a stranger. She worked as a bookkeeper in one of the Family's front businesses. Smart, ambitious, always composed, always knowing exactly how to position herself to win. She had a reputation for being sharp, capable, and just a little too good at playing the game. She had access to the ledgers, the accounts, the supply chains. Everything that ran through the Valente organization's legitimate side passed through her hands at some point.
A total bitch in disguise.
And now I understood just how far her game had gone. She hadn't just been playing for a better position in the organization. She had been building a life behind my back, piece by piece, right under my nose.
My voice cut through the silence, sharp and trembling with disbelief.
"So, you've been screwing around with Giada this whole time?!"
Giada didn't flinch. Instead, she smiled as if I had just paid her a compliment.
"Oh, come on, Seraphina," she said, almost playfully. "Don't be mad. If you really loved Nico, you'd want what's best for him, wouldn't you? Even if that means stepping aside."
Nico let out an impatient scoff, clearly annoyed by the delay.
"Hurry up and sign the papers already," he said coldly. "Stop dragging this out."
I looked at him then, really looked at him, and suddenly, the man standing in front of me blurred, replaced by the boy he used to be.
The nobody from a dirt-poor fishing village in Southern Italy. The one who was too proud, too ashamed to ask anyone for help. I remembered how he used to sit alone in the back rooms of the social club my father let him sweep, eating stale bread because it was all he could afford. His hair had been dry and brittle, his face pale, his shoulders hunched under the weight of hunger and quiet humiliation. A kid with shirt cuffs too short, always tugging them down over his wrists.
I remembered the day he collapsed during a pickup game behind the compound.
Everyone else froze, unsure what to do.
I was the one who ran to him. I carried him to the Family doctor myself, refusing to leave his side. That was the moment I truly understood how bad things were for him. From then on, I made sure he never went hungry again. I paid for his meals, helped him get back on his feet, stood beside him when he had nothing. My father, Don Salvatore, took pity on him because I asked. Brought him in as a low-level associate. Gave him a name that meant something.
And somewhere along the way, we fell in love.
Or at least, I thought we did.
And Giada?
第3章
She had never been just a colleague or an outsider.
She was his past. His childhood sweetheart. The girl he had loved long before I ever entered his life. They had supposedly broken up years ago, their story finished and buried.
But I guess some stories never really end.
Around us, the crowd began to murmur, whispers spreading like wildfire through the ballroom of the Valente estate.
"God, poor Seraphina… She just gave everything to those kids, and now he does this to her?"
"Didn't they agree not to have children at all? And then he goes and adopts two behind her back? That's insane."
"And now that the kids are heading off to the Ivy League, he doesn't even bother pretending anymore."
The voices blurred together, but every word cut deep, each one confirming the truth I could no longer deny.
"I think those twins are Nico's biological kids, with that Sorrentino woman," someone muttered under their breath, just loud enough for the people nearby to hear.
"Is there even a doubt?" another voice chimed in immediately, sharper, more certain. "Why else would he be so eager to push Seraphina into transferring all the territory to them? This was planned from the start."
"Poor woman," a third person added, shaking their head. "She didn't just get fooled. She was completely played from beginning to end."
The whispers spread like wildfire, rippling through the gathering in overlapping waves of speculation, judgment, and disbelief. What had started as a formal sit-down filled with toasts, old vintages, and the carefully measured laughter of Family allies had twisted into something else entirely. A spectacle, ugly and raw. Conversations faltered, heads turned, and eyes began to settle on me, some filled with pity, others with curiosity, and a few with thinly veiled satisfaction. Even the soldiers standing post along the walls had gone still, their hands loose at their sides, watching the center of the room the way men watch a car wreck on the expressway.
And at the center of it all, I stood there, holding the remains of a life I had just signed away.
My mother clutched my arm tightly, her fingers trembling as if she were trying to anchor me in place. Her face was streaked with tears, her carefully composed elegance completely shattered. Her other hand had found the crucifix at her throat, and her knuckles were white around it.
"Seraphina, this is exactly what we warned you about," she cried, her voice breaking as emotion spilled over. "We told you he was calculating. We told you he wasn't what he pretended to be. He's always been after our territory, our name, always! That man never loved you, not for a second. And those kids…" Her voice faltered, her grip tightening on my arm. "You don't even know where they came from! But you wouldn't listen. You refused to listen to us."
Her words trembled with both anger and despair, years of suppressed worry finally breaking free.
My father had stormed off earlier in a fit of rage, unable to bear what he was witnessing. But now he returned, flanked by two of his oldest soldiers who kept a respectful distance, his expression dark as thunder, his entire body rigid with fury. The room felt the shift before anyone saw him. Conversations nearest the door died first, then silence spread outward like a pressure wave. Even diminished by age, even with his heart betraying him, Don Salvatore Valente still moved through a room the way a blade moves through water.
The moment his eyes landed on me, something inside him seemed to snap all over again.
"How could I have raised such a foolish daughter?" he roared, his voice shaking with anger and disbelief. "Why the hell would you give up everything for a man like him?"
He took a step closer, his gaze burning into me.
"You already gave up your position in the Family. You gave up your womb. You handed over the deeds to our territory like they meant nothing!" His voice cracked with a mixture of heartbreak and rage. "Seraphina, you're a disgrace to the Valente name!"
Around us, the murmurs grew louder, the weight of judgment pressing in from every direction. I could feel their stares, their silent verdicts, their curiosity feeding on the collapse of my marriage like it was entertainment. Capos who had kissed my father's ring were watching his bloodline unravel in real time, and not one of them moved to intervene. That was the code. Family business stayed Family business, even when it bled onto the floor in front of a hundred witnesses.
Slowly, I lowered my gaze to the severance papers in my hands.
No one noticed the faint curve at the corner of my lips.
It was subtle. Almost imperceptible. Not sorrowful. Not broken.
Almost amused.
"Seraphina," Nico said, his voice dripping with a faux gentleness that now made my skin crawl. He tugged his left cuff down over his wrist as he spoke, a gesture so practiced it had become invisible to everyone but me. "You can't blame me for this. I'm just a man."
He spread his hands slightly, as if explaining something obvious.
"You had your uterus removed. You can't have children anymore. What choice did I have?"
A dry laugh escaped me, hollow and devoid of warmth.
"You're the one who asked me to do it," I said, my voice calm but cutting. "So we could live a child-free life together. You told me we'd never regret it. You swore that if I gave up my ability to have children, you would stay with me forever."
第4章
For a brief second, silence lingered between us.
Then Nico shrugged, dismissive, as if none of that had ever mattered.
"Well, that was then," he said casually. "Things change."
His gaze hardened, his tone turning blunt and unapologetic.
"I want a family now. I want children. And since you can't give them to me, I'll find someone who can."
"Exactly." Giada stepped forward at just the right moment, as if she had been waiting for her cue all along. She carried herself with polished confidence, her smile perfectly measured, like she was performing for an audience. Her fingers drifted briefly to the hollow of her throat before she let her hand fall.
"What's the point of keeping a woman who can't give you an heir?" she said lightly, her voice laced with cruel logic. "And what good is all that territory, all those tribute lines, if there's no blood to pass it down to?"
Her words were sharp, deliberate, designed to cut.
Around the room, heads began to nod. Some of the older capos exchanged knowing glances, others whispered in agreement, their expressions reflecting a quiet acceptance of her heartless reasoning. In this world, a dynasty without heirs was a dynasty already dead.
Unable to endure it any longer, my mother stepped forward, her grief transforming into fury. Her hand released the crucifix at her neck, and her eyes blazed. Her trembling finger shot out as she pointed directly at Nico.
"You," she spat, her voice filled with venom. "Have you forgotten where you came from?"
Her words sliced through the noise, forcing the room into silence. Even the soldiers standing along the walls went still.
"You crawled out of some dead-end fishing village in the south with nothing but lint in your pockets. You couldn't even afford a proper suit. You were hiding in a back room of a social club, surviving on handouts and table scraps like that was a proper life."
Her voice rose with each word, years of suppressed resentment spilling out.
"If Seraphina's father hadn't stepped in and covered your mother's medical debts, she wouldn't have made it through the month. Don't you dare forget that!"
The room was completely still now, every eye fixed on her.
"We didn't ask you for a single cent in tribute when you married our daughter," she continued, her voice trembling with both anger and heartbreak. "Instead, we gave you a house. We gave you a car. We welcomed you into our Family like you were one of our own blood."
Her lips quivered as she forced herself to continue.
"When Seraphina found out you liked slow-cooked ribs, she didn't just order them from the restaurant. She hired a chef, learned the recipe from scratch, and spent weeks perfecting it. Just to make you smile."
Tears streamed down her face, but her voice did not falter.
"And when your brother lost his crew and his wife walked out on him? Seraphina begged her father to help. Don Salvatore gave your brother a position. Caporegime of his own territory. Full protection. A seat at the table. We lifted your entire bloodline up."
Her voice broke on the last words.
"We treated you like family… and this… this is how you repay us?"
A heavy silence fell over the hall. Somewhere in the back, a glass was set down with exaggerated care, as though even the clink of crystal would be an obscenity.
Nico let out a short, humorless laugh, his expression turning impatient. He tugged the cuff of his left sleeve down over his wrist.
"Why are you bringing up the past?" he said dismissively. "That has nothing to do with what's happening now."
Then he turned his attention back to me, his gaze sharp.
"Well, Seraphina?" he said. "Are you just going to stand there and stare at the agreement?"
A slow, mocking smirk spread across his face.
"Not like it'll make any difference if you don't sign," he added. "The territory's already been transferred to the kids. There's barely a few hundred left in our joint accounts."
He tilted his head slightly, his tone dripping with sarcasm.
"Tell you what. You can keep that. Consider it a thank-you for all the sacrifices you made for me and the kids. Should be enough for your retirement."
A wave of shocked gasps rippled through the crowd.
"If it weren't for Seraphina," someone whispered, unable to hold back, "his mother wouldn't even be alive."
"He'd still be a nobody," another voice added. "No territory, no standing, nothing. He wouldn't be sitting at the head of any table without the Valentes."
"They dragged him out of poverty, and he turned around and cleaned them out. Played his cards perfectly. Poor Don Salvatore…"
"And look at him now," someone else muttered bitterly. "Grinning like he just hit the jackpot."
第5章
Nico's smug smile stretched wider and wider, his satisfaction almost grotesque.
Then—
Smack!
The sharp crack echoed through the banquet hall like a gunshot, cutting through every whisper and every breath. Every soldier along the walls went rigid. Hands drifted toward waistbands on instinct.
"You bastard!"
My father had lunged forward, his hand striking Nico across the face with such force that his head snapped violently to the side. The sound alone was enough to make several people flinch.
He stood there, chest heaving, eyes blazing with uncontrollable fury. Don Salvatore Valente, the man who had once held the Commission in his grip, who had built the Valente name into something that made other Families lower their voices when they said it. The image of everything I had sacrificed, for this man, for this marriage, for this alliance, seemed to ignite something primal inside him. And now, seeing it all reduced to this humiliation, this betrayal, was more than he could bear.
"She gave up her womb for you!" my father roared. "She gave you status, gave you the Valente name, gave you territory you never could have held on your own, and this is how you repay her?!"
Nico's face flushed red, not from the pain of the slap, but from the humiliation of being struck in front of every capo, associate, and guest in the room. His pride shattered, his composure cracked. I saw his left hand move, the cuff tugged down over his wrist in that old, reflexive way he'd never been able to shed.
He waved his arm sharply, his voice rising in anger.
"Security!" he shouted. "Get this old man out of here!"
At once, several enforcers moved forward like trained hounds responding to a command. They surrounded my father in an instant, their eyes cold, their stances aggressive, fists clenched as they prepared to drag him away by force.
The same men who had been all smiles earlier, helping my father carry boxes, setting up decorations in the estate's grand hall, laughing and chatting as if they were still loyal to the Valente house, turned on him in an instant, their expressions hardening as if a switch had been flipped. These were men my father had once commanded with a single look. Now they answered to the name on the deed, not the blood in the room.
"You lay a finger on me and you'll regret it," my father warned, his voice sharp and unyielding, the authority he once carried still echoing in his tone. Even weakened, even stripped of operational control, Don Salvatore Valente's voice could still make the air heavier.
One of the guards scoffed, clearly unimpressed. "Why wouldn't we? Who do you think you are?" he sneered, taking a step closer, his posture deliberately provocative.
For a brief moment, they hesitated. Something in my father's eyes, that unbroken fire, that pride that refused to bend even now, made them pause. The old Don's gaze still carried the ghost of the man who had once decided whether men like them lived or disappeared. But that moment didn't last.
Giada, thriving in the chaos like it was her personal stage, strode forward with a gleam of excitement in her eyes. Her fingers brushed the hollow of her throat as she moved, that old habit, and then without a second thought, she raised her hand and slapped my father hard across the face.
The sound rang out, crisp and brutal.
He froze. Completely.
This was a man who had once stood at the top. Former head of the Commission of the Five Families. A man who had sat across from senators, judges, governors, men whose careers he had built or ended with a phone call. A man who commanded respect wherever he went. And now, in front of a room full of people, he had been struck by the very woman who had stolen everything from him, a Sorrentino nobody who had crawled into his household through his son-in-law's bed.
For a split second, it looked like he was about to explode, years of dignity and restraint collapsing into pure rage. But I moved faster. I grabbed his arm, pulling him back with all my strength before the situation spiraled completely out of control.
"This is too much," someone whispered, their voice trembling. "They even hit Don Valente?"
"How could they disrespect him like that?" another voice rose, louder this time. "Don Valente is a great man. He's built churches, funded scholarships, kept families fed when times were hard. How dare they treat him like this?"
"Seraphina threw her entire life away for that man," someone else added bitterly. "Doesn't she understand? A woman can't undo that kind of sacrifice. Men can become fathers at seventy, but a woman… once it's gone, it's gone."
"If my daughter had done something like this," another muttered darkly, "I would've knocked some sense into her a long time ago."
"This couple, Nico and Giada, they're disgusting," someone said, unable to hide their contempt. "And now they're sitting on the Valente fortune? Running Valente territory? What a joke."
The room filled with anger, with pointing fingers, with voices rising and overlapping. Some cursed Nico openly. Some pitied me. Others simply watched, drawn in by the spectacle like it was something they couldn't look away from.
But Nico?
He stood there, completely unfazed. Not a flicker of guilt. Not a hint of shame. He adjusted his cuff one last time and let his hand fall still.
"Are we done yet?" he asked casually, as if the entire scene was nothing more than an inconvenience.
第6章
The room fell silent.
Nico turned his gaze back to me, impatience written all over his face. "So, Seraphina? Are you signing or not? Hurry up. We don't have all day to wait for you."
"Fine," I hissed, the word slipping through clenched teeth. "I'll sign it."
When I finally looked down at the agreement, I couldn't help it. A small chuckle escaped me.
It was almost laughable.
The terms were so simple, so brutally clean. A few thousand dollars. Just enough to survive for a short while. No territory. No claims. No rights. Nothing. A complete erasure of everything I had built, everything I had given. Every favor called in, every alliance brokered, every year spent holding together a dynasty that should have crumbled the day my father let this man through the gates of the Valente compound.
A clean exit.
I picked up the pen and signed my name in a few quick, emotionless strokes, as if I were signing off on something utterly insignificant. The scratch of the nib against parchment was the only sound in the room. Every capo, every associate, every wife and cousin pressed against the walls of that dining hall held their breath as if watching a woman sign her own death warrant.
Nico snatched the papers from my hand immediately, his eyes scanning the page. Then he let out a mocking laugh, loud and unrestrained.
"Good. Great," he said, clearly pleased. "Seraphina, you're our biggest benefactor! Thank you, for handing over the entire Valente empire just like that. My family and I will be living off your generosity for generations."
Giada, glowing with triumph, lifted her wine glass and drained it in one smooth motion. "Honestly, Seraphina," she said with a bright, theatrical smile, "you're like my fairy godmother. I should probably toast to you every year from now on." Her fingers drifted to the hollow of her throat as she said it, two fingertips pressing against the skin there, light as a whisper.
I smiled back.
Good.
Let's see how long that smile lasts.
Then everything changed.
My father, who had been standing there, forced to watch them revel in their victory, forced to watch a family legacy forged over five generations of blood and silence slip into the hands of a man who had once begged to carry his luggage, suddenly coughed.
Violently.
Once. Twice.
And then he collapsed.
Blood spilled from his mouth, staining the marble floor in a horrifying instant. The old Don of the Valente Family, the man who had once commanded the Commission of the Five Families with a closed-eyed pause and a single word, crumpled like something hollow had finally given way inside him.
"Papa!" I screamed, my voice breaking as I rushed toward him.
"Salvatore!" my mother cried out, dropping to her knees beside him, her hands shaking as she tried to hold him up. Her fingers found the crucifix at her neck and closed around it so hard the chain bit into her skin.
The room erupted into chaos. Relatives surged forward from every direction. Someone lifted his head. Someone else tried to pour water into his mouth. Another pressed desperately at his pressure points, calling out instructions that no one could fully follow. Two of the old guard soldiers who had served my father for thirty years pushed through the crowd without asking permission, their faces grey.
Panic spread like wildfire, swallowing everything.
I looked at him. His face pale, his lips trembling, his breathing shallow and uneven. His heart had always been weak. Fragile. He had nearly suffered a stroke when I chose to undergo the hysterectomy for Nico, when the family doctor had told him his daughter would never produce a blood heir and the Valente line would end with her.
This… this might be the moment that finally broke him.
And Nico?
He just stood there, watching.
No urgency. No concern.
As if none of this had anything to do with him. He tugged the cuff of his left sleeve down over his wrist, a gesture so small and so automatic that only someone who had watched him for eighteen years would catch it. I caught it. I always caught it.
Then his gaze shifted, catching sight of someone pushing through the crowd. A tall man in a sharply tailored navy suit, moving quickly toward us. The soldiers near the door hadn't stopped him. No one had stopped him. He moved through that room the way only a man with his own army at his back could move through another family's territory: without permission and without apology.
"Lorenzo Marchetti?" Nico narrowed his eyes, clearly annoyed. "What the hell are you doing here? Don't tell me you're interested in Seraphina now. She's not exactly in demand anymore."
Lorenzo and Nico had come from the same place. The same dirt-poor fishing village on the southern coast, the same nothing beginnings. Back then, Nico had always looked down on him, mocking him, calling him a nobody, a peasant who would never amount to anything.
Lorenzo simply offered a calm, polite smile. Cool. Controlled.
He didn't even bother looking at Nico.
Eventually, my father regained consciousness, letting out a weak groan. With careful hands, people helped him to his feet and guided him away, escorting him to a quiet room deeper in the estate where he could rest. Two of his oldest soldiers flanked him without being asked, one of them murmuring into a phone, calling the family doctor.
"Where are the twins?" someone suddenly asked, breaking the tension.
"I think they went to get their admission letters," another replied uncertainly.
At that exact moment, the grand doors at the front of the hall swung open.
Two teenagers walked in.
Tessa and Adrian.
They had grown over the years, filled out a little, their features more defined now, but their smiles were still the same. Bright. Familiar. Once full of warmth.
But the moment their eyes landed on me, everything changed.
Their expressions hardened.
They turned away.
Without hesitation, they ran straight toward Nico.
"Dad!" Tessa beamed, throwing her arms around him. "Aunt Giada! We did it! We both got in!"
Nico's face lit up with pride. "I knew you would," he said warmly. "I'm so proud of you both."
第7章
After embracing them, he guided them gently to sit, his voice dropping to something soft and deliberate. "Kids… from now on, don't call Giada 'Aunt' anymore."
He paused just long enough to make the moment land.
"Call her 'Mom.'"
The twins' eyes lit up instantly, like they had just been given the best news in the world. They turned to Giada, their faces glowing with excitement, and shouted in perfect unison:
"Mom!"
"Mom!"
My heart dropped.
"Mom…" I repeated under my breath, the word barely leaving my lips.
Hearing the children I had raised, the children I had loved, protected, devoted my entire life to, call another woman "Mom"…
It felt like being crushed. Completely.
I was the one who packed their lunches every morning. I was the one who stayed up through endless nights when they were sick. I was the one who held their hands through heartbreak, who sat through every school event, who kissed every scraped knee and soothed every tear.
And now.
Giada smiled radiantly, reaching out to smooth their hair, cupping their cheeks with a tenderness that felt like theft. "My kids," she said sweetly. "Now I don't have to sneak around like some criminal just to see you anymore."
My mother couldn't take it anymore.
Her voice broke as she shouted, raw and desperate. "Tessa! Adrian! Your mother is right here!"
She pointed straight at me, her eyes blazing with disbelief and pain. The crucifix pendant at her neck was white-knuckled in her other fist, the chain biting into her skin.
"She gave up eighteen years of her life to raise you!" she cried. "And now you're calling the woman who destroyed our Family 'Mom'? Have you lost all sense of right and wrong?!"
"Adrian," my mother said, her voice trembling so badly it sounded like it might shatter, "you were a sickly baby. Do you remember that? Of course you don't. You were always burning up with fevers, always crying through the night. There was one night, one night your temperature spiked to 104. It was pouring rain, a storm so bad no one dared step outside. And your mom," her voice cracked as she pointed at me, "she didn't hesitate. She wrapped you up, ran out into that storm, and carried you through the rain just to get you to the Family doctor. She didn't even think about herself."
Her words hung in the air before she turned, eyes red and swollen, toward Tessa.
"And you," she continued, her tone breaking between anger and heartbreak, "when you started at that prep school, you got mixed up with the wrong crowd. Those kids weren't your friends. They were dangerous. Sons and daughters of people who would have loved nothing more than to hurt a Valente. That night, they drugged your drink. You didn't even know what was happening to you." Her voice rose, trembling with the memory. "If your mom hadn't burst in at just the right moment, with help, God knows what they would've done to you."
She paused, her breath uneven, her hands shaking.
"She fought them off," my mother said hoarsely. "She protected you. She took ten knife wounds for you. Ten. Do you understand that? If it weren't for her, your life would've been ruined that night."
The room was completely silent now. Every single person listening. The bodyguards along the walls had gone still, eyes fixed straight ahead, trained not to react but unable not to hear. Somewhere in the back of the room, a glass had been set down and not picked up again.
"And when you became a young woman," she added softly, almost pleading now, "who was the one who sat with you? Who explained everything, who stayed by your side so you wouldn't be scared or confused? Who made sure you felt safe?"
No one spoke.
The silence stretched, heavy and suffocating.
Because deep down, they all knew the answer.
I had taken care of them. I had been there for everything. Every moment that mattered.
A long moment passed before Tessa let out a scoff, flipping her hair over her right shoulder with open disdain.
"Do you think I care?" she said coldly, her voice dripping with indifference. "Whatever she did doesn't count. She's not my real mom."
Adrian let out a harsh, mocking laugh, his expression twisted with contempt. His left hand curled on the tablecloth, and his knuckles cracked one at a time, pinky to thumb, slow and deliberate.
"Exactly," he sneered. "Just look at her. You really think this broke, pathetic woman deserved to be our mother? Not in a million years. She's nothing in this Family."
His words cut through the room like a blade.
Then, without warning, he slammed a folder down onto the table in front of everyone.
The sharp sound echoed through the silent room like a gunshot.
A blood verification test.
第8章
Just like that, the final piece of truth was laid bare for all to see. The twins weren't just adopted children. They were Giada's children. Hers and Nico's all along.
Illegitimate. Hidden. Carefully concealed until now.
A wave of gasps swept through the crowd, even though the rumors had already been circulating in whispers.
"I knew it," someone muttered under their breath.
"Please, it was obvious," another added. "They said they didn't want kids, and then suddenly came back with twins? Who were they trying to fool?"
"God… poor Seraphina," someone said quietly, their voice filled with pity. "She raised someone else's children for eighteen years. Gave them everything. Love, time, even a piece of the Valente territory. And in the end, they turn around and call the woman who destroyed her marriage 'Mom.'"
The murmurs grew louder again, filled with sympathy, disbelief, and a hint of cruel fascination. In the far corner of the room, two of Don Salvatore's old soldiers stood with their arms folded, watching the scene with the rigid stillness of men who had been ordered not to intervene. Their jaws were tight.
All eyes turned toward me.
Some mocking. Some pitying. Some simply curious.
To them, I was the punchline of a cruel joke. The heiress of the most feared name on the Eastern Seaboard, humiliated at her own table.
They expected me to break. To scream. To cry. To lose control in front of everyone.
But I didn't.
Instead, I reached calmly into my bag and pulled out a folder of my own. Without a word, I tossed it onto the table, the motion deliberate and steady. The sound of it hitting the polished wood carried through the silent room like a gunshot.
"Since you've made your stance clear," I said evenly, my voice calm to the point of being unsettling, "let's settle this once and for all."
A ripple of shock moved through the room.
"Let's cut our ties here."
Gasps rang out immediately. No one had expected that. Not at a sit-down in the Valente estate. Not from the woman whose name was carved into the foundation of this house.
"You're just going to give them up?" someone whispered, stunned. "After everything you've done for them?"
Tessa let out a laugh, bright and unapologetic. "That's exactly what I wanted," she said without hesitation. She flipped her hair over her right shoulder, already reaching for the documents.
Neither of them showed even the slightest bit of doubt.
They picked up the documents and signed their names quickly, without a second thought, as if eighteen years meant nothing at all. As if everything I had given them could be erased with a few strokes of a pen.
Then they walked over to Nico and Giada, their movements light, almost celebratory.
The four of them stood together, smiling at one another like they had just won the lottery. Like this was the ending they had always wanted. Finally, they didn't have to pretend anymore. No more sneaking around. No more lies. They could play happy family out in the open, right here, under the Valente roof, surrounded by men who had once kissed my father's ring.
"Great," I said, smiling as well.
I had given them a chance. Even at the very end, I had hoped, just a little, that they might show a trace of humanity. A sliver of gratitude. Something.
But human nature is blinding. Like staring straight into the sun. Look too long, and you lose your sight completely.
Around us, people whispered in confusion, unable to understand how things had come to this. No one could quite grasp how someone like me, a Valente by blood, a woman who had built an empire worth billions through the Family's legitimate operations and the darker channels beneath them, could end up raising another woman's children like some tragic fool.
"Seraphina," Nico said coldly, his tone stripped of all pretense now. He tugged the cuff of his left sleeve down over his wrist. "This party has nothing to do with you anymore."
He glanced around as if already claiming everything in sight. The estate. The soldiers. The name.
"You can leave," he added. "And while you're at it, tell your parents to pack up too. The mansion is in my kids' names now."
I tilted my head slightly, a slow, knowing smile spreading across my face.
My thumb traced along the inside of my ring finger, where a wedding band once sat.
"Not so fast," I said lightly.
"This is still my children's graduation party," I continued, my voice steady, almost playful. "The celebration hasn't even started yet."
I paused, letting the words sink in. Somewhere behind Nico, one of his men shifted his weight. The room had gone very quiet.
"Why would I leave now?"
Then I turned my gaze toward the entrance, my expression calm but unreadable.
"Kids," I called out clearly, my voice carrying across the silent hall. "Come on in."
Every head in the room turned toward the doors.
The air seemed to freeze.
And then two students in crisp school uniforms stepped inside.