The Don's Melted Snow

For fifteen years, I bled for my husband, a ruthless Mafia Don, helping him build his syndicate from the ground up.

But on our anniversary, I found a cheap strawberry lip balm in his armored car. That was when I discovered he was having an affair with a civilian secretary, and she was pregnant with his heir.

Instead of staying with me, he lied to my face and abandoned me at home to rush to her side.

"He sees you as an unbreachable fortress, and her as someone who needs his protection."

His right-hand man had been covering it up for months. I learned my husband had bought the mistress the flawless blood diamond he once promised me when we were starving in safe houses. He was even taking her to the Swiss Alps-our dream wedding destination.

I had stitched his bullet wounds in unlit basements and frozen in the winter cold to deliver his bribes. I gave him my youth and my absolute loyalty, only to be tossed aside for a fragile girl who just wanted a crown.

I didn't cry, and I didn't beg him to stay.

I left my cheap copper wire wedding ring on his pillow, drafted a severance demand to take half of his laundered assets, and booked my own first-class ticket to Europe.

This time, I was going to see the snow for myself.

Chapter 1

Elena POV

Next to the man who had three families executed before his thirtieth birthday-my husband-I retrieve a tube of strawberry lip balm from the seam of an armored seat.

When he blames his right-hand man for it without a moment's hesitation, I know the union I helped him build is finished.

The heavy doors of the vehicle lock with a solid, final thud.

Cassio sits beside me, the leather of the seat groaning under his weight. The air in the vehicle thins, as if his presence has displaced a third of it. He is a man who carries the scent of expensive cologne, of gunpowder, and a faint, coppery trace of the blood he commands.

I roll the small, pink plastic cylinder between my fingers.

No soldier in the Syndicate would carry such a thing.

"Whose is this?" I ask, my voice pitched with a deliberate lightness.

Cassio turns his head. His eyes drop to the tube in my hand. For a fraction of a second, the lethal composure that defines him falters. A muscle jumps in his jaw. His broad shoulders stiffen under the threads of his bespoke suit. He clears his throat.

"Lorenzo. It must be his."

Lorenzo is his Consigliere. His sworn brother. A man who kills without ceremony.

I do not reply, simply watching him.

With a pantomime of annoyance, Cassio pulls his phone from his pocket. "I'll call him now. We can't have my wife getting the wrong idea over a piece of rubbish." He connects the call through the vehicle's Bluetooth speakers. The phone rings twice. Lorenzo answers.

"Lorenzo," Cassio barks, his tone clipped. "Stop leaving your things in my car. Elena found a lip balm in the back."

A beat of silence. Then a clear, unforced laugh echoes from the speakers.

"Ah, boss, I've been looking for that," Lorenzo lies smoothly. "A gift for my new girl. A civilian. Keep it for me, will you?"

Cassio ends the call.

He looks at me with a smooth, reassuring smile. His hand closes over mine, plucking the lip balm from my palm. "I'll give it back to him tomorrow," he says.

I look at his handsome face-the same face I stitched up in unlit basements when we had nothing but a mattress stained with old blood on the floor.

"A gift for another should be handled with care," I tell him, my voice low.

Cassio misses the sheer gravity of my words. "You used to like that flavor," he says, his thumb brushing my knuckles. "I can buy you a case of them."

I shake my head calmly. "There's no need."

A cold, dense weight forms in my chest.

I know the lip balm is not mine. My lipsticks are custom-blended, and I would never purchase a cheap brand from a corner drugstore. The fact settles deep in my bones: another woman has been in this car-his private, heavily guarded sanctuary.

The rest of the drive back to our penthouse is an exercise in restraint. I stare out the tinted window at the streaking city lights, my mind a quiet ledger, calculating every detail. I wonder who she is. I wonder how long my husband has been compromising his security. And I wonder why Lorenzo, a man bound by the oath of Omertà, lied for him with such ease.

Sensing the quiet, Cassio reaches out and places his large, warm hand over my knee. "We'll make Lorenzo buy us dinner for the trouble," he suggests softly. "After our anniversary."

I nod, saying nothing at all.

That night, the penthouse settles into a deceptive quiet. I wait in the darkness of our bedroom, my back straight against the headboard. When the rhythm of Cassio's breathing finally deepens into sleep, I slip out from under the silk sheets. I do not hesitate. I do not tremble. I simply walk to the door, my bare feet silent on the cold marble, and step into the private elevator.

I am going to find Lorenzo.