ManyWriters

In our six years of marriage, Dante Moretti, betrayed me three times.
The first time, at an underground casino, he slept with a girl and swore he had to be responsible for her.
The second time, to make that girl happy, he locked me in a warehouse for three days while I was seven months pregnant. Then, our baby’s heartbeat stopped.
The third time, that girl fell ill and needed a kidney transplant from me. He strapped my mother, who was on a ventilator, into his sports car and sped wildly along a cliffside highway.
I knelt, begging, "I'll donate it. Just let my mom go. I'll do anything you ask..."
Dante smiled, his hand tightening on the remote control.
The next second, the car smashed through the guardrail, and I could only watch, as my mother plunged toward the lake.
"Remember this. This is the consequence of making Isabella suffer for even one more day."
"From now on, as long as you learn to be obedient, everything can go back to the way it was."
But I knew that was impossible.
Dante, there could never be a future for us.

Love Drowns In the Lake

He had barely walked away when Isabella's call came in.


"Dante, why aren't you here yet? I'm waiting for you to cut my cake!"


Her voice was as coquettish and gentle as always, but now, as it fell upon Dante's ears, his mind flashed back to the despair and sorrow in my eyes as I knelt on the floor, begging him to save my mother!


A sharp pain shot through his heart again.


On the other end of the line, when Isabella didn't receive a reply, she asked feigning innocence:


"Is it Stella? Is she putting on another act for you so she doesn't have to apologize to me? I've told you before, she has a wicked heart and always bullies me!"


Isabella had often made such passive-aggressive comments in the past, but Dante had never seen anything wrong with them.


But in this moment, he suddenly wondered if he had been wrong all along.


That the one who truly loved to act, the one with a venomous heart, wasn't me. It was Isabella.


At this thought, Dante's face darkened as he spoke into the phone:


Chapter 8