---- Chapter 7 Vincent's POV The moment I saw the charred, twisted metal where Isabella's car had burned, a part of me died with her. I locked myself in her old studio, a ghost in her abandoned sanctuary. Her scent-lilies and turpentine-still clung to the air. On the easel sat her last unfinished sketch. My profile. She had drawn my face a hundred times. And Thad never once truly seen her. I found her diary and read it, page by page. Each entry was a fresh twist of the knife in my gut. "Vincent came home late again, but I made him his favorite pasta. He said it was delicious. His smile made my whole day." ---- "Day twenty after the surgery, still no feeling. Vincent told me not to worry, that the doctors would fix it. I believe him." "T saw Sophia's new exhibition today. Her style... it looks so much like mine. Vincent said I was overthinking it. He's probably right." She trusted me. God, she loved me with a purity I had never deserved. And [had repaid her with betrayal. I pulled up the security footage from her final day, watching it on a loop. The sight of her smearing her own blood on the bed, her hand trembling as she signed the divorce papers... it was a portrait of a soul in absolute despair. The look in her eyes as she glanced at the camera one last time wasn't filled with a death wish; it was a death sentence she had signed for herself, because of me. "Why..." I screamed at the monitor, my voice raw. " ---- Why didn't you give mea chance to fix it?" But Isabella was gone forever. I started digging into Sophia, using every resource, every dark connection the Torrino family possessed. Three days later, the truth unraveled. My lieutenant, Carlo, knocked on the study door, a thick file in his hands. "Boss. The investigation you ordered." I took the file, my fingers shaking. The first page alone was enough to make me want to burn the world down. "Sophia Martinez: Record of Secret Communications with the Castellano Family" "June 15, 2019: Sophia deliberately leaks Isabella's location to a Castellano hitman..." "June 16, 2019: Isabella is shot in the hand during the ambush. Sophia subsequently takes credit for saving Vincent..."